Pritam

Pritam Chakraborty (born 14 June 1971), also known mononymously as Pritam, is an Indian composer, instrumentalist, guitarist, music producer and singer.

He recreated the famous 1971 song, "Dum Maro Dum" for Ramesh Sippy's 2011 movie of the same name.

In 1994, Pritam joined FTII, Pune, where he took up Sound Recording and Engineering.

Pritam formed a band called "Jotugriher Pakhi" with his Presidency batchmates, for which he played the guitar.

They released a cassette around that time.

Pritam joined a Bangla band, Chandrabindoo.

Later Pritam started the band Metro with James, Suhail, Soham, and Eric during his film called Life in a... Metro.

After completing his sound engineering course from FTII Pune, Chakraborty came to Mumbai in 1997.

He started composing ad jingles where he met other budding artists such as Shantanu Moitra, Rajkumar Hirani, Sanjay Gadhvi and Jeet Gannguli.

Pritam composed renowned jingles for brands like Santro, Emami, McDonald's, Head & Shoulders, Thums Up, Limca, Complan and composed title tracks for TV serials such as Astitva, Kkavyanjali, Ye Meri Life Hai, Remix, Kashmeer, Miilee, and Dil Kare.

Graduating from FTTI in Sound Engineering, he was working as an ad jingles composer, later he debuted as a co-composer in the 2001 Hindi film Tere Liye.

He debuted as a solo composer with the album Dhoom.

Composition of the title track of Dhoom became the first viral music of indian film history, helped him win the Zee Cine Award for Best Track of the Year & vast acknowledgements.

In a career spanning over two decades, he has composed music for more than 125 Bollywood Movies, and he has been the recipient of numerous awards, including six Filmfare Awards for Best Music Director and 4 Mirchi Music Award for Music Composer of The Year from 14 nominations.

Pritam was born in a Bengali Brahmin family to Anuradha Chakraborty and Prabodh Chakraborty.

He gained his early training in music from his father and learned to play the guitar while he was in school.

He went to St. James' School and has a bachelor's degree in geology from Presidency College.

Pritam was associated with the non-partisan political platform Independents' Consolidation during his days at Presidency.

Pritam got his first break for Tere Liye (released December 2001).

Though the music was well-received, the film missed the mark.

In 2002, The Jeet-Pritam duo once again composed music for Yash Raj Films' Mere Yaar Ki Shaadi Hai.

All the songs from the film were chartbusters.

Soon after, over some misunderstanding, Jeet decided to split and the partners and go their separate ways.

Pritam's compositions were noted for their ability to blend Indian classical music with western styles.

His compositions for Gadhvi's second film Dhoom were a runaway hit.

The title-track of Dhoom in two versions – Hindi (by Sunidhi Chauhan) and English (by Tata Young) – broke geographic barriers becoming popular in pubs in the UK, USA and the East Asia and won him his first Zee Cine Award for Best Track of the Year.

He received his first nomination for the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director for the soundtrack of Dhoom.

In 2006, he also composed the songs for Gadhvi's Dhoom sequel, Dhoom 2, which despite mixed critical reviews, achieved major commercial success and became the highest-selling Indian music album of the year.

It also earned him his second nomination for the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.

He followed this up with compositions for films like Gangster, Jannat, and Kismat Konnection.

In 2007, his compositions for Anurag Basu's Life in a... Metro garnered him widespread critical acclaim.

He formed a band called Metro with Suhail Kaul, Sohu pet name Chakraborty, Eric Pillai and Bangladeshi singer James for the film.

He won his second Zee Cine Award for Best Track of the Year for the song "Mauja Hi Mauja" from Jab We Met by Imtiaz Ali.

Jab We Met won him his first Producers Guild Film Award for Best Music Director.

Both Jab We Met and Life in a... Metro earned him his third and fourth nominations for the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.

He then composed the soundtracks of Race (2008), Kismat Konnection (2008), Love Aaj Kal (2009) and Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani (2009), all of which earned him his fifth, sixth and seventh nominations for the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.

His Sufi songs for the 2010 film Once Upon A Time in Mumbaai were popular with the masses and songs like "Pee Loon" and "Tum Jo Aaye" were declared chartbusters, earning him his eighth nomination for the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.

He teamed up again with Mahesh Bhatt and Vishesh Films for music of Crook of which the song "Mere Bina" got instant recognition with public.

His foot-tapping numbers for Rohit Shetty's Golmaal 3 were also equally successful.

In 2011, he got to work for Salman Khan's Ready and Bodyguard.