Best songs of 1942

And the winners are? As we go back more and more into vintage years there is a concern whether we would come across some familiar songs. There are indeed some undiscovered gems, but there are also many songs which have become immortal and have been part of us since the radio era. KL Saigal wasREAD THE FULL ARTICLE

Songs of Synecdoche and Onomatopoeia

The CBSE syllabus for its Board examinations in English includes a topic ‘Poetic Devices’ or ‘Figures of Speech’. The common ones like simile, metaphor, irony, hyperbole  and oxymoron have entered our everyday vocabulary. But two sound very profound and scholarly: Synecdoche and Onomatopoeia. I start with a brief introduction before I come to the songs.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

The Sculptors of Film Songs (3): Enoch Daniels

Guest article by Piyush M Pandya (Gujarati) and Ashok M Vaishnav (English translation) as a tribute to Enoch Daniels on his 90th birth anniversary (b. 16 April 1933) in the continuing series on Arrangers and Musicians

(After their articles on Sebastian D’ Souza and Anthony Gonsalves, the guest authors Piyush M Pandya and Ashok M Vaishnav now write this article as a tribute to another legend Enoch Daniels on his 90th birth anniversary. We are lucky that he is still around, in Pune.

Enoch Daniels is synonymous with piano-accordion. He is among the few Arrangers and Musicians who established their independent identity, through his records and concerts. I am grateful to Piyushji and Ashokji for another excellent article on the legendary Enoch Daniels. – AK) 

How to begin the article on Enoch Daniels is the dilemma of choosing between presenting the musician first or his instrument. Accordion has its presence registered in almost all genre of music, such as Rock n Roll, Jazz, Pop etc. The great accordionists like Goody Seervai, Sumit Mitra, Kersi Lord, Dheeraj Dhanak, K. Bharat, Enoch Daniels, Sammy Reuben and Suraj Sathe greatly contributed to the wide-spread use of (piano) accordion in songs, title music, background scores, or anywhere where music had a role in Hindi films in the 50s and 60s. Because of its universal appeal, it seems better to talk about the accordion first.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Ballads of Love: Agony

Guest article by DP Rangan (DP Rangan had written on the ecstasy side of love when the stars shine bright, sky is bluer than ever, flowers are in bloom, and the world smiles tenderly. But joy and sorrow are the two sides of the same coin – खुशी के साथ दुनिया में ह्ज़ारों ग़म भीREAD THE FULL ARTICLE

SN Tripathi Part 1: The Vintage Years – A Multi-faceted Talent

A tribute to SN Tripathi on the 35th Anniversary of his Remembrance Day (14 March 1913-28 March 1988)

Whenever we think of melody, honey-dipped sweetness and beautiful dances to classical/ semi-classical tunes we think of SN Tripathi. We all have many of his immortal songs on our lips: Aa laut ke aaja mere meet, Nain ka chain churakar kar le gayi (Mukesh); Zara saamne to aao chhaliye, Na kisi ki aankh ka noor hun, Lagta nahin hai dil mera ujade dayar mein, Parvardigaar-e-aalam tera hi hai sahara (Rafi), Sakhi kaise dharun main dheer, Nigaahon mein tum ho khayalon mein tum ho jidhar dekhati hun nazar aa rahe ho (Lata Mangeshkar). And it goes on and on. Chitragupta must have got his melody and sweetness under his tutelage.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Ballads of Love: Ecstasy

Guest article by DP Rangan

(We celebrated Holi sometime back. This is the season of romance and love, when the flowers bloom, there is music in the stream of rivulets and rustling of leaves, and the hearts of even old people are aflutter with desire. There is a folk proverb to describe this: ‘फागुन में बुढ़वा देवर लागे’. (This has nothing to do with the guest author DP Rangan’s age though.) Mr Rangan is deeply romantic, but absolutely clean; he has taken additional precaution to start this post with the evolutionary anthropology of love.

Our films are generally love stories full of songs and dances. The Bollywood hero and heroine hid in the bushes and ran around trees; when they were bashful, flowers swayed and kissed each other. In another type of love, towards the end, the woman applied the dust of her devata’s feet to her parted hair and installed the deity in the mandir of her heart. We lapped these songs. I was not surprised when I got a suggestion to write on ‘love songs’. I was hesitant because every second song was a love song, and some of the ‘romances’ made me cringe.

I find on SOY that when I am not able to fulfil the readers’ request, by some telepathy someone offers to fill up the gap. Mr Rangan is now in his 80’s, but he has the energy of an eighteen-year old. He is the most prolific guest author, having written 28 articles for SOY. Here he comes up with another exhaustive article on the commonest theme of Bollywood songs. Thank you Mr Rangan for this interesting piece. – AK)

Human beings were the last to emerge in the evolutionary process which commenced with unicell organisms progressing to multi-cell and more complicated forms of life over aeons. Initially humans were living as a hunter-gatherer society following their prey. Invention of agriculture about 12000 years ago was a great step in progress. It enabled them to stay rooted in a region and stabilise their lives. Their numbers grew into an organised society. Endowed with cognitive abilities, they developed skills as painting on rocks of which there are plenty of evidence discovered by archaeologists. To celebrate important occasions in their lives, community get together was born with activities as dancing.

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Kleptomania in Bollywood

Wishing the readers and their families a very Happy Holi and International Women’s Day

We are all aware of the drug problem in Bollywood, thanks to the media which went into frenzy at some NCB raids at rave parties and the homes of some celebrities. There was a lot of moralising about the decadent lifestyle of our role models. Bollywood in turn was surprised at the hullaballoo and their response was, Guys! Grow up to the new social reality. Everyone does party drugs, which have been legalised in many countries. And Hey lawmakers and enforcement agencies! Remove them from the list of banned substances.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

The Sculptors of Film Music (2): Anthony Gonsalves

Guest article by Piyush M Pandya (originally in Gujarati) and Ashok M Vaishnav (English translation) as a tribute to Anthony Gonsalves (12 June 1927 – 18 January 2012)

(Greg Booth starts his celebrated book on the musicians and arrangers, “Behind the Curtain: Making Music in Mumbai’s Film Studios”, with the introductory chapter titled, “Who Is Anthony Gonsalves”. We all, of course, know that he was one of the three brothers of Manmohan Desai’s “Amar Akbar Anthony” (1977), played on the screen by Amitabh Bachchan, who burst out of a huge Easter egg, singing the suerhit song “My Name Is Anthony Gonsalves”.

However, not many know that LP composed this song as a tribute to Pyarelal’s violin guru, Anthony Gosalves. Booth also points to the irony of the biggest star of Hindi films, The Amitabh Bachchan playing a character and lip-sync a song named after a musician and arranger who lived a life of anonymity.

Anthony Gonsalves was regarded as the first arranger of Hindi films, starting his career from the 1940s. Continuing their series of tribute to what they call “The Sculptors of Film Music”, the guest writers Piyush M Pandya and Ashok M Vaishnav now answer the question, “Who Was Anthony Gonsalves”. Their first article was devoted to Sebastian D’Souza. Thank you Piyushji and Ashokji for another highly informative article on one of the greatest musicians and arrangers. – AK)

Even a very keen follower of film music would it find it difficult to list the music arrangers and instrument players beyond a few, more by luck than design, handpicked popular names. When radio was the major source of listening to the film songs, one possible reason that music arrangers and instrument players hardly got any mention when the song was played was that for each song such a list would probably take more time than possibly the actual paying time of the song, typically recorded on one side of a 78-RPM shellac record. By the time FM radio listening generation came in, this genre of supporting music was confined to pre-programmed database of ‘digitally generated’ sounds of digital or electronic instruments. So, when the music director himself was becoming more of an assembler, it would be surprising if any other support sources would have got some mention.READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Nimmi – ‘The Unkissed Girl of India’

A tribute to Nimmi on her 90th birth anniversary (b. 18 Feb 1933 – d. 25 March 2020) by guest writer DP Rangan

(When you think of Nimmi, you think of a live-wire, innocent village belle; a mountain girl who pines for her city-slick lover; a courtesan loved by a nawab who cannot disclose his relationship to the world, which the courtesan accepts in suffering, but gives a decent upbringing to his bright brother. A commoner who dares and looks in the eye of the villainous prince. And that takes me to Aan (1952) which has become the reference point for the tagline of this article on Nimmi by DP Rangan.

I have been so far describing Mr Rangan as a septuagenarian going on seventeen. I didn’t realise that the age counter moves up every year. Now he is well into his eighties with the same unbounded energy. He was forced to lie low for some medical issues and computer malfunction. As soon as he came out of this period he was raring to go with a number of ideas for different posts. My response to him has been, now he has to take it easy. Mr Rangan has been the most prolific guest writer on Songs of Yore, and he is familiar to SOY regulars. He has as usual written a thorough article on an important actress who debuted with RK’s Barsaat in 1949 and went on to make a mark in several superhit films as the lead or the second lead. Thank you Mr Ragan for this nice tribute to Nimmi on her 90th birth anniversary. – AK)

Let us jump back in time, a favourite concept in very many scientific novels/films (e.g. Back to the Future, a Hollywood movie) and position ourselves before Hotel Rialto, London on the 18th July 1952. It is a gathering of distinguished guests from England, India, Indonesia etc. Nimmi is part of the entourage along with Mehboob Khan, producer of the movie Aan. The premiere of the movie in its English version named The Savage Princess is being held. It is the first Indian film to be made in full colour and shown abroad. A few days later a reception was well attended by film personalities from Hollywood too. Dazzled by the charm of Nimmi, four producers from Hollywood, including Cecil B. De Mille offered her roles in their future ventures. Nimmi refused it. Errol Flynn, a leading Hollywood actor, sought  the hand of Nimmi to plant a kiss in the traditional western style. Taken aback, Nimmi declined it stating that she was an Indian girl and such practices were foreign to her culture. As usual paparazzi were buzzing among the guests. Next day came headlines in many papers – ‘Nimmi the Unkissed Girl of India’. This was stated by Nimmi herself in an interview. A truly remarkable way to gather such a title.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