Leslie Lewis hindi Biography
Overview
Leslie Lewis is perhaps best known as one part of Colonial Cousins, a duo made up by Lewis and Hariharan. An all rounder in music profession, he is a composer, arranger, lyricist and a music director. Since his childhood Lezz was acquainted with music and began learning music. He came to know of rock music greats in the form of Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton and others while in college, which gave him, experience in various genres. In his desire to create his own music he was spurred to open his personal company wherein he used to record jingles for commercials. He got instant recognition in the form of four consecutive nominations at the Indian Academy of Advertising Film Art, before finally bagging the prize in 1989. Lezz launched his musical career as a guitarist by regularly playing at Mumbai's Cafe Royale, Oberoi towers hotel while at the same time recording jingles for TV and films during the day for his own company (Ze Bop Music) at his own 24-track studios - Purple Haze. Many music directors of the country like R. D. Burman, Laxmikant – Pyarelal, Louis Banks and Kalyanji – Anandji asked him for his guitar accompaniment. He composed and produced albums including Bombay Girl (for Alisha Chinnoy), Paree (Sunita Rao) and the super-hit Jaanam Samjha Karo (Asha Bhosle). He had previously worked with Kalyanji-Anandji, R. D. Burman and Laximikant Pyarelal before teaming up with Hariharan. Lewis’s first feature-length composition was the soundtrack for Apna Asman. He is also the composer of music for the film Jahd that features the voice of Hariharan which launched KK. Lewis is not happy that the Hindi film industry has used pop music in films. He feels that Hindi pop was created as an alternative to Hindi film music, and that music companies are responsible for allowing mediocre remixes and adulterated music videos to be released Lewis firmly believes that remixing is a craft on its own - not just adding different beats to an old song. A remix ne believes, should take the original voice of the singer and re-do it with new music. Lewis has also created fresh new sounds for artists like band of Boys and Sonali Rathore. Sonali, popular for her ghazal and folk rendition, sang a different beat, with romantic and peppy tracks in her album, Sunali- This is Me. The album is a mix of jazz, R&B and club beats, which Leslie Lewis has composed solely for her. In 2003 Lewis averred that the public associated him much too much with his remixes and for that reason he began to avoid remixes and instead concentrated on his original compositions and on his work in Colonial Cousins