Shankar Jaikishan

Shankar Jaikishan’s duets (2)

Shankar-Jaikishn May 16, 2017

In the first part of Shankar-Jaikishan’s duets, I covered the songs in which either Mukesh or Rafi sang with a female singer. They being the predominant singers, one would think that that post would cover most of the famous duets composed by them. But SJ were hugely talented and diversified, and played a key role […]

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Shankar-Jaikishan’s duets (1): Mukesh/Rafi with female singers

Shankar Jaikishan April 25, 2017

In the last calendar year I did a series of posts on Shankar-Jaikishan’s songs: singerwise for Lata Mangeshkar, Mukesh, Rafi, Manna Dey, ‘Other singers’ and two posts on their dance songs – for Lata Mangeshkar and female dance duets. Several readers rightly remarked that SJ’s series would not be complete without covering their duets. That […]

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Shankar-Jaikishan’s multi-faceted genius with ‘other’ singers

Shankar-Jaikishan December 1, 2016

In my series on Shankar-Jaikishan, I have covered so far their best songs for his leading singers, Lata Mangeshkar, Mukesh, Rafi and Manna Dey. SJ would be easily reckoned among the top five music directors for these major singers. Besides, I have also presented his best dance songs for Lata Mangeshkar and female dance duets. […]

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Some great songs of Lata Mangeshkar by Shankar-Jaikishan

Shankar-Jaikishan with Lata Mangeshkar November 9, 2016

Lata Mangeshkar is a ubiquitous presence on SoY. Shankar-Jaikishan, being one of the most dominant and successful music directors, have also figured very prominently on this blog. Therefore, it is difficult to believe, but it is true, that I have not done a post on the best songs of this combination as I have done […]

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My favourite Rafi songs by Shankar-Jaikshan

Shankar-Jaikishan with Rafi July 31, 2016

A tribute to Rafi on his 36th death anniversary (24 December 1924 – 31 July 1980) Rafi is arguably the best male playback singer of Hindi films, and Shankar-Jaikishan are, by any yardstick, among the greatest music directors. In any case they have been commercially the most successful and dominant figure over two decades (1950s-60s). […]

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Shankar-Jaikishan’s songs for Mukesh

Shankar Jaikishan and Mukesh July 22, 2016

A tribute on Mukesh’s 93rd birth anniversary (22 July 1923 – 27 August 1976) Mukesh debuted as (actor-)singer in 1941 with Nirdosh, i.e. 8 years before Shankar-Jaikishan’s debut in 1949 with RK Films’ Barsaat. After some initial struggle, Mukesh got a chance to work with the music titan of the era, Anil Biswas, courtesy his […]

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Shankar-Jaikishan’s female dance duets

Aji chale aao May 29, 2016

My post on Shankar-Jaikishan’s dance songs for Lata Mangeshkar generated a great deal of enthusiasm. I think the readers were with me that these songs are of exceptional quality and their orchestration and picturisation are very unique to SJ. KS Bhatiaji who has a great liking for SJ, matching mine for Naushad, suggested that their […]

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Manna Dey’s songs by Shankar-Jaikishan

Shankar-Jaikishan with Manna Dey May 1, 2016

A tribute to Manna Dey (1 May 1919 – 24 October 2013) on his 97th birth anniversary Mumbaikar8 has rightly pointed out that Manna Dey has not yet got the importance on SoY he deserves. That in a way is also a reflection of his career. Recognised as an unparalleled singer of classical songs, he […]

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Shankar-Jaikishan’s dance songs for Lata Mangeshkar

Shankar-Jaikishan with Lata Mangeshkar February 12, 2016

(DP Rangan recently asked me who would be the music director of 2016. Obviously, he presumed there would be one, because I celebrated 2015 as the Year of Naushad (with C Ramchandra in tandem), and the year before that as the Year of Anil Biswas. Concurrently, I also covered SD Burman extensively, but that happened […]

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Best songs of 1953: Final Wrap Up 4

Shankar Jaikishan_C Ramchandra_Ghulam Mohammad_Anil Biswas_Salil Chaudhary December 21, 2013

The Songs of Yore Award for the Best Music Director goes to? Canasya asked in one of the posts in this series, what was the avowed objective of these posts? Jignesh mentioned that SoY Awards have surpassed the fame of Filmfare Awards (I like that ).  Filmfare is indeed a reference point, because this series […]

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