Other works

Other works

Rahman has been involved in several projects aside from film. He made an album Vande Mataram (1997) on India's 50th anniversary of independence to commercial success.^[27][28] He followed it up with an album for the Bharat Bala–directed videoJana Gana Mana, a conglomeration of performances by many leading exponents/artists of Indian classical music. Rahman has written jingles for ads and composed several orchestrations for athletic events, T.V. and internet media publications, documentaries and short films.

In 1999 Rahman, along with choreographers Shobhana and Prabhu Deva Sundaram and a Tamil cinema dancing troupe performed with Michael Jackson in Munich, Germany, for his "Michael Jackson and Friends Concert." In 2002, he composed his maiden stage production Bombay Dreams (2002) following a commission from musical theatre composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, a success in London's West End. With Finnish folk music band Värttinä, he wrote the music for The Lord of the Rings theatre production and in 2004, Rahman composed the piece "Raga's Dance" for Vanessa-Mae's album Choreography.^[17]

In the last six years, Rahman has performed three successful world tours of his concerts to audiences in Singapore, Australia,Malaysia, Dubai, UK, Canada, the US (Hollywood Bowl and 3d tour) and India.^[17] He has been collaborating with Karen David for her upcoming studio album. A two-disc soundtrack, Introducing A. R. Rahman (2006) featuring 25 pieces he composed from his Tamil film scores was released in May 2006. His non-film album,Connections was launched on 12 December, 2008.