Musicians Raaza Razaq and Imthiyas Beegum, better known as Raaza Beegum
| Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT
It was music that made Raaza Razaq and Imthiyas Beegum a couple. Better known as Raaza Beegum or Raaza and Beegum in the music circle, the husband-wife duo will perform in the city on March 9.
Raaza Razaq and Imthiyas Beegum bonded over music. Raaza says, “It was the love for ghazals that brought us together. But our music is not restricted to ghazals. We make independent music, which is inspired by evergreen, old Hindi and Malayalam songs and ghazals. We showcase Urdu ghazals and Malayalam and Hindi retro-Indian film music, along with our original [Malayalam] songs at our shows.”
Music and romance
Their musical journey started in Kannur, Raaza’s home town, over a decade ago, at a cultural meet. “Although our families knew each other well, we never interacted much. Once, when I sang at a programme, he accompanied me on the keyboard. Several such performances followed. Eventually, we fell in love and married in 2011,” says Beegum.
While Raaza is not musically trained, Beegum, a native of Thiruvananthapuram, has learnt Carnatic music for 10 years. “But ghazals became close to me because of my father, a huge fan of Jagjit Singh. He had all the albums of the legend at home and since I listened to those songs day in and out I also developed a taste for his kind of music — soft and melodious,” Beegum says.
Raaza Razaq and Imthiyas Beegum, better known as Raaza Beegum or Raaza and Beegum
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT
It was their own composition, ‘Omalale ninne orthu’ written by Yoonus Salim, that kickstarted their career in music. The song was recorded long back at their home and was forgotten. One day they uploaded a portion of it on their social media handle in the voice of Raaza and their daughter, Zainab Yusra, then a toddler, and it went viral. ‘Omalale’ remains a sought-after song at their shows even now. Among their other popular original songs are ‘Salaam cholli’, ‘Mizhikondu mathram’, ‘Aye khuda’, and the recent one ‘Pandathe pattu’. Zainab has also sung in some of the productions, like ‘Neeyerinja kallu’ and ‘Pathummante aadu’.
Three years ago Imtiyas and Zainab had gone viral on social media with their rendition of the popular devotional track, ‘Kani kanum neram’ during Vishu.
Talking about the creative process behind their songs, Raaza says lyrics is the first priority. “We enjoy simple yet powerful verses that convey profound meaning. The best among our works have lyrics that we have selected together. Even though I do the composing and music production, we finalise the song together. Working on new songs is a learning for me, especially when I explore ragas for my composing sessions or when I experiment with genres in music production. Indie music is all about self-learning, thus making up for my lack of professional training,” Raaza says.
Beegum adds that they complement each other. “Raaza has not learnt music whereas I am trained. But he is amazing on the harmonium and is an impeccable composer, which I am not. So we balance it out as musicians,” she says.
They have started giving individual concerts as well. “That is because we both have our personal favourites, which we are unable to sing when we perform together. We present them at our solo shows,” Raaza says.
He is an artist as well and has been painting in acrylic and water colour, the latter being his favourite medium. “I hope to come up with a project combining music and art, thus providing an audio-visual experience for the viewers,” he says.
Meanwhile, the duo, settled in Kozhikode, is pleased about the love for ghazals and melodies, especially among the youth. “In an interview Hariji [singer Hariharan] observed that as long as love is there ghazal will be there. I want to add two more emotions – pain and separation. It is overwhelming to see how the young generation has lapped up ghazals. We are pleasantly surprised when they ask for classics at our shows,” Beegum adds.
Raaza and Beegum will perform at WOW Week at Kerala Arts and Crafts Village on March 9 at 8pm.