Mumbai: Singer Hriday Gattani, who considers A R Rahman his idol, says the music maestro once suggested that he should write fun stuff rather than “intense” lyrics.

“I started my song-writing when I was in Chennai. I was in college, learning vocal technique, it was a vocal course.

We got to spend time at studio and watch programmers and singers like A R Rahman sir and it helped me with technical ideas and composing ideas rather than just song-writing,” Hriday told PTI. “Watching Rahman sir I learnt a lot. I used to write something and show it to him, read out the lyrics to him and he used to give feedback. He told me why are you writing intense lyrics, write something fun. He has been helpful in igniting certain fire in my mind.” Hriday is excited about his new single ‘Uljha’ which released on November 25 in collaboration with Vishal Dadlani. The song is composed, written and sung by Hriday. “I have been doing writing for four years and this was done as experiment….I have been playing this material for two years in festival circuit with my band,” Hriday said. “It came across to Vishal sir at festival; he was anyways planning to launch the label to support independent music. It was something that just happened,” he said. These days it’s Bollywood celebrities that are part of singles and it grabs instant attention. “It’s a huge gamble (to do songs without stars) because there is no independent sector. There are independent album coming up but with Bollywood stars. I am trying to bring back that Indie culture. I will be performing this material live. It’s a gamble,” Hriday said. — PTI