He used to sell TV remotes to make money at one point and a few years down the line, he’s the man behind two superhit music albums in Sandalwood. Meet Bengaluru boy Judah Sandhy, whose tracks in the Kannada films Operation Alamelmma and Chamak have been appreciated massively by music buffs. In a tete-e-tete with us, Judah gets chatty about his intriguing journey, his debut Telugu project and more…
Ask him about his first Telugu film for which he’ll be composing music and he says, “It’s called ABCD and stars Allu Sirish. They heard my songs from Chamak and called me. Initially, I thought it was a prank. But soon, I met them, listened to the story and things took off. The album has five songs and I’m doing the background score as well. Currently, I’m also working on Kannada films Taayige Takka Maga, 8MM and Godhra.”
Taking us back to his early days, the musician reveals that his tryst with music happened when he was in school and he’d play a little bit of guitar. “After my tenth grade, I decided to join St Aloysius College with my musician friends and that’s where my band Slain took off. We won numerous fests at IITs and IIMs, and were even featured in the Rolling Stones magazine,” says the former frontman of Slain. After 2011, Slain disbanded and Judah had to struggle to make things work. “I worked at a jam factory and also sold TV remotes to make money to buy a MIDI keyboard,” says the inspiring musician, who didn’t pursue a degree after his 12th grade as he wanted to make music his life. “But when I had to take it up as a professional, I thought I could survive only by going mainstream. Being familiar with films, I could play around a bit with software, and I started experimenting and figured out that music production was my strength. I started approaching people and did corporate jingles until my first film Badmaash
happened.”
As someone who looks upto AR Rahman and Harris Jayaraj, he has one important goal that he wants to achieve in the coming years. “As ridiculous as it sounds, I’d like to do a Hollywood film by the time I turn 35. I’m dreaming about it and just dreams will not get me there — I’m building my contacts and pushing my work,” he says.
