Book/Film Reviews

Book Review: “Behind the Curtain”

Behind the Curtain: Making Music in Mumbai’s Film Studios
Author: Gregory D Booth
Publisher: Oxford University Press 2008
Pages (including Index and References): 321
Price (Amazon Kindle Edition): ₹357

The SOY readers’, especially S Joseph’s, request to write a review of “Behind the Curtain” predates the series on Arrangers and Musicians, and my own desire to review the book goes further back by some years, well before the pandemic, when I would have written it as “In Conversation with Gregory Booth” – because during one of his regular visits to India, I had set up a meeting with him, but at the last moment he got stuck up in a small town in Western UP due to a medical emergency in the family of his musician friend he was visiting.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Book Review: “चल उड़ जा रे पंछी (संगीतकार चित्रगुप्त: व्यक्ति एवं कृति)”

चल उड़ जा रे पंछी…
संगीतकार चित्रगुप्त: व्यक्ति एवं कृति (खण्ड 1 एवं खण्ड 2)
By: Dr. Narendra Nath Pandey
Kautilya Books, New Delhi: 2022
ISBN: 978-93-90885-68-8
Pages: (256+474=730)
Price on Amazon: ₹1500 (Hardcover)

I have to start with a disclosure. The author of the above book, Dr Narendra Nath Pandey, is well known to me, having studied in the same college and lived in the same hostel, he being four years senior to me in the Physics Department. This small hostel of Patna Science College was known as a house of nerds, but Narendraji stood out even those days with his interest in literature, theatre and radio plays. After college our paths separated; I moved into the wide world of anonymity, and he into academics, finally retiring as University Professor of Physics. Along the way he pursued his other interests; the Research Council of the University gave him special permission to do research in the Hindi Department, finally honouring him with D. Litt.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Book Review: ‘Hindi Cine Raag Encyclopaedia’ Vol. 3, 4 & 5

Hindi Cine Raag Encyclopedia Vol 3, 4 & 5

Hindi Cine Raag Encyclopaedia
(Reference Edition Raagwise: Vol. 3, 4 & 5)
Author: KL Pandey
Sangeet Shilp Prakashan, Lucknow
First edition 2022
Hardcover ₹4800 on Amazon

A passionate lover of Hindi film music, who has deep interest in classical music too, asks two different types of questions: One, which raag(s) this favourite song is based on; Two, which are the famous songs based on this particular raag? These are very different questions, and can be conveniently searched only if there are reliable sources compiled on the two different parameters. On the internet a respected site chandrakantha.com gives links for Index of Song Titles (and their underlying raags) and Index of Raags (and songs based on that raag).

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Book Review: “The Unforgettable Music of HEMANT KUMAR”

The Unforgettable Music of HEMANT KUMAR
By Manek Premchand
Pages: 441
First Edition: 2020
Blue Pencil, New Delhi
(With study of his Bengali repertoire by Antara Nanda Mondal and Sounak Gupta)

Salil Chowdhury once said if God wanted to sing, he would do it in the voice of Hemant Kumar. Lata Mangeshkar said about him, “Listening to Hemant Da songs, I feel as if a Sadhu is singing bhajan in a temple.” A darling of Bengal where he was known as “Chhoto Pankaj” (Little Pankaj Mullick), and one of the top singers of Rabindra Sangeet. There was something divine about his mellifluous voice. I have not met a person who is not deeply passionate about Hemant Kumar’s voice. This blog celebrated his centenary in a very comprehensive manner in 2020, anchored by two erudite articles by N Venkataraman – Hemantayan Part 1 and Hemantayan Part 2 and a number of other articles on Hemant Kumar’s music in different combinations. Thus SOY readers’ appetite whetted  by the capsules on him, they would lap up Manek Premchand’s exhaustive book on Hemant Kumar.

Hemant Kumar was a man of many parts. We love him as a singer, his non-film songs are as mesmerising as his film songs. If he ruled our hearts in Hindi, he was an icon in Bengal. He continued his professional commitments in both Bombay and Calcutta, shuttling between the two cities at a  frenetic pace. He was a composer par excellence where he didn’t show any partiality to his own voice, freely taking other male voices if he considered that more suitable. He also ventured into film production, which barring some exceptions, were a commercial failure. With all that he looked after and provided for a large family. All this, coupled with his smoking habit must have told upon his health. All this is captured in the book in sufficient detail.

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Book review: ‘Yesterday’s Melodies Today’s Memories’

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Yesterday’s Melodies Today’s Memories
by Manek Premchand
1st Edition 2003
2nd Edition 2004
3rd Updated Edition: 2018
Notion Press, Chennai

A book review is generally meaningful when the book has come fresh out of the mint. But there are a number of reasons why it is never too late to review ‘Yesterday’s Melodies Today’s Memories’ (YMTM) on this forum. YMTM had made quite a splash when it came out and it has since remained quite popular. Book Review is not a regular feature on this blog. A reader Shachindra Prasad suggested that I review well-known books on Hindi film music, and I recall that he also mentioned this book. But the most important reason for me is that, true to its title, it is so much like Songs of Yore. The tagline of this blog says “A tribute to old film music. Songs of the 30s through 60s”. And Manekji says in the first line of his introduction to the book that it is “essentially about the many creative individuals whose genius produced unforgettable Hindi film songs from 1931 to 1970, and specifically between the years 1947 and 1970”. There couldn’t have been a better fit than this book for review on SOY.

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‘Hindi Cine Raag Encyclopaedia’ by KL Pandey: Book Review

Hindi Cine Raag Encyclopaedia (Reference Edition: Vol. I and Vol. II) Author: KL Pandey Sangeet Shilp Prakashan, Lucknow Second edition (Revised and Enlarged): December 2020 Hardcover ₹3200 on Amazon (Note: ‘Sur Samvadini’, a glossary of Hindustani Classical Music and a list of 174 raags appearing in Hindi film songs with their basic grammar, available complimentaryREAD THE FULL ARTICLE

“Guide, The Film: Perspectives”

Book Review

Guide

Guide, The Film: Perspectives
Lata Jagtiani & Other Writers
Blue Pencil, New Delhi, 2019
ISBN: 978-81-939555-2-9

An unintended blessing of Corona-enforced lockdown, I thought, was that I would be able to finish some half-read books and watch and rewatch some of my favourite films. With this thought I resumed ‘Guide, The Film: Perspectives’ which had been sitting on my desk for a while. My desire appeared to be facing a serious setback as Doordarshan decided to take us back to their golden era by carpet-bombing DD National and DD Bharati with their classic serials, Ramayan, Mahabharat, Buniyad, Dekh Bhai Dekh and NFDC films etc. I didn’t want to miss the nostalgia, but by then I was quite engrossed in the book and I had to finish it by rationing my time between different pulls.

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Book Review: “Incomparable Sachin Dev Burman”

Incomparable Sachin Dev Burman By HQ Chowdhury Published by Blue Pencil, New Delhi, 2018 ₹599 (Available for less on Amazon); pp 437 Among all the biographies of SD Burman – I am aware of at least four, all well known – the ‘Incomparable Sachin Dev Burman’ by HQ Chowdhury of Bangladesh, first published in BangladeshREAD THE FULL ARTICLE

‘Forgotten Artists of Early Cinema and The Same Name Confusion’

Welcoming the ‘writer’ Arunkumar Deshmukh and his first book

Forgotten Artists of Early Cinema

‘Forgotten Artists of Early Cinema and The Same Name Confusion’
By Arunkumar Deshmukh & Prof Surjit Singh
Published by Professor Toofaanii Publishers

I want some information about Master Vitthal and Zubeida, the lead actors of the first talkie, ‘Alam Ara’, for writing my dissertation for my film course. Where can I get information about the early stars like Master Nissar and Jahanara Kajjan, and other actors, such as Mridula, Vasanti, Bhudo Advani etc? Did the hero Shyam of ‘Dillagi’ (1949) also sing his songs, such as the duets with Suraiya, ‘Tu mera chaand main teri chaandni’ or ‘Zaalim zamana mujhko tumse chhuda raha hai’? Is Rajkumari, who played the role of Chandramukhi in ‘Devdas’ (1935), the same as the famous singer Rajkumari who sang ‘Suno bairi balam kuchh bol’ in ‘Bawre Nain’ (1950)? Are Sitara Kanpuri and Sitara Devi the same person?

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