Ajaneesh Loknath interview: A deep-dive into the music of Rishab Shetty’s ‘Kantara: Chapter 1’

“Music romba nalla irukku (music is truly good),” said AR Rahman to Ajaneesh Loknath successful their caller virtual interaction. For the euphony composer who grew up listening to the legendary composer’s chartbusters, the words of praise for his enactment successful Kantara: Chapter 1 meant a lot.

“My dada watched Indian (1996) astatine Urvashi Cinema successful Bengaluru, and helium was truthful amazed by the film’s euphony that helium went to SP Road, bought 3 cassettes, and recorded the full movie,” says Ajaneesh. “You whitethorn telephone it piracy, but successful those days, we wouldn’t get the OST (Original Soundtrack) of movies. In fact, Rahman sir called the method educational,” helium adds.

A true-blue fanboy, Ajaneesh is inactive awe-struck astatine the method mastery of ‘Akadanu Naanga’ and ‘Telephone Manipol’ from the S Shankar directorial. “That said, ‘Pachai Kiligal’ stands retired for its beardown affectional quotient. I would creation with my dada for the opus similar however Chandru and Senapathy would successful the movie.”

Ajaneesh is basking successful the biggest occurrence of his career, arsenic Kantara: Chapter 1 has emerged arsenic India’s highest-grossing movie of 2025 truthful far. A decennary into his career, the occurrence comes arsenic a fitting milestone for the composer, and it has arrived with his regular collaborator, actor-director Rishab Shetty.

In 2014, Kannada cinema was seeing a paradigm shift. Pawan Kumar’s Luciahad signalled the opening of a movement. Fuelled with passionateness to present thing new, friends Rishab and Rakshit Shetty collaborated connected duplicate projects, Ulidavaru Kandante (2014) and Kirk Party (2016). Both movies had euphony by Ajaneesh, and proceed to bask a cult presumption among Kannada movie buffs.

“Rishab and Rakshit worth euphony a lot. For them, it’s arsenic important arsenic the plot,” says Ajaneesh. The outstanding soundtracks of Ulidavaru Kandante and Kirik Party are bespeak the passionateness for prime euphony shared by the young team.

Ajaneesh opens up connected the deed ‘Brahmakalasha’ from Kantara: Chapter 1 to reiterate Rishab’s heavy transportation with music. “The archetypal 40-50 seconds of the opus are enhanced by the usage of Alaap (the introductory and improvisational melodic conception that sets the code of a opus oregon a performance).

“In the epoch of philharmonic hooks, it’s precise uncommon for an histrion oregon a manager to let a composer to usage Alaap successful a song. Rishab was precise wide from the beginning. He wanted the euphony to person planetary standards,” says Ajaneesh.

Brahmakalasha is an arresting devotional song. It has the masterful usage of antithetic ragas combined with a soundscape that is authentic to past past depicted successful the movie. Singer Abby’s soulful dependable lends further spot to the song, which is besides a ocular marvel. “Abby’s dependable is simply a batch akin to mine. Our dependable isn’t excessively masculine. It has a soothing prime that’s needed for a opus similar ‘Brahmakalasha’,” explains Ajaneesh.

‘Madana Mana Mohini,’ a melodious emotion way involving Rishab and Rukmini Vasanth, begins successful a captivating fashion. “I utilized thanam (an improvisational method to elaborate a raga) to commencement the song. The ‘Brahmakalasha’ opus begins with an instrument. So, this had to beryllium different. The opus had to person an constituent of shrungara (element of love). When I placed a thanam at the opening of the song, it had a charming effect, and Rishab loved the idea.”

The romanticist fig is sung by Vijay Prakash and Ananya Bhat, the duo that sang the fashionable ‘Singara Siriye’ from Kantara (2022). “I was disquieted that radical would comparison ‘Madana Mana Mohini’ with ‘Singara Siriye.’ Vijay ji instilled assurance successful me. He said that my opus has the quality to turn gradually connected the listener.” Vijay was proven right, arsenic the opus has dilatory gained popularity aft initially being nether the radar.

Ajaneesh calls Kantara: Chapter 1 his astir challenging task yet, with the week earlier the merchandise investigating his imaginable to the maximum. “I struggled to people for the climax information of the movie. It was arsenic if I had reached a dormant end. I don’t cognize how, but eventually, conscionable earlier it was excessively late, I managed to make the inheritance people successful conscionable 30 minutes. We besides had to instrumentality the output of 25 songs arsenic the movie was dubbed successful 5 languages. Till the past moment, I was awaiting galore approvals. I judge a divine unit helped maine sail done these challenges. It’s hard to explain,” helium says.

The composer had a packed 2024, with big-scale Kannada films specified arsenic UI, Max, Bagheera, and the Tamil thriller Maharaja, starring Vijay Sethupathi. He says, “The quality to accommodate to antithetic projects astatine the aforesaid clip comes from my clip spent successful the tv industry. For a serial, you request to make galore jingles and respective inheritance scores for antithetic moods of the story. However, arsenic you turn and get established, it’s amended to prioritise your projects and instrumentality time.”

ALSO READ: Singing for ‘Indian 2’: How vocalist Abby V got his large breakthrough

Ajaneesh’s upcoming movies are Mark, starring Sudeep, and Devil, headlined by Darshan. The 2 songs, ‘Psycho Saithan’ and ‘Idre Nemdiyaag Irbek’, received mixed reactions from fans.

He concludes, “Star-driven movies are a antithetic shot game. Fans person capable songs to comparison the latest 1 with. The request to adhd philharmonic hooks to songs is sidesplitting creativity. That said, some the songs volition deed you otherwise erstwhile you spot them connected the large surface with the discourse of the plot.”