Composers Vishal (from top) and Shekhar collaborated with Senegalese rock star Akon for the chartbuster Chammak Challo, and with Grammy winner Imogen Heap on the TV show The Dewarists

It was a question that nobody had expected from Senegalese rock star, Akon. “I need to understand the lyrics,” he said, breaking off in mid-song, “Who is a chammak challo?” This was, of course, a perfectly valid query but one that nobody had anticipated from the African singer who has become a global star.

Akon had flown into India to record the song for the Shah Rukh Khan-starrer, Ra.One. But he impressed everyone by the level of commitment he brought to the recording studio in Mumbai. “I have to understand the words to make my singing believable,” he added, as he called a halt to take quick Hindi lessons from music composers Vishal-Shekhar with whom he was collaborating for the song. A few hours later he was ‘ready to woo the village hottie’ — as he put it.

“He sat with us, understood the song, and the next thing we knew, he had full control over it. He was here for two days but we finished the recording so early that we decided to record another song, and that’s how Criminal happened,” says Shekhar.

But Akon isn’t the only music star who’s teaming up with top Indian musicians. You have some of the biggest names in the world like Britney Spears and Lady Gaga jamming to create music with a difference with our own local superstars.

Britney collaborated with Sonu Nigam for a remix of her hit I Wanna Fly and he gave the number an Indian flavour by rendering Hindi lyrics and notes to the song. Soon after the song was put together, Britney tweeted: “So excited about having Sonu on I wanna go (sic). His vocals add such a different feel which I love.”

Sonu says it was a painless collaboration. “It’s a romantic number,” he explains. “It just took me a couple of hours to write and put my part in the song in order. When I sent it across they instantly took a liking to it. They mixed and matched and that was it.”

A few months earlier it was Sunidhi Chauhan singing in harmony with Spanish singing sensation Enrique Iglesias for the Indian version of Heartbeat, a song from the special Indian edition of his album Euphoria. “The original song has Nicole Scherzinger adding only musical notes. But in the Indian version I get to sing 50 percent of the song. Isn’t it amazing?” says Sunidhi, as she makes herself comfortable in her beautiful house at Lokhandwala, Mumbai.

The Vishal-Shekhar team has been hitting the high notes with other foreign stars too. A few months ago, the duo paired with another international singer, the Grammy Award winning Imogen Heap, on the television show The Dewarists. The result — a track called Kahan Le Aaye Naseeba which, interestingly, is inspired by Rabindranath Tagore’s poem Where the Mind is Without Fear. The music video, filmed at Samode Palace just outside Jaipur, shows Heap and Vishal roaming the streets and connecting with commoners thro-ugh their music.

Says Shekhar: “Imogen is very open-minded and loves Indian music. She heard us very patiently and appreciated our ideas. It was a delight to work with her.”

The biggest of the global collaborations is, of course, the heavily publicised transnational SuperHeavy which consists of Mick Jagger, A.R. Rahman and other giants like Dave Stewart, one of the founders of Eurythmics, and Damian Marley (he’s the son of musical legend Bob Marley). Rahman was invited to join the motley group of stars to add an Indian flavour to the compositions. “It’s different from anything else I’ve ever been involved in. The music is very wide-ranging. From reggae to ballads to Indian songs in Urdu,” Jagger told Rolling Stone magazine.

It was hardly surprising that the top secret SuperHeavy project took almost three years to reach fruition. Coordinating the schedules of all the superstars was a nightmare. Says Rahman: “This album is the most complicated record ever made. Imagine trying to co-ordinate all of our schedules! Some of it is recorded in Los Angeles, some of it is recorded in the South of France, and some of it was recorded on a yacht off the coast of Turkey! And some songs were created in my studio in Chennai, in India.”

“Mick thought it sounded like a good idea but I wasn’t sure whether it would actually happen! I don’t think any of us knew what kind of music we’d make, and certainly we didn’t know if it would be any good, but we hoped we’d have fun on the way,” he adds.

Singer Sonu Nigam (above) gave the Britney Spears song I Wanna Fly an Indian flavour by adding Hindi lyrics and also produced a song and performed it with Jermaine Jackson (on piano) as a tribute to Michael Jackson

However, other collaborations have been entirely different affairs. For instance, Enrique and Sunidhi never met. Their duet was an example of technology at work. “We exchanged music through .wav files. We recorded our part and sent it to Enrique’s team. It took us four months to complete the entire song. They liked the music and they merged their part along with it,” says Shameer Tandon, former managing director of Virgin EMI and the music director of the Indian version of Heartbeat.

Similarly, Sonu Nigam and Britney too never met. Says Sonu: “I sent my part of the track across, which they mixed for the final version.” Sonu also got together with Jermaine Jackson last year to sing a tribute to his brother Michael Jackson at the International Indian Film Awards ceremony in Toronto. “I produced the song but I did not intend to sell it so it was just an experiment and I loved it,” adds Sonu.

The music entrepreneur behind Sonu’s tie-up with Britney and Jermaine is Los Angeles-based Anjula Acharia-Bath, CEO of Desihits.com. “I was approached by Spears’ agents who wanted to know more about Sonu who was then touring the US,” she says. “When I explained the huge fan following Sonu commands, they said they’d like to work with him. I discussed the project with Sonu and that’s how it materialised.”

Acharia-Bath’s company records and distributes content produced in India and abroad and also aims to create a platform where both East and West can meet. “There is a huge potential for crossover music (between South Asia and the West),” says Acharia-Bath.

Last June, Desihits entered into a joint venture with Universal Music Group to create a new label, Desi Hits Universal, fully funded by the record label giant. Says Acharia-Bath: “The aim is to be a home for South Asian talent, globally.”

Acharia-Bath is also the brain behind getting Bollywood composers Salim-Suleiman to remix two of Lady Gaga’s hits, Judas and Born This Way. “We approached the duo to make the Indian version of two popular songs sung by Lady Gaga,” says Acharia-Bath. “The idea was to make her popular in India and the same goes for the Indian duo as the songs have been included in her album.”

“The first thing we did was bring in a sitar, and that changed the flavour. We kept the aggression but changed the style and made it more House. We also tried to give it a Sufi touch,” says Salim. When Lady Gaga performed at the Formula One post-race party she sang the Indian versions of both numbers.

There are critics who say these musical ventures can’t really be called ‘collaboration’. Achille Forber, managing director of Deep Emotions, a joint venture with Universal Publishing Music Group believes it’s only a true collaboration if the stars are working together in person. Says Forber: “Look at SuperHeavy. They worked together and took three long years to complete the album. Now, that’s what I call collaboration.”

(Above) Damien Marley, Dave Stewart, Mick Jagger, A.R. Rahman and Joss Stone, jammed and brainstormed over three years for SuperHeavy; (below) Sunidhi Chauhan sang the Indian version of Enrique Iglesias’s Heartbeat

Salim, disagrees. “If Rahat Fateh Ali Khan is sitting in Pakistan and does the recording for me over Skype, does that mean he hasn’t worked with me? Why can’t we use technology ? Must we have chai together and gossip and work?”

Sonu points out that bringing together stars from different parts of the world can be tough. “These days, even Bollywood singers don’t record together. Nobody has the time. Everybody sings separately and it’s then mixed by technicians.”

Adds Atul Churamani, CEO of OnMobile:“If you were to fly an A-lister singer from abroad, you would have to provide him/her everything first class — right from airfare to hotel rent, studio rent and inter-city travel. The expenses would run into lakhs.”

There have, of course, been occasional false notes. Four years ago, composer Ram Sampath, who recently scored a hit with Delhi Belly, teamed up with Justin Timberlake. But nothing materialised. “They never got back to me and canned the project,” he says. Sampath was more fortunate with the Grammy award-winning INXS. “The band was in Mumbai for a concert when I and Sona Mahapatra, who’s done many songs with me, met them,” says Sampath. “They wanted to make an Indian version of their hit Afterglow. So after several meetings, we finally finished the work in a day.” The song also has a video featuring Mahapatra and the former lead vocalist of the band, the late Michael Hutchence. “We shot in India, the band shot abroad and they later merged the two,” says Sampath.

What benefit do these collaborations have for Indian musicians? Rahman’s music lawyer Simon Long insists that the star has benefited hugely from SuperHeavy. Says Long: “Even after the Oscars, Rahman didn’t get any big projects. It was only after this album that he has started getting more projects.”

Composer Ram Sampath and singer Sona Mahapatra worked with Grammy-winning band INXS (below) to make the Indian version of their hit Afterglow

Similarly, Sunidhi met up with and sang with Alicia Keys, though she refuses to reveal details about the project. Says Sunidhi: “Keys knew me from my collaborative songs and it feels great.”

For Bollywood music director Sandeep Chowta, his international links have brought rich possibilities. He collaborated last year with American jazz fusion band Spyro Gyra to co-produce an album, The Foreign Affair. The album made its debut at number two on the Billboard Jazz world charts. The project broke into the US Billboard Jazz Charts. One track in the album, Khuda, has all-Hindi lyrics.

Chowta says: “I met three of the band members — Tom Schuman, Jay Beckenstein and Scott Ambush — about two years ago. Then, when I was in Toronto last year, Jay, the Spyro frontman, requested me to write for their new record. I sent across my compositions, and they loved them.”

And, why are the international singers and bands doing these ventures? The answer, quite simply, is that they are planning for the future. India is still a relatively small market, but they see a huge potential for growth. “India is becoming more commercially attractive if you add record sales, downloads, opportunities for gigging and endorsements,’’ says Arjun Sankalia, director, international music, Sony Music Entertainment India.

”It is very difficult to sell non-Bollywood music in India but we are now trying to penetrate this market. Our main motive was to sell Enrique’s album hard in India,” says Ashish Joshi, marketing director of Universal Music, which is Iglesias’ record label. He points out that, brands like Lakmé played the song in their fashion weeks and that the cricket Indian Premier League too used the songs during their events.

Composer Sandeep Chowta (in striped shirt) got American jazz fusion band Spyro Gyra to co-produce The Foreign Affair and Salim-Suleiman (below) remixed Lady Gaga’s (below) Judas and Born This Way

Saregama, on the other hand, has tied up with an international agency to work out collaborations. “We have started working in this direction and will hopefully come out with something this year,” says Adarsh Gupta, business head, Saregama.

Some artists grumble that not enough is done to promote these joint venture songs. Says Sampath: “Our songs would have become even more successful if there was enough publicity but sadly the record labels have their own logic to follow.”

Nevertheless, as the world becomes a smaller place music and musicians are reaching out across the world. It all proves the old saying — music knows no boundaries.