Reality music competitions have been notorious for their dramatisation and exaggerated melancholic backgrounds.
Breaking the stereotype, veteran music composer A R Rahman presents his own YouTube original music show Arrived.
A short 14-episode series, the show pierces through the generic format and keeps a one-track focus on the art. A Batch 2020 student at SCMC, Antara Nandy, recounts her experience as a part of the endeavour and making it to the top 10 in the competition.
“ARRived was really great. I have always dreamt of making it to this place. I idolise Rahman sir and have wanted to work for him for as long as I can remember. So, when I came to know of ARRived, I just knew this is where I have to be. Post ARRived, I even got to record for Rahman sir”, says Nandy, 19.
With 15 years of training in Hindustani classical music, Nandy has also participated in SaReGa-MaPa L’il Champs in 2009. With a taste of television as well as the online medium, Nandy states that the transparency on ARRived is undeniable. She says, “Other shows are like a game of chess played by the creative team. So, in the rush to earn TRP, real talent gets sabotaged. In this case, the whole decision actually was in the hands of the judges. Everything depended on how a contestant is performing on the stage, as it should be. Also, on other shows, songs are imposed on you.
So, there are genres that you might not be very comfortable singing and that acts as a disadvantage for the contestant but that wasn’t the scene here.”
Sahana Iyer
Batch 2019
