Amit Kumar and his brother Sumit are just back from the US with their tribute concerts on Kishore Kumar.
“We performed in Detroit and Chicago. We called the show ‘Do Kishore’. We did it on a trial basis in the two American cities. Now that it has been accepted so wholeheartedly, we’ll take our two ‘Do Kishore’ concerts to the rest of the world. We’re already booked for 6 concerts in the US in April 2012. Then we’ll take the concert all over India.”
The ‘Do Kishore’ concerts are Amit Kumar’s brainchild. “We first did the ‘Do Kishore’ charity concert with us two brothers celebrating our father’s memory through his music in Kolkata on 12 April in 1992. Sumit was only 9 years old then. Many luminaries associated with my father, like Ashok Kumar and Rajesh Khanna were present at the show.”
Amit Kumar also has plans of making a film on his legendatry father. “It was Bhaijaan (Mehmood) who suggested it. My brother and I had devised a skit where we both go to the moon and meet our father there. Mehmood suggested we make a film on that theme. That hasn’t happened so far.”
Amit and Sumit are also on the verge of starting a music company named Kumar Brothers Music. “It will be an online company. I’d be putting out my own composition for my fans online. It won’t be film music, but folk songs, semi-classical numbers… One of my compositions Zindagi dard has been put out just to get a response. It’s been well-received by my fans.”
The online recording company attained a feasibility in Amit Kumar’s mind due to the progressive paucity of offline music companies. “There’s no company one can take one’s music to. It isn’t as though I’m attempting to compete with T-Series or any other music company. An online music company eliminates the need for a mediators like a producer or a music- company executive. It’s a direct connectivity between my creativity and my listeners. I know I have an audience. There are people who love my voice.”
Amit says he’s done with film music. “What is there to sing in Hindi films? The greats that I worked with are dead or retired. I could bear with the changes ten years. The whole scenario has changed now. The music these days is cacophonic. I don’t listen to the songs. And these item songs… so many of them and so boring! Some of today’s composers claim that melody is back. Sorry, I don’t hear it.”
