AR Rahman on working with Hans Zimmer for Ramayan: ‘It’s awesome, Hans created the soundscape’

Music maestro AR Rahman has revealed about his much-talked about collaboration with renowned Hollywood composer Hans Zimmer for the upcoming epic film Ramayana. Speaking about the experience, Rahman described the process as creatively thrilling and extremely challenging, as the story holds cultural and emotional weight across generations and geographies.

AR Rahman on working with Hans Zimmer

In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter India, Rahman reflected on working with Zimmer. He said, "We just did a few sessions and you heard the early promo. It’s awesome for both of us that we’re achieving something so prestigious and important to the world."Elaborating on his creative process, Rahman explained how his ideas merged organically. "In the promo, they had a soundscape and then I took Sanskrit words and added." 

He further talked about the complexity of the task and said, "So what’s complicated is that you’re taking something that’s so epic, that every Indian knows and we have to give them something new as a world. We are giving to the world, from India to the world." Rahman stressed the need to strike a balance between tradition and innovation and said, "So you have to unlearn some things. Our instinct demands from the mind that this should be done. But also imbibe some eternal qualities present in the culture."

About the movie Ramayana

Ramayan is directed by Nitish Tiwari and produced by Namit Malhotra, who is helming the project on a grand scale with a massive cast. Ranbir Kapoor plays the role of Lord Ram in the film, while Sai Pallavi plays the role of Sita. Yash plays the role of the villain Ravana. The cast also includes Sunny Deol as Hanuman, Ravi Dubey as Lakshman and Lara Dutta as Kaikeyi. The epic drama will be released in two parts, with Part 1 releasing on Diwali 2026 and Part 2 releasing on Diwali 2027, offering a grand cinematic retelling of the Indian epic.