A tribute to old Hindi film music. Songs of the 30s through the 60s.

Guest Authors

Sajjad Hussain, Bollywood’s Loss

July 21, 2018

Guest article by DP Rangan to pay tribute to Sajjad Hussain on his 23rd death anniversary (15 June 1917 – 21 July 1995) (Sajjad Hussain has been acknowledged as an undisputed genius by all the stalwarts of film music. His name also became a byword for his short temper and his spats with his colleagues. […]

Read the full article

Roshan & Madan Mohan: Twin Towers of Rhapsody

July 14, 2018

Guest article by DP Rangan, with annotation by Subodh Agrawal, as a joint tribute to Roshan on his 101st birth anniversary (14 July 1917 – 16 November 1967) and to Madan Mohan on his 43rd death anniversary (25 June 1924 – 14 July 1975) (Subodh Agrawal once said that we often think of music directors […]

Read the full article

Suraiya: The Last Nightingale of Bollywood

June 15, 2018

Guest article by DP Rangan (Suraiya was literally as sweet as a nightingale. I have covered her in some detail. But with his amazing enthusiasm for research, DP Rangan was not deterred in finding enough interesting material and uncovered songs on her. I thank Mr Rangan for this nice article and join him in paying […]

Read the full article

Talat Mahmood: A Mesmeriser

May 9, 2018

Guest article by DP Rangan as a tribute to Talat Mahmood on his 20th death anniversary (24 February 1924 – 9 May 1998) (We know all the famous songs of Talat Mahmood. Most of them are already covered on SoY. But that is not a deterrent to a real Talat-fan like our indefatigable DP Rangan, […]

Read the full article

Tasveer exhibits of Bollywood

March 22, 2018

Guest article by DP Rangan (A lesser mortal, when asked to write on songs on ‘tasveer’, would have made some general observations about pictures, and mentioned some songs which contained the word ‘tasveer’. Not DP Rangan, as we know well by now. Mr Rangan takes us to pre-historic days when mankind would have started making […]

Read the full article

Nuptials in Bollywood

January 14, 2018

Guest article by DP Rangan (With Makar Sankranti and Pongal, as the month-long ‘inauspicious period’ comes to an end and the wedding season is set to resume with full vigour, our indefatigablete DP Rangan comes up with a very nicely-timed post on nuptial songs from our films. In his characteristic style, Mr Rangan packs in a […]

Read the full article

OP Nayyar unlike OP Nayyar

December 14, 2017

Guest article by Ravindra Kelkar (OP Nayyar lived life king size. Even when he was in financial difficulty in his later years, he was immaculately dressed and had a regal bearing; there was no dent in his famous pride – he refused the Lata Mangeshkar Award for music, which carried a substantial cash award for […]

Read the full article

Duets of OP Nayyar: Part 2

December 3, 2017

Guest article by Ravindra Kelkar (Of the 223 total duets composed by OP Nayyar, the most conspicuous are male-female duets in which the male voice is Rafi and the female voice, either Geeta Dutt or Shamshad Begum or Asha Bhosle. These are 119 in number, and were the subject matter of Ravindra Kelkar’s last post […]

Read the full article

Duets of OP Nayyar: Part 1

November 23, 2017

Guest article by Ravindra Kelkar (SoY readers would recall that Ravindra Kelkar has been making valuable contributions on OP Nayyar through his guest articles and, thus, filling up a gap in SoY. He has contributed three articles so far: ‘Three distinct phases of OP Nayyar’; OP Nayyar-Geeta Dutt: A peerless combination’; and OP Nayyar’s influence […]

Read the full article

Waterfalls in Bollywood

November 2, 2017

Guest article by DP Rangan (DP Rangan is a man with boundless energy. Even with a late debut on the Songs of Yore, at the rate he is writing he will soon overtake the regular guest writers. After the horse series, he switched to romantic themes of moon and stars. This post on Waterfalls in […]

Read the full article

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →