Allah Rakha Rahman

Allah-Rakha Rahman is an Indian composer, singer-songwriter, musician and philanthropist.

Rahman was born in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India in a middle-class Tamil Mudaliar family. His father ,R.K.Shekhar, was a film score composer and conductor for Tamil and Malayalam films. After his father's death when Rahman was nine years old, the rental of his father's musical equipment provided his family's income.
Ha accompanied the great tabla maestro Zakir Hussain on a few world tours and also won a scholarship at the Trinity college of Music at Oxford University.

Rahman was introduced to Qadiri Islam when his younger sister was seriously ill in 1984. He converted to Islam (his mother's religion) with other members of his family in 1989 at age 23, changing his name from R.S.Dileep Kumar to Allah Rakha Rahman

Rahman met one of India's most famous directors Mani Ratnam. Rahman played him a few of his music samples. Mani loved them so much that he asked Rahman to compose the music for his next film,Roja then his music is going on and get so many awards like ACADEMY AWARDS, two GRAMMY AWARDS, a BAFTA AWARDS, a GOLDEN GLOBE, four NATIONAL FILM AWARDS, fifteen FILMFARE AWARDS and thirteen FILMFARE AWARDS SOUTH.Rahman's body of work for film and stage has given him the nickname of "THE MOZART OF MADRAS"and Tamil commentators and fans call him MUSICAL STORM.

Rahman has been bestowed with the "PADMA BHUSHAN" and "PADMA SHRI" , two of India's highest national civilian awards, recognizing his contribution to music, in addition to several other awards including 4 Indian National Film Awards and 28 Filmfare Awards, India's leading recognition for films. he has also been conferred with honorary doctorates from the Trinity College of Music, Aligarh Muslim University, Anna University and the Middlesex University.  He was also named by Time Magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, in 2009.

Allah-Rakha Rahman is married to SAIRA BANU and has three children : KHATIJA, RAHIMA AND AMEEN.