A WORLD FIRST – Maestro Ilaiyaraaja composes HCCB’s anthem His first ever composition for a corporate in 40+ years
Chennai, December 13, 2019: HCCB (Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages), one of India’s largest FMCG companies, today released its corporate anthem – a piece of music created by the maestro Dr. Ilaiyaraaja. This is the maestro’s first composition for a corporate in 40 years, in any part of the world. That the creator of more than 7,000 songs in 1,000 films, has never composed anything for a corporate entity may come as a surprise.
The anthem that the maestro has composed for the Bangalore based HCCB, bears his signature. It is eminently identifiable as his work. The tune is simple, registers with the listener instantly, and grows on the individual with every successive rendition. The melody catches attention and the richness of the composition provides longevity. The tune was composed by Dr. Ilaiyaraaja at Prasad studios in Chennai.
“HCCB is a pan Indian company, a very large enterprise, which is in multiple geographies, touches multiple communities and converses with multiple cultures. We also needed our anthem to convey HCCB’s values and the simplicity of our business. We therefore needed a composition which would bring all these things to life. I knew that only Raaja Sir would sum the scale and soul of HCCB with utmost simplicity and purity. Says Kamlesh Sharma, Chief Communications Officer, Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages.
Beginning with a soft and mellifluous tune on the flute, the anthem gradually extends into a powerful visual of India. In many ways, the music represents the new India, which is traditional and yet contemporary; always on the move, inspiring others and the world in the process.
Prathap Suthan, Chief Creative Officer at BangInTheMiddle, who conceived the brief for the maestro, says, “To me HCCB is a river that flows through India with enough and more tributaries – these tributaries being the various products that HCCB manufactures. Much as India interacts with the shores of the rivers, is how the local community would interact with HCCB. When you listen to the track that Ilaiyaraaja has composed, there is a certain flow to the tune. It feels like a river that meanders through. The entire tune is very smooth, there are no hard edges. It’s a masterpiece”.
About HCCB
HCCB is one of India’s largest FMCG companies. It manufactures, packages and sells, some of India’s most loved beverages – Minute Maid, Maaza, SmartWater, Kinley, Thums Up, Sprite, Coca-Cola, Limca, Fanta, Georgia and several others. A network of 3,900 distributors, 250,000 farmers, 7,000 suppliers and over 2.5 million retail outlets, makes HCCB, an ecosystem of significant scale. It operates in 25 states in 493 districts. Through its 18 factories, HCCB manufactures and sells 60 different products in 9 different categories.
