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Eager fans turned up on the St. George’s school grounds as early as 4 pm on Sunday evening, to “catch places” in the front rows. Shouts of “Rahman-Rah-Rah” filled the air and the excited audience waved posters, phootgraphs and sketches of Rahman. A bright green and red “Thank you Times of India” poster was waved around. Even the normally-staid VVIPs let their hair down to cheer and screech. The fashionably late found themselves standing in the aisles until accommodating organizers brought in more chairs.

After waiting for seven years, India’s most famous contemporary music composer A.R. Rahman Wednesday launched his first full-fledged orchestra. It has been named “Global Music” and is the first homegrown orchestra.

“I kept hearing someone is setting up an orchestra and waited for seven long years for someone else to set up an orchestra like the New York, London or Budapest Philharmonic in India. But it did not happen”, Rahman, whose recent works include music for “Guru” and “Jodhaa Akbar”, told the media here.

“Whenever I want to compose for an orchestra, I have to go to London or Budapest,” he complained.

The music maestro announced setting up of the orchestra along with the launch of his KM Conservatory, a music school for professional musicians in the outskirts of the city.

The orchestra, to be fully operational in the next two years, will have both Indian as well as Western musicians. “It will play combinations of two kinds of instruments. There is so much talent in India, but we have no symphony orchestra,” Rahman told the media.