PremiumExclusive! Ritvik Muralidhar: I’m excited about my music for Baang and nervous about my acting
Ritvik Muralidhar, the composer of the upcoming Kannada film Baang, is the lead actor as well.
Last Updated: 05.50 PM, Aug 11, 2023
A few years ago, Ritvik Muralidhar was a finalist on the first season of the singing reality show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa and was hopeful of getting a break in cinema as a playback singer. “Back then, participants of such reality shows were not as sought after as they are today. I tried hard to get a break in singing for cinema, but that didn’t work out for me. So, I learnt electronic music production and began composing jingles for advertisements, background score for short films. This journey eventually brought me to films, but as a music composer,” says Ritvik.
As a composer, Ritvik has worked on about a dozen Kannada films, mostly background scores and the odd song here and there. His next, Baang, which releases in theatres on August 18, is only his fourth project in which he’s handling all the songs and the background score. “But what makes the film extra special is that it also marks my acting debut,” he adds.
From the music studio to donning greasepaint
My debut as a composer was with Sankashta Kara Ganapati, directed by Arjun Kumar, with Likith Shetty in the lead. Sree Ganesh Parashuram, who is making his directorial debut with Baang, was an assistant director on this set and that’s how we met and became close. We’d been discussing the possibility of collaborating on a film since then. When it all came together and we could get started on Baang, I was on board as the composer only, initially. Later, when Ganesh began casting for the roles, he wanted a few new faces. He knew that I’d ben harbouring a dream of becoming an actor someday and then asked me if I’d be interested to try my hand at it. At the time, though, I was a tad unsure, because I wanted to focus on my career as a composer. Also, I didn’t want people to think that I used music as a stepping stone and then discarded it along the way. But when Ganesh persisted, it also got me thinking about the countless aspiring actors looking for opportunities and not being able to make it. So, I decided to take up my chance and do my best. I am very nervous at this point of time as to how audiences will react to our film.
A dark comedy to start with
Baang is a quirky dark comedy action flick that revolves around a group of friends, who stumble upon a mysterious bag. The contents of this bag are of interest to a couple of gangsters – Daddy (Raghu Dixit) and Leona (Shanvi Srivastava). In the trailer, we’ve tried to establish that the narrative follows what happens to these friends once the bag is in their possession. There is a lot more to the film, but the basic line is that it is about four friends, two gangsters and a bag. We did not want to pitch something through the trailer and give audiences something else.
Bringing Raghu Dixit on board as Daddy
I knew Raghu since Sankashta kara Ganapati, for which he’d sung the title track. We’ve been close friends since then and, hence, I know that despite his gruff appearance, he’s quite the fun-loving guy, who is also a good actor on account of being a trained Bharatnatyam dancer. When Ganesh wrote the character of Daddy, I was sure that it had to be done by Raghu, but he did not entertain the idea for the longest time. It took a lot of cajoling to finally get him onboard. When he eventually came to the set, he said that he would shoot some sequences and check if it looks good or not, depending on which he’d take a call about whether to do the full film. After the first day of shoot, everything fell in place.
Interestingly, we have used Raghu only as an actor. I could not use his voice for the songs as he was playing one of the characters in the film. In fact, Raghu has complained multiple times that I did not give him a song in the film, but I could not entertain that thought, which will become clear to everyone when they see the film on August 18.
The music of Baang
Baang is a dark comedy action film, for which I have composed six songs, which will play out with montages at various points in the film, without disrupting the flow of the narrative. The film is all of two hours long. I have tried to explore different genres in the six songs , three of which are in the public domain and have been well received. We will be releasing one more song before the film comes out. This will be quirky number sung by Vasuki Vaibhav. After Baang, I have a couple of projects in the pipeline and even though I enjoyed my time on set and loved acting, as of now, I want to focus on my career as a musician.