Music Review: ‘Prithviraj’
Writer-Director Dr. Chandraprakash Dwivedi brings his much awaited big screen bonanza with the historic story of the great Indian king Prithviraj Chauhan who fought with utmost valour in the 12th century to protect Indian from Persian rulers. A Yash Raj Films production, ‘Prithviraj’ will be a really expensive war epic production that has been a long time coming with the script completed over a decade ago. But the movie is completely shot during the pandemic and kudos to the YRF production for such a massive cast production project to be managed at a time when basic factors like social distancing would have been a challenge to create a historical magnum opus. The trailer looks great with great attention to the sets, costumes, war action, romance, drama all rolled into one. With Akshay Kumar leading the movie as the titular character, one can expect some great charisma to this role. The film also stars Sanjay Dutt, Sonu Sood, Ashutosh Rana, Sakshi Tanwar, Manav Vij in leading roles with the beautiful Manushi Chhillar making her Bollywood debut after winning the Miss World title in 2017. The music reigns are in the hands of the extremely talented trio Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy. This will be their second period drama project after ‘Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi’ (2019) which wasn’t a success to be honest but given the experience and talent that these three have amongst them, one can expect them to surprise and create a masterpiece here under the YRF banner.
The first single, Hari Har is a perfect song to open this soundtrack as a war cry song. The song is grand in every way possible! The opening chorus is so impactful that the first 30 secs drive a strong impression right away without beating around the bushes. The vocal chorus mixed with the building percussions and brass ensemble grabs your attention right away. The music build up suddenly stops and then the opening vocal lead of Adarsh Shinde is even more impressive! His voice has the right tonality and classical balance to fit it perfectly with the period setting. He has the power to drive the song but also a subtlety to his vocal that helps expression while he sings praises of this great king and inculcates vigour for the war setting. While the music is loud and makes a bang, Shinde’s vocal brings a lot of balance to the song. The music pickup in the bridge and chorus is beautifully arranged. The execution is quite terrific as it would have been a challenge recording this with the range of classical Indian instruments that have been recorded perfectly to the T. The percussions are the real driving force with a nice upbeat tempo to it supported well by the brass and strings orchestra making this overalls sound huge even on tiny ear phone, while the theatrical impact is simply worth imagining! Lyrics by Varun Grover are fairly well composed with a traditional Hindustani language that represent the period well while inspiring pride, honour, praise and valour all in this war cry while still being a little contemporary to work with audiences today. Overall this song in itself is a magnum opus and when coupled with the visual execution it will be something worth experiencing in the cinemas. The music precision and conduction are epic in many ways and perfectly fitting for the movie. 4/5
More singles from ‘Prithviraj’ will be reviewed on this page when they become available.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
