There, after all, could be a method to his genius. Charles Assisi finds out.

Soon after I got out of AR Rahman’s North Mumbai home (which also doubles as his studio), I went online. To look up ‘Munbe Vaa’, a song in the Tamil movie, Sillunu Oru Kaadhal, for which Rahman had composed the music.

Now, I don’t understand a word of Tamil. And I can confidently say—without fear of contradiction from my wife—that I’m rarely ‘mushy.’  But the moment the song started to play, I was lost. Lost in words I didn’t understand, and—I hate to say it—falling in love with love all over again.

We had visited Rahman with a clear brief in mind. There’s a section in ForbesLife India , ‘The Pursuit of Happiness,’ where we talk to people who are perceptibly happy and ask them one central question: How do they achieve happiness? In earlier issues, as part of this series of dialogues, we’d spoken to people like the absolutely lovely Asha Bhosle, Bollywood’s original charmer Shammi Kapoor, and the redoubtable Leander Paes who’s known to play his tennis with his heart worn loud on his sleeve…read more.

—Image courtesy of Forbes India Magazine/AR Rahman’s private collection