Three films with Sagar Desai's score at MAMI film festival

Sagar Desai at his studio in Mumbai. Pic/Devyani

Sagar Desai at his studio in Mumbai. Pic/Devyani

A chance encounter brought Chicago-based Sagar Desai to India 12 years ago. And after having worked with well known names like Sivamani, Vishal-Shekhar, Pritam and the late Aadesh Shrivastava, the music composer admits that his career has received a boost after his film, A Death in the Gunj, opened to rave reviews at the Toronto International Film Festival earlier this year. The Konkona Sensharma-directed film opened at MAMI Film Festival recently, and is one among three screenings that Desai has lent the background score to.

"It's taken me a while to decode the rules of creating music that suits this audience. I was able to successfully apply my learning to this film," says Sagar, adding that being involved from the scripting stage helped him understand the mood better. "I wanted to give it a retro vibe without making the music sound like that of the '70s. It had to be serene, graceful. I used instruments like the harp, flute and guitar."

His second film, Pulkit's Maroon, will be screened in the India Story section. Sagar admits that the "visually rich, complex and trippy film" got him excited. "A fair deal of experimentation went into it, because it demanded a heavy background score. The music had to be dark and overpowering, much at odds with the music that A Death in the Gunj required. It was complicated as the protagonist's state of mind is complex; you don't know if he's lying or worried," he says, adding that the third film, Nicholas Kharkongor's Mantra, was challenging.

"It took a while to find the right notes. Eventually, I had to sit the team down and play tunes on the spot for approvals." Desai admits that Konkona's movie helped him bag commercial or what he calls 'naach-gaana' films. "I have a Ronnie Screwvala project titled, The Wedding Photographer and a Kalki Koechlin and Sumit Vyas-starrer called Ribbon. There's Gitanjali Rao's Bombay Rose too," he signs off.