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Who's That: Amar Mangrulkar is Adland’s Pied Piper
An MBA who started out in client servicing and carried on in copywriting, this Mumbaikar finally settled as a music composer
He has composed music for the latest Slice commercial with Katrina Kaif romanticising the drink, rasiya. He has also scored the music for the recent and first non-celebrity Airtel commercial for 2009. A pucca Mumbaikar, Amar Mangrulkar composes music for ad films, majorly for telecom brands Airtel, Vodafone and Virgin Mobile. For Virgin, he has put the signature tune in place.
The music for the Madhavan-Vidya Balan Airtel films has been composed by him and so is the music for Vodafone, including the 10p film featuring a guy purchasing a ring, Tell The World series, and the Chhota Credit commercial.
When not working, the 39-year-old composer likes to indulge in sports, movies, books and spending quality time with his family.
A management graduate, he started his advertising career in client servicing with O&M in 1994. When offered a creative role, he promptly took the plunge and became a copywriter.
During one of his regular trips to the music studios, he realised that he wanted to compose music. That’s when he quit his job with O&M.
He got his first break as a music composer while he was freelancing as a copywriter for Bajaj Fans’ creative agency – Heroes Publicity. He ended up scoring the music for the brand.
In 2002, Mangrulkar began working with production houses and agencies. Preparing promos for B4U was one of his stepping stones. However, composing music for the title track of Kaun Banega Crorepati (Season 2) - Umeed Se Dugna, changed things.
Recently, he has composed music for Nilon’s Pickle, Bingo and Mentos (the donkey animation film). The music track Nazar Ko Kya Chahiye for Max New York Life Insurance was scored by him as well. Mangrulkar works with production houses such as Nirvana, Corcoise, Footcandles and Soda Films on a regular basis.
“Having worked in the ad industry helps me in my compositions, as I try to incorporate the creative motive in the music. It’s like a silent, unspoken advantage I bring to use at times,” he says.
(Who's that? is an effort to highlight the lesser known talents from the advertising, media and marketing industry.)