Archive for the ‘Manik Verma songs’ Category
Soyaa gagan mein chaand so jaa
Posted on: March 11, 2023
This article is written by Arunkumar Deshmukh, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a contributor to this blog. This article is meant to be posted in atulsongaday.me. If this article appears in other sites without the knowledge and consent of the web administrator of atulsongaday.me, then it is piracy of the copyright content of atulsongaday.me and is a punishable offence under the existing laws.
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Today’s song is from a film of the Golden Era-Sandesh-1952.
This film was made by Sandesh pictures and its producer’s name was also Sandesh Adhikari. Luckily, the director was not any Sandesh. It was Bal Gajbar, a director not known in Hindi cinema, but he was a celebrated director in Marathi films. he did only 3 films in Hindi as a director namely, Mere Laal-1948, Sandesh-1952 and Gokul ka Raja-1954….his last film in Hindi.It’s Marathi original was Gokulcha Raja ( गोकुळचा राजा ) made in 1950, which was also directed by Bal Gajbar only.
There were 8 songs in the film, written by Manohar khanna (father of Music Director Usha khanna), Nihal Chand Jain-strangely called Nihal Uzanavi. The third lyricist was Kumud Tripathi, the well known comedian. He was one of those who came to the film industry to become a Lyricist but ended up being a reasonably successful comedian and a character artiste. He started as a Lyricist for the film Rimjhim-1949 and then wrote songs for Bijli-1950. He wrote 2 songs for the film Nai Zindagi-1951. During this film he attended one song filming. The director Mohan Sinha offered him a small comedy role in that film. This became his Debut if films as an actor. Though he wrote songs for film Sandesh-52, his career as a comedian had kickstarted. He last wrote songs for the film Jeevan Sathi-1957. Offhand I remember another 2 comedians who started as Lyricists but ended as Comedians namely, Mirza Musharraf and Kanhaiyalal Chaturvedi. Actors like Sajjan and Mahipal also started as Lyricists before becoming heros.
During his struggling days in the early 50s, Kumud Tripathi was staying in Bandra’s slums along with Sunil Dutt and Rajendra kumar. He acted in 73 films. His first film as an actor was Nai Zindagi-1951 and his last film was Hum se badhkar kaun-98. His one role I remember is from the film Apradhi Kaun-57, in which he had sung two songs also on the screen. After retirement from the films, he joined TV and did a memorable role as Guptaji ( owner of a Gen. Store) in a famous serial of the 1986 period- Nukkad.
The cast of the film was Durga Khote, Umesh Sharma, Kumud lele, Nana palashikar, Lalita Pawar etc.etc. The story of the film Sandesh-1952 was….SANDESH-1952 was a story of a doctor with distorted principles. Dinanath’s father Vidyadhar,an honest and straightforward School teacher is falsely implicated in cases of treason and mutiny against the British and is convicted in 1922. This shock takes Vidyadhar’s life.
Dinanath and his mother go to Kashinath, who was a favourite student of Vidyadhar,for help. Kashinath promises Dinanath that he will make him a doctor. During his education,Dinanath falls in love with a rich Barrister’s daughter Sudha,but their marriage can not take place as Dinanath is very poor. She gets married to his classmate.
Dinanath goes to England and when he comes back as a Doctor,he becomes only money minded,as he realises the value of money in this world. Due to his nature,his mother Saraswati bai leaves him.
One day,his mother meets with an accident and is brought to his Hospital,but she refuses to be treated by him. He realises that relations are more important than money and a Doctor’s profession is a noble one.
He repents and changes himself. Meanwhile,Sudha gets a divorce and they meet again and unite,finally.
The Hero of the film was Umesh Sharma,who acted in Deepak-51 and Apna desh-49 also as a Hero. Later he worked in many other roles,as well as as a writer,director and producer also. He acted in 33 films.He was the writer of the famous film BOMBAY-1995.
The Music Director was S.Purushottam, about whom not much is known. Similarly his assistant for this film was Shyamrao Kamble, who later became a very well known Arranger in Hindi films. He too has not received any publicity like other Arrangers- Anthony Gonsalvez, Sebastian D’souza, Chick Chocolate, Chriss Perry, Frank Fernando etc.
LUCK plays an important role in our film industry. It is this Luck which has built bright careers and it is this Luck that has brought down people’s careers.
It was a matter of Luck that Devika Rani chose the hesitant, shy and simple Ashok Kumar as her hero in films, otherwise he would have, at the most, become a Cinematographer or a senior Lab Technician in the Photography department of Bombay Talkies ! It was a matter of sheer luck that Khan Mastana was the Main singer in Rafiq Ghazanavi’s Laila Majnu, and a shy aspirant Mohd Rafi was a part of Chorus and later in K Asif’s Laila Majnu, Mohd.Rafi was the Main singer and the poor Khan Mastana was in the chorus !
It was luck that the immensely popular master Nissar made the Governor of Bombay to stop and give way to the sea of Nissar’s admirers and fans and it was the same luck that a tattered, poor master Nissar died in Penury and anonymity in the bylanes of Kamathipura when his last rites were done through charities. The unprecedented record breaking popularity of ‘Jai Santoshi Maa’ was nothing short of a miracle and good luck to the hapless producer who was totally broke. Was it not Luck that made Pt. Hanuman Prasad listen to Geeta Dutt, without her knowledge and then brings her to the Films ?
The Hindi film industry is full of stories of luck. Thousands of people work in the industry, in different departments, but only a few get mentioned like say Cinematographer. What about his assistants who contribute equally, if not more to film shooting ?
Music Directors’ names are famous. At times their assistants too get a mention in the credits, but what about the soul of every song-the Arranger ? Many people do not even know that there is someone called an Arranger. An Arranger not only exists, but without him the song orchestration is not possible.
How many Arrangers are known to the public in India ? A composer is Zero without an Arranger. So they try to employ the best of them in their service. Some of the Arrangers become successful Composers themselves, like Sonik-Omi or Laxmikant Pyarelal. Most arrangers fail as composers because they don’t know the commercial aspect of composition, like getting films, knowing and mixing with film personalities in Parties, having friends and God fathers in the right place etc etc.
The other day I was reading a book “Voh Bhooli Dastaan” by Subhash Chandra Jadhav,on Indian Film Music. In this book he has described information about one such successful but totally unknown Arranger SHYAMRAO KAMBLE.
Kamble was born in Karad, near Kolhapur in Maharashtra, on 23-10-1925. His elder brother taught him Tabla and Pakhawaj. Kamble joined a musical drama company where he learnt writing notations. When he came to Bombay he accompanied great singers like Saraswati Rane, Suresh Haldankar, Manik Verma etc. He used to make rounds of film studios and learnt to play Piano, Saxophone, trumpet, mandolin etc.
His career started as an assistant to music director H N Sharma.
Then he worked for Roshan in Bawre nain, wherein he played harmonium in all songs and Roshan was pleased. In Bheegi Raat-65 he played Guitar in the song ‘Dil jo na kah saka’
While doing Anokhi Raat he made use of Flute artistically in ‘oh re taal mile’. During this film Roshan died and he helped his wife to complete the recording of ‘Sapnon ka raja’ by Lata.
Chitralekha’s background music was liked by Hemant kumar very much.
After Roshan, Kamble worked for his son Rajesh Roshan also.
Kamble says,“Though my work was appreciated, my name never appeared in film credits till Jaidev and Sudhir Phadke insisted for it.”
From ‘Mujhe jeene do’-63 Kamble became Jaidev’s assistant. He says,’ Jaidev ji was a composer totally sold to indian classical music.’ For Reshma and Shera Kamble used Sarod effectively.
The producer director of Gharonda,Bheem Sen insisted its music to be like R D Burman. Kamble used the interludes in every song just like RDB and songs of Gharonda became very famous. Jaidev was so happy that he gave a 5 speaker gramophone to him as a Gift.
In the film ‘Tumhaare Liye’ Kamble wanted Hariprasad Chaurasiya to play Flute. He discussed it with Hari ji, but Hari ji did not come for any rehearsals, so Kamble called Sumant Raj and did the rehearsals. As luck would have it,on the day of recording Hariprasad came to play Flute. Kamble did not hesitate in making his decision. He used both the flutists for different pieces in the song.
Kamble also worked with Sudhir Phadke. when a producer wanted to make a remake of marathi film ‘Vahininchya Bangdya”, he took Sudhir Phadke for Bhabhi ki choodiyan as a composer, but put a condition that his Arranger will work with him. That person was a Goanese and Phadke did not like his arrangement with western instruments for this emotional film. He called Kamble and asked him to write notations for all the songs on the tunes decided already. Kamble did all this and left. Phadke gave the notations to the Goanese arranger and asked him to arrange orchestration accordingly. That is why all the songs of this film including ‘Jyoti kalash chamke” became popular.
Shyamrao Kamble did not attempt to become a film composer himself, as he knew his limitations. However,for “Bibal-My Brother”-1975, he shared the music with Prabhakar Jog.
Shamrao himself was a brilliant composer as well. He used to compose Bhajans and once on listening to the Bhajans he composed, music director Pyarelal asked him “Shamraoji if you can compose the tunes so nicely, why don’t you think to be a full-fledged music director for films ?” He just said “I am more interested in the Music Arrangements..” Pyarelal asked him jokingly, “so shall I use your compositions ?” smiling, within a second he said, “Pyareji, my all work is for you… you may use it whenever you wish..!” I am very much sure that if Shamraoji had taken music-direction as a career, he would have definitely achieved the position in the list of most talented and successful composers in the Indian music field,” said Pyarelal Ramprasad Sharma, the ace music director.
“His knowledge and devotion towards music was so deep, that he even used to guide or suggest the top artists like Rais Khan (sitar), Hariprasad Chaurasia (flute), Shivkumar Sharma (santoor) about the playing during the recordings. He also used to express that a particular music piece would be more effective if improvised in a different manner etc. And the greatness of those artists also, who used to sportingly accept Shamraoji’s suggestions and appreciate the same.. This was only because they were fully aware of Shamraoji’s knowledge and capacity. And also this was the reason that we had given total freedom to him in our work also,” said Pyarelal.
In his early career, Shamrao had worked as a notation-writer. He was the one who wrote down the notation for Dinanath Mangeshkar’s natya sangeet (Chandrika hi janu, Vilopale madhu meelanat ya, Yuwati mana etc).
Though he retired and settled in Poona, Laxmikant Pyarelal always called him for work. He has toured several countries with Laxmikant Pyarelal’s orchestra as an Arranger. Shamrao kamble died on 17-10-2008, at Dombivali, due to Brain Haemorrhage, at the age of 83 years.
The tribe of Arrangers always worked behind the curtain, without any limelight on them and without appearing in film credits.
Truly, they are the brains behind good music in films ! (Thanks to Subhashandra Jadhav of ‘Voh bhooli Dastaan’ and Imprints and images, with thanks.)
Let us now enjoy the song by the classical singer Manik Verma. She sang only 17 songs in 13 Hindi films. Today’s song was her last song in Hindi films.
Song- Soya gagan mein chaand sojaa (Sandesh)(1952) Singer- Manik Verma, Lyricist- Kumud Tripathi, MD- S.Purushottam
Lyrics
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soya gagan mein chaand
soja
soya gagan mein chaand
soja
pyaar ki loree
gaaye chakori
gaaye chakori
baadal jhulna jhulaaye
so jaa
soya gagan mein chaand
soja
soja aaye sapne suhaane
mit jaaye dukh dard puraane
dard puraane
sapnon mein meet bulaaye
soja
soya gagan mein chaand
soja
hat jaayega dukh ka andhera
aayega jab sukh ka sawera
sukh ka sawera
pichhli kahaani bhulaaye
soja
pichhli kahaani bhulaaye
soja
soya gagan mein chaand
soja
soya gagan mein chaand
soja
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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