Archive for the ‘Post by Sadanand Kamath’ Category
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
Khursheed Bano ( 14/04/1914 – 18/04/2001), the singer of immortal songs such as “panchhi baawara chaand se preet lagaaye” , “ghataa ghanghor ghor” , “jiske milne ki tamanna thhi wo pyaara mil gayaa” was born as Irshad Begum near Lahore on April 14, 1914. She became an actor at a time when the era of silent movie was about to end. In the advent of talkie films when actors had to sing their own songs, she had to learn singing in furtherance of her acting career. In one of her interviews, she said that it was because of the painstaking efforts by music directors of that time that some of the actors like her could improve their singing skills.
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This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
In my younger days, my uncle used to play M S Subbulakshmi’s (MS) LPs of Venkateshwara Suprabhatam or Vishnu Sahastranamam early morning every day which I used to resent as it became virtually a wake-up alarm for me. But as days passed, I not only started liking her renditions, some of its verses got stored in my mind.
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This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
In my native place in Mangalore district (and perhaps other places in India specially in villages), it was a tradition in almost every house that all family members would assemble in the Pooja Room soon after the dusk for singing some devotional songs. In a joint family system, this tradition also worked as a means of creating bonding among large family members. After shifting to Mumbai in early 50s, with a nuclear family and a city culture, this tradition slowly got discontinued. But my mother would sing at least a couple of devotional songs every day after dusk while doing her kitchen chores. One of the devotional songs which I had often heard in my childhood was in the Konkani language, my mother tongue. I was very much impressed by the lyrics and the tune of the song.
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Kyaa dekha ab nainon waali
Posted on: April 5, 2012
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
I was contemplating a write-up on the song ‘kyaa dekhaa ab naiano waali nainaa kyoon bhar aaye’ from film DHARMPUTRA (1961) over a month for discussion in the blog. But the song is so heart touching that I have been avoiding watching it again for a write-up. The song is a masterpiece and worthy of bringing to the notice of readers of this blog. The film was produced by B R Chopra and directed by Yash Chopra. Mala Sinha, Rehman, Shahsi Kapoor and Indrani Mukherjee were the main actors in the film. Five songs from this film have already been discussed in the blog.
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Saawan ke nazaare hain
Posted on: April 4, 2012
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
KHAZAANCHI (1941) was produced by Lahore based Pancholi Art Picture owned by Dilsukh Pancholi and directed by Moti Gidwani. The star cast included Ramola, S D Narang, M Ismail, Durga Mota, Manorama, Ajmal etc. Recently, I watched this film on the internet and felt as if I was watching one of the films of 50s with a familiar story line – romance, a villain, murders, court proceedings, climax scenes of chase etc and finally victory of truth over evil. No doubt, this film was a blockbuster at the box office front. I am giving below a synopsis of the film story just to get an idea as to how this type of the story line became familiar in the films mostly produced in the 50s.
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Aaj milan ki raat hai raat hai
Posted on: April 3, 2012
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
KEECHAKVADH (1959) as the name of the film suggests, was a mythological film. It was produced in Marathi and Hindi versions by Balasaheb (P K) Pathak under the banner of Manik Studios and directed by Yeshwant Pethkar. The star cast included Baburao Pendharkar (Keechak), Sumati Gupte (Draupadi), Shobhna Samarth (Sudeshna), Vishwas Kunte, Vimla Kumari, Helen etc. I had seen the Marathi version of the film on the internet mainly to get to know the song situation of the iconic song ‘dhund madhumati’. In that process, I had to see the full film as this particular song was almost at the end of the film before Keechak is killed by Bheem. I had no regret in watching the full film as the crisp screen-play made the already known story a still interesting one to watch.
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This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
I was not aware of the film MERA SALAAM (1957) until few days back when I came across while searching for some songs on a website. This was a period film produced under the banner of Sushil Pictures and directed by Harbans. Bharat Bhushan and Bina Rai were in the lead roles with Veena, K N Singh, Gope, Durga Khote, Nishi, Cuckoo in supporting roles. The film had some lovely songs which were written by Sheven Rizvi and set to music by Hafeez Khan. Some of the song’s orchestration appear to be somewhat different than what is normally heard in the songs of that period. For example, the song ‘husn kehte hain mujhe’ probably depicting a mushaira competition between Bharat Bhushan and Bina Rai is rendered without the use of any musical instrument. Then, it has a nasheed ( Islamic devotional song) ‘madinewale se mera salam keh dena’ sung by Mohammed Rafi, Bande Hasan and others, the composition of which, in my view comes close to the qawwali style.
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This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
FARIYAAD (1964) was produced and directed by Kidar Sharma under the banner of Show People. Ashok Sharma ( son of Kidar Sharma) and Zeb Rahman (also known as Preetibala) were in the lead roles with Ashok Kumar, Achala Sachdev, Dilip Dutt and Tuntun in the supporting roles. I remember to have read the reports in some of the film magazines at that time about propping up of Preetibala (Zeb Rahman) as another Madhubala in the making taking advantage of the resemblance of her face with that of Madhubala.
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This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
‘Ghazab kiyaa tere waade pe aitbaar kiyaa’ is a famous ghazal written by Daagh Dehlvi. Ever since I heard this ghazal sung by Mohammed Rafi for the first time in late 60s, I am spellbound by his rendition. In fact, I scouted for a gramophone record in 78 rpm of this song in early 70s and I was able to get a brand new record. I must have played this record many times and now I can tell which points Mohammed Rafi takes a momentary pause while singing this ghazal. This non-filmy ghazal was set to music by Khayyam. This ghazal has also been sung by many well known singers of thesub-continent such as Mehdi Hasan, Pankaj Udhas, Mallika Pukhraj, Farida Khanumand many more. With due respect to all these singers who are numero uno in their own rights, I still prefer to listen to Mohammed Rafi’s version.
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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