A R Rahman - Introduction

Allah Rakha Rahman (born on January 6, 1967 as A.S. Dileep Kumar in
Chennai, India) is a popular Indian film music composer. He is a native
Tamilian. He made his debut in 1992 with Mani Ratnam's Tamil movie,
Roja (Rose), which was subsequently dubbed into many languages. Ram
Gopal Verma's Rangeela (Colorful) (1995) was the first Hindi movie to
have Rahman as the music director. He is a recipient of the Padma Shri.
Early years

Rahman is the only son of R. K. Sekhar, who was an arranger and
conductor for Malayalam films. His father died when Rahman was nine
years old, and his family used to rent out musical equipment to make
ends meet, something they found very difficult. During those hard
times, a Sufi (Muslim) saint helped them spiritually. This led him to
convert to Islam.

At the age of 11, Rahman joined the troupe of Indian composer Ilayaraja
as a keyboardist. He later played on the orchestra of M.S. Vishwanathan
and Ramesh Naidu, and accompanied Zakir Hussain and Kunnakudi
Vaidyanathan on world tours. The experience allowed him to obtain a
scholarship to the Trinity College at Oxford University, where he
received a degree in Western classical music.