What Surprising Story Did Jonita Gandhi Reveal About Her Song Credit in ‘Highway’?

Synopsis
Key Takeaways
- Jonita Gandhi experienced unexpected credit for a song she did not record.
- A. R. Rahman’s creative process can transform rehearsal tapes into new tracks.
- The unpredictability of music collaboration can lead to unique outcomes.
Mumbai, June 15 (NationPress) — Collaborating with the Oscar and Grammy-winning composer A. R. Rahman can lead to unexpected outcomes for a singer. Playback singer Jonita Gandhi has confirmed this with her unique experience. During a rehearsal for a song by Rahman, her unpolished humming evolved into a standalone track.
In a conversation with IANS, Jonita shared her “very different kind of experience” while working alongside Rahman.
She explained, “I’ve worked on some tracks where a scratch singer had already recorded them, allowing me to sing them in my style. This was the most straightforward process for me. Conversely, when I participated in the creation of a song, the process felt random. I recall singing ‘Kahan Hoon Main’ for ‘Highway’, and upon the album's release, I discovered that another song credited to me had been included, which I had not recorded.”
Perplexed, she reached out to Rahman’s team to clarify whether there had been an error in the credits or if there was a misunderstanding.
Jonita recounted, “I asked his team, ‘Hey, there’s another song on the tracklist titled ‘Implosive Silence’, credited to Jonita Gandhi, but I haven’t sung this track. My only contribution was to ‘Kahan Hoon Main’.’ I later learned that he used portions of my takes from ‘Kahan Hoon Main’, parts where I was still mastering the melody.”
“I was merely getting acquainted with the tune at that moment, and he managed to create an entirely new song from it, which was astonishing. It was one of those spontaneous bursts of creativity for him, where he could take a song in one direction and completely transform it into something new,” she added.