Vande Mataram (album) Vande Mataram (album) Vande Mataram is a 1997 studio album by Indian musician A. R. Rahman. It is the largest selling Indian non-film album to date. It released on December 9, 1997 by Columbia Records, a music label owned by Sony Music. It was released on the Golden Jubilee anniversary of India's independence and has been instrumental in instilling a sense of patriotic pride and national unity amongst the people of India. Ever since release, both the album and its title song "Maa Tujhe Salaam" have had a profoundly positive and unifying impact on the nationalistic and patriotic mood of
Of Thee I Sing In addition, as an integrated song-and-story production it produced fewer hit songs than many of the Gershwins' musicals. Ira Gershwin explained, "In the show there are no verse-and-chorus songs; there is a sort of recitative running along, and lots of finales and finalettos." Ira Gershwin recalled that the title song, inspired by the final phrase of "My Country, 'Tis of Thee", was somewhat controversial among the production staff. "When we first played this sentimental political campaign song... there were objectors who thought that juxtaposing the dignified 'of thee I sing' with a slangy 'baby' was going a bit too far.