Karan Johar’s Kuch Kuch Hota Hai is celebrating 26 years of entertaining audiences. From the story to the acting and the chemistry by Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol, plus the incredible music by Jatin-Lalit KKHH, a classic of Bollywood cinema, it is an enchanting film.
Talking with Subhash K Jha, composer Lalit Pandit dives into creating the score of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai and why he feels it was The Movie.
Where do you place Kuch Kuch Hota Hai in your repertoire?
It is one of the best scores of my brother and I. It is an absolute personal favourite of mine and I remember it all clearly as if it all happened just yesterday. Aaj bhi logon ko kuch kuch hota hai.
Did the freshness of the film inspire your fresh tunes?
KKHH was indeed a great film and had a completely different vibe from anything that happened earlier in the film industry. Karan Johar wrote a great script and directed brilliantly with his own personal style, which brought a change to Indian cinema. It had a great storyline and fantastic actors and was produced lavishly from all points of view. But Subhashji, you know what makes the film really memorable?
The music?
That’s right. All memorable films have to have a great musical score for it to be remembered and cherished. We can find many examples of this fact in the careers of superstars starting right from Dev Anand to Rajesh Khanna to Shah Rukh Khan. We remember these great actors even more because of the music they have had.
You and your brother Jatin were exceedingly busy at the time when you were offered Karan Johar’s debut film?
Jatin and I realised Karan Johar needed to be given special attention and time from us to deliver the score the film needed. Right from Karan’s narration it was clear this was The Film and it deserved great effort.
Walk me through the song recordings?
The first song that was recorded was ‘Koi mil gayak and Karan wanted that song first because it involved every character in the film as well as it would set the tone of the music the film required. I remember when I first sang out the tune to him, he sort of liked it but thought it was very long. It indeed was! But I explained that he has a lot of kids singing along, and each character will get lines to sing, etc. I was very happy to see that he had the confidence in us. I predicted, ‘Karan, the song will work great.’ When it got recorded Karan did tell me that he was very happy with the song and that all of them (assistants and actors) loved it. I was very happy too about it.”
The title song is hummed to this day?
It has a tempting, timeless lilt to it. I am so proud that our title song of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai is Karan Johar’s Dharma Production introductory music at the beginning of each film of theirs.
