KHANAK – Editorial Vol 3

Dear Music Lovers!

You are looking at the special ‘IPRS anniversary’ volume of Khanak! Yes, being incorporated on 23rd August 1969, IPRS recently celebrated its 52nd Anniversary.This volume of Khanak is again an information-packed one – a treasure trove to be preserved. But more about what’s inside, in a moment. First, let me tell you about something very cool.

From ‘BusspanKaPyar’ to ‘Manike Mage Hithe,’ the last few weeks have been a treat for trends in music. And I love all that is trending, all that is popular, because the more the music plays, the more of our fraternity members hear cha-ching, or, ahem, ‘Khanak’! But having said that, it is crucial to look beyond the trends and find good music that might not be trending. So, we started the #KnowYourMusic campaign last month. And that’s the cool thing I want to talk about.

When I was a teenager, we use to save up our allowances to buy cassettes (and later CDs) once a month. All I could afford was 2 or 3 albums. And choosing those 2-3 albums was given more thought than the British government did while redrawing the map of the Indian subcontinent in 1947. When we were buying music with our own money, we were super careful about what we heard, and we didn’t rely on others’ opinions. There was popular music that organically reached us, but there were no manufactured trends. No music company could pump in a few million in marketing and compel us to listen to the song. We heard it if and only if it was worth one-sixth of our pocket money every month. That was the era when the customer, the paying customer, was actually the king. Today, the market works differently, and don’t get me wrong, good music is still good music, and it works well, but somewhere in this barrage of free music that we are getting, our power to choose is being eroded slowly. Just like people can die of over-eating as much as they can die of hunger, this overwhelming ocean of music is not letting us stay on one song and enjoy it for even a whole day. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I don’t know. But music is evolving, and it is an arduous task to keep up with it.

We wanted to make people aware that they can still choose good music. They can still ignore trends, and they have the power to enable the right artists. #KnowYourMusic is all about this. Wehave started a new series of musicalepisodes (or Musisodes, as our team likes to call them) on Youtube to flag it off. In each episode, we focus on one genre of music and talk to a maestro of that genre. Dolby India provides us with backend support, and we have already published three epis… sorry, ‘musisodes.’Our first video(in association with Anahad Foundation) was on folk music.The second one with Sitar maestro Purbayan Chatterji was on classical music. And the third one, which just came out,was on devotional music featuring Bhajan Samrat Shri Anup JalotaJi. All these videos are packed with great insights. So, do watch them on our youtube channel if you have missed them. Also, subscribe, like, share, comment – you know the drill.

Now, back to the excellent articles and resources in this issue.

Our visionary chairman Shri Javed Akhtar Saab’s anniversary address tells us about the history and the importance of IPRS.

Our CEO Rakesh Nigam Ji gives us insights into the CMO (Collection Management Organization) ecosystem and tells us how IPRS is working as one of its only kind CMO in India.

In the creators’ corner, we have the inimitable composer– ShriBappiLahiriJi. I’ve had the good fortune of working with Bappi Da in Disney’s #Moana where he voiced ‘Tomatoa’ – a giant sea-monster who loves shiny things. (Yes, I made him voice a character in a Disney film, you are welcome!) It was such a joy working with him in the studio while dubbing the lines and the fantastic song: ‘Shona!’ for that film.

From this issue, we are starting a column that I wanted from the very first issue. The column is called #AskAmeet, where you can clarify your doubts about copyright and legalities by asking anything to our resident legal advisor Shri Ameet Datta sir, who happens to be one of India’s top authorities on the subject. In this issue, apart from other things, he also talks about the perils of piracy during the pandemic. I’m a fan of Ameet sir’s insights, and you will be too when you read his column.

We have somehelpful resource articles this month as well. ‘The Year That Was’overviews the past year for the music industry, and ‘Stories From the Industry’collates recent essential events. In addition to these, our regular FAQ section tells you about ISRC, cue-sheets,and the importance of metadata. Finally, the ‘From the IPRS Desk’ section will tell you about our exciting and valuable upcoming sessions and membership tools. In short, you cannot miss reading these.

Going ahead, we want to make IPRS and Khanak more inclusive. We want to give voice to all the diversity we have amongst our members. We want to talk about regional music and news, and events happening all across the country. So, if you are out of Mumbai and have something to share from the regional music scene, do let us know.

Festival season is upon us already, and the markets are doing better after a long time. I wish we all grow prosperous and create music that lasts forever because music heals all pain.

Bob Marley said that there is one good thing about music. When it hits you, you feel no pain.

So, let’s create more music and less pain for the world.

With all the warmth in the world,

Mayur Puri.

Mumbai.
August, 2021.