As someone responsible for the arts, entertainment and culture beats at UNB and Dhaka Courier, I regularly explore different forms of art, literature and culture. Music, films, theatre and visual art are not simply subjects I write about; often, I have to listen to, watch and experience them before I can understand what they are trying to communicate. That is how I came across 'Kolpona' on a rainy afternoon during a day off, when I sat down with some music on YouTube and pressed play without any particular expectation.

For those of us who grew up in the 1990s, our relationship with music can feel somewhat different. We grew up at a time when songs were given time to settle in. Albums were played repeatedly, melodies were remembered and certain songs gradually became attached to particular emotions and memories. Contemporary music, meanwhile, has become technically more sophisticated and sonically expansive, but I do not always find myself emotionally connected to it in quite the same way. Listening to 'Kolpona', however, I found traces of that older feeling again, even though the song itself makes no attempt to imitate an earlier era. And that, made me curious.

Beneath its contemporary production and expansive arrangement, there is an emotional sincerity that made me listen to the track more than once. I was also surprised that the song had not travelled among listeners as much as I thought it might have. Popularity is never an exact measure of a song's value, but when a piece of music makes me want to return to it, I naturally become curious about how it was made. That curiosity led me to speak with the singer Arafat Mohsin and his brother Arafat Kirty about 'Kolpona', contemporary music and the craft behind the sound.

Arafat Mohsin has established himself as a singer-songwriter, composer and music producer, working across independent music and cinema. His film credits include 'Surongo', 'Toofan', 'Borbaad', 'Daagi' and 'Taandob'. From his work with Studio58 and debut EP 'Thako' to songs such as 'Konodin' and 'Kolpona', melody, arrangement and emotional character have remained central to his music.

'Kolpona' feels particularly personal. It does not reveal its full scale immediately. The song begins with acoustic instrumentation and Mohsin's voice, creating an intimate space before gradually introducing drums, guitar, keyboard, organ and layers of vocals. The arrangement grows almost organically, making the eventual expansion feel earned rather than imposed. For me, that gradual transformation is one of the song's most compelling qualities.

This is where Arafat Kirty's contribution becomes especially interesting. Based in Bangladesh and currently in the UK, Kirty works as a music producer, mixing and mastering engineer and live sound practitioner. Musically trained from an early age, including three years of tabla, he later studied Music Production and Audio Engineering at Middlesex University. His work spans recorded music and major live performances in Bangladesh and the UK, including productions involving artists such as Srikanta Acharya, Ustad Shujaat Husain Khan, Padma Shri Anup Jalota, and Bangladeshi bands Souls and Chirkutt. He also worked as a sound engineer for Rasio Foorti.

Yet while listening to 'Kolpona', what struck me was not simply Kirty's technical background but how quietly his work operates. Good mixing is often most effective when the listener does not notice the engineering itself. In 'Kolpona', Mohsin's voice remains the emotional centre even as the arrangement expands. Kirty carefully shapes the space around it, deciding what sits in the foreground, what recedes and how that space changes as the song develops.

One detail particularly stayed with me: after the organ passage, the vocal delay leaves behind a faint trace of the voice. It does not feel like a conventional echo. Instead, the phrase seems to linger for a moment before disappearing. In a song called 'Kolpona', that quality feels almost metaphorical, like the residue of a thought that remains after the thought itself has ended.

By the final section, drums, electric guitar, keyboards and multiple vocal layers create a much larger sonic landscape. Yet the effect is not simply about volume. The open spaces established at the beginning have gradually been filled, allowing the climax to emerge naturally. This, perhaps, best illustrates the complementary roles of the two brothers: Mohsin builds the musical world, while Kirty gives that world depth, distance and perspective.

There is an interesting parallel in their musical journeys. Mohsin is developing his voice through contemporary Bengali songwriting, composition and performance in Bangladesh, while Kirty works from London, bringing his understanding of South Asian music into contemporary sound practice. In 'Kolpona', those experiences meet without either one overpowering the other.

My interest in the song, therefore, began simply as a listener's response on a rainy afternoon but became something more after speaking with its creators. Music production has changed, technology has changed, and the way we consume songs has changed, yet our relationship with melody remains deeply familiar. When a song opens a door to a personal feeling, we still respond to it instinctively.

Perhaps that is what I found in 'Kolpona': not a return to the past, but a contemporary song carrying a familiar emotional impulse. It begins quietly, gives itself room to breathe and gradually expands into a larger soundscape. Much like imagination itself, it starts as something small and inward, grows with space, and eventually finds a language of its own.