Bollywood’s top singers on friendship and music

By Siddhi Jain

New Delhi, Aug 4 With the weekend of friendship and sibling bond behind us, Indians have found comfort and joy in togetherness amid trying times. Capturing the spirit of friendship and music, a new upbeat anthem has witnessed participation from musical trio – Benny Dayal, Shalmali Kholgade, and Sneha Khanwalkar – who share interesting thoughts on the music-friendship connect.

The three real-life musical buddies jammed with each other to create a foot-thumping track ‘Indian Jam Karega’. Speaking about Friendship Day, Shalmali told IANSlife it was “definitely different because we are following social distancing norms. Of course, I miss my friends, going out with them, partying, sleep overs and all but I seriously miss singing with my friends. I really enjoy jamming with my friends and we used to do it so often.”

“Especially with Benny, we have sung so many songs together and with him, the recording studios are filled with our laughter, I think that’s what has kept our friendship alive – with music friends are always khush! And I think that’s the best part about this track! Made by friends, dedicated to friends!”

Sneha Khanwalkar shared how she was introduced to new music, thanks to her surroundings: “Being a music composer, I always looked for music in everything. Be it creating ‘Tung-Tung’ or lending music to ‘Gangs of Wasseypur’, I am always inspired by the raw tunes of the environment around me. My travels across India have inspired me to create most of the music that I have composed.”

“Puneet (Sharma, lyricist) and I started working together to create music for this unique brand project and it so happened that it started to inspire while I started to listen to the voices of our country on the App! The insight that stood out was how these singers on the App were singing and bonding over music. The lyrics Puneet wrote, were to be set in music that would defy the regional boundaries and give this community of singers a song that they could connect to.”

Sharing how the making of the anthem by Radio Mirchi and Smule, was a complete riot, Benny Dayal told IANSlife: “We took a lot of inspiration from our own incidents in life, how it all started, our love for music, how we used to just start humming a song at any place, different moods while singing, etc.”