Sometimes, it all comes down to instinct. That’s what happened with actor Soni Razdan when director Danish Renzu mentioned that he was planning a biopic on the Kashmiri music icon Raj Begum and wanted her to play the protagonist. Instinctively, she said yes. “I didn’t even read the script. I said yes, there and then,” smiles Razdan, recalling how Songs of Paradise had her heart from the moment she heard of it.

Luckily, the film found legs. Producer Shafat Qazi and Amazon Prime Video backed Renzu’s vision, while Excel Entertainment came on board as the presenters. Led by Saba Azad and Razdan, Songs of Paradise — also starring Taaruk Raina, Zain Khan Durrani, Sheeba Chadha, and Shishir Sharma — tells the largely unheard story of Begum, who began her career singing at weddings and emerged as the first female voice for Radio Kashmir in 1954. Known as the Melody Queen of Kashmir, the Padma Shri awardee broke several social and cultural barriers.

Raj Begum