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

Singers

Kishore Kumar’s duets by SD Burman

October 13, 2014

A tribute on Kishore Kumar’s death anniversary October 13 It is befitting that I am completing my (renewed) series on SD Burman with the singer he was most fond of. With 115 songs, he gave Kishore Kumar more songs than any other (male) singer. Surjit Singh’s site indicates that out of this only 53 were […]

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The Lonely Ghazal Queen: Begum Akhtar

October 7, 2014

A tribute on her Birth Centenary, October 7 A legend in her lifetime, who achieved enormous fame at a very young age, and gave joy to millions of listeners of many generations, including doyens like Mehdi Hasan, Talat Mahmood, Madan Mohan, Pt. Jasraj and Pt. Ravi Shankar, Begum Akhtar’s own life seems to be full […]

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The Swar-Saamraagyi and the the Sangeet-Maartand: Best of Lata Mangeshkar by Anil Biswas

September 28, 2014

Continuing Anil Biswas Centenary series, his best songs for Lata Mangeshkar as birthday greetings to her Anil Biswas occupies an important place among the music directors who played a major role in grooming and developing Lata Mangehskar. She was an artiste par excellence, but Anil Biswas taught her the craft of playback singing: the importance […]

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Hemant Kumar’s songs by SD Burman

September 17, 2014

Hemant Kumar, a singer-composer par excellence, and SD Burman, a Titan among singer-composers. And the former was quite open to singing for other composers too. That brought the two great Bengalis together. Hemant Kumar was another name for melody and sweetness – he is among those who never sang anything which was less than extremely […]

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Made for each other: Mukesh and Kalyanji-Anandji

August 27, 2014

A tribute to Mukesh on his death anniversary August 27, and a tribute to the music duo In the surfeit of TV programmes associated with Centenary Celebrations of Indian Cinema last year, I closely followed the ones on film music. There was one presented by a young lady on Kalyanji-Anandji. After a quick reference to […]

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Rafi’s duets by SD Burman

July 31, 2014

A tribute to Rafi on his death anniversary, July 31 If you revisit my earlier post on Rafi’s songs (solos) composed by SD Burman, along with the readers’ comments, you realise the high regard in which the music lovers hold their combination. In spite of his known fondness for Kishore Kumar, SD Burman had something […]

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The Maker of Mukesh: Anil Biswas

July 22, 2014

Continuing Anil Biswas Centenary Year celebration, a tribute to his most famous protégé, Mukesh, on his birth anniversary, July 22 And the rest is history. A worn-out cliché, but nothing describes Anil Biswas’s role in the emergence of Mukesh better. Mukesh was a struggling singer-actor in the period 1941-1945, when his brother-in-law, Motilal, took him […]

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Suraiya’s songs by SD Burman

June 15, 2014

A tribute on her 85th birth anniversary, June 15 SD Burman getting into Navketan camp and Suraiya’s intense romance with Dev Anand meant that there would be a number of songs of this singer (and actor)-composer pair. Since SD Burman made his debut late, his songs for Suraiya are much less compared to, say, Naushad’s, […]

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Multiple Version Songs (16): Rabindra Sangeet and Pankaj Mullick

May 7, 2014

Hridaya Pankaje Rabi Viraje A tribute to Gurudev Rabindranath Thakur (7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941) and Pankaj Mullick (10 May 1905 – 19 February 1978) by guest author N Venkataraman (The appeal of Rabindranath Thakur’s poetry and songs of love, nature and worship transcends the boundaries of language and culture. Pankaj Mullick, one […]

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East meets West: Shamshad Begum’s songs by SD Burman

April 23, 2014

A tribute on Shamshad Begum’s first death anniversary April 23 As the ethnic stereotypes go, no two people can be further apart from each other than a Bengali and a Punjabi. SD Burman and Shamshad Begum were the leading lights of the two extremes – East Bengal and the West Punjab, yet when they combined they […]

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