Once Again : Piya Tose Naina Laage Re

Prelude 

We had started www.SDBurman.Net as a great labour of love. It was a journey that three kindred souls, diverse in age, background, nationality and geography undertook together. More than anything else SDBurman.Net was a triumph of human bonding and universality of music. I an Indian, Maajid Saab (Maajid Maqbool) a Pakistani and Chowdhury Saab(HQ Chowdhury) a Bangladeshi all met on the internet, bonded over the music of a composer who was well before all our times and created this website in his honour. Later in 2006 we also organized a centenary function in his honour. That evening, to date, remains one of the most exhilarating moments of my life.

While the appreciation and love for SDB's music continues to remain close to all our hearts, the website has somehow fallen to disuse, neglected due to a shift in the phases of our lives. For me, work has grown more and more demanding and these vital pleasures have somehow taken a backseat. SDBurman.Net still stands, but like an old ancestral home, it is decaying due to neglect. There still are areas of SDB.Net that are fully intact, but others have become preys to the vagaries of internet time. One such crumbling 'room' was what we used to called 'Burmanda Ka Pitara'. A section where we regularly picked up a gem from Dada's dazzling array of musical jewels, turned it over, held it high, admired it and then put it on a pedestal. This section has now disappeared. Today as I went looking for an old article I wrote on 'Piya Tose Naina Laage Re', I was dismayed to have found it to be gone. Dismayed, not because of the intrinsic worth of that writing, but more so because it was a loss of a thought at a point in time.

However, the internet is a great preserver, someone, somewhere at sometime had reproduced the article (a fact that used to irk me to no end in the past!) and lo behold! the article stood in front of me like a memory excavated from under a ruin.

Now, when I read the article, I do think it is too dry and academic (I was trying very hard to be taken seriously those days :)), I would have written it very differently today. But I guess we need to stand up for our past actions and so here we are, the charming, the dulcet and the oh! so vulnerable - Piya Tose Naina Laage Re!

Piya Tose Naina Laage Re

'Piya tose naina laage re' stands out for the intrinsic beauty of its 'roopak taal' based tune. This 4 stanza/8 minute piece is a marathon song that traces the rise of Rosy (the film's female protagonist played by Waheeda) from a small time artist to the sensational dancing star Nalini. Today in Burmanda ka Pitara we will re-visit the beauty of this song.


The song starts off suddenly without any prelude (a habit that was quite common with Dada) and then moves ahead with rich orchestral interludes. The composition itself has two meters running simultaneously in the antaras. One with a long drawn out alaap as in Aayi holi aayi and the other with a fast 'raat ko jab chaand chamke' both blend back into the mukhda seamlessly with extremely catchy bols, set to the rhythm of 'Dhi na k dhi n dhi n'. These bols have been woven into the overall lyrical theme of the song beautifully by the lyricist Shailendra.The orchestral interludes in this song are rich and varied. Though these music pieces are tailor-made for a dance choreography, unlike most dance pieces they do not remain limited to a frenzy of ghungroos, tabla and sarangi/harmonium. 


The orchestral interludes, here, in typical SD Burman style, are uncluttered and spontaneous. However they still use a wide variety of instruments and are richly layered. Violins, Sitars, ghungroos, tabla, drums (note the lovely use of a north eastern drum in the portion before 'bhor ki bela suhani') and the flute all fit into the overall composition like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. Strings, as with most of Dada's songs, are used with great felicity. Note the extremely catchy short string pieces strewn all over the song. In particular, the part where the song returns to the mukhda as in.


.Piya tose ..~~~~little string pieces
~~~~Piya tose naina tabla starts laage re ..


The tabla is heard distinctly throughout major portions of the song and there is a gentle swaying rhythm to the tabla tempo. A trait that is faintly reminiscent of Sachinda'a favourite 'bhatiyali' rhythms. There are portions where the tabla takes a backseat and the drums or some other percussion takes over, however it always makes a high profile and arresting entry back into the forefront particularly when the song returns to the mukhda.


The lyrics by Shailendra are sweet and heartfelt in his trademark style. This is one of those songs where Shailendra excels in 'Shringar Ras', which otherwise is considered by many to be a bastion of the likes of Majrooh Sultanpuri. Just like the composition. the lyrics also follow twin tracks. The long meter depicts the Holi and Diwali (major festivals of India) and the fast tracks depict day and night. Shailendra's mastery is apparent in the manner he makes a crisp return to the mukhda.


Lata Mangeshkar's rendition, finally, is the icing on the cake. She gives the song a delicacy and innocence that is very heart-warming. Note the way she stresses on naina each time she sings the mukhda. Very dulcet. Any discussion about 'Piya Tose Naina laage re' would be incomplete without mentioning its unforgettable picturisation. While Waheeda is elegance and grace personified, the choreographer Hiralal like the rest of this team thinks out of the box. The end result is one of the most scintillating dance sequences in the history of Indian Cinema.

Some trivia

•  The extremely catchy 'Dhinak dhin dhin' that seems to flow so spontaneously was actually put there by design!. Maruti Rao Keer, (a percussionist in SD's team), recalled how Dada worked to include this bit knowing his audience would love it.

• Special mention must be made of Rahul Dev Burman who along with Basu and Manohari assisted Dada in this film. The orchestra in more ways than one was Pancham's triumph as well.- Santoor maestro Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma who assisted Dada during this period played the tabla in this song.

• Waheeda Rehman worked very hard on the dances of this film. She would get up at 4:00 in the morning to rehearse. She also drank lots of milk to get the strength to execute those rigorous steps!. After all this hard work when the songs were canned and the film went on the editing table, Waheeda had just one fear... that the long dance sequences could be edited out. Finally she made a request to Dev Anand.Cut my scenes if you like but please don't edit out my dances. Dev Anand promised her he wouldn't and the dances stayed. And thus what we have today a set of dances that have become textbook material for dances in popular cinema.

• This one is for the collectors. There are stories of the existence of one version of this song in the voice of the master himself. Now wouldn't that be a treat for all connoisseurs of Dada's singing?

Post Script: As per Ritesh Gadhvi, the tabla in this song was not by Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma. He played in Mose Chhal Kiye Jaaye. There is a possibility then, that the tabla is by Pt Samta Prasad.

Rise, Shine and Spring - Champako Jaago Jaago

Many suns, moons, springs and falls ago, I was in school and we had to write essays. They were a staple of the growing up years. As I lazily finger dust off random spots of memory on this languid Saturday afternoon, the gentle revelation is that not all memories around these essays are pleasant.

Writing was not one of my preoccupations in childhood and these essays - they were all over the place. You had to write them in English, you had to write them in Hindi and horror of horrors you had to write them in Sanskrit too! Since I never got around to learning how to construct a straight sentence in Sanskrit that part of my education basically contributed to honing my 'ratafication' skills.

The Gods who defined curricula and set exam papers in those days believed that an essay was a critical component which contributed to making the future citizens of India informed, opinionated and articulate. No wonder essay writing accounted for atleast 20% of the total marks for the paper. For someone who wanted to be an astronaut, explorer, architect or sometimes just a person who could read Enid Blytons for a living, writing essays was a fundamental distraction from mission life. At that point in time, it was the preciseness and unambiguity of the science subjects that appealed. After all you could write what you considered the best ever piece on 'Cleanliness is Godliness' or 'Festivals of India' or 'My Summer Vacation', the teacher could still strike off and give you a 2/10. It was too whimsical and I just got by it.

I know what runs in your mind at this moment. You are wondering, why in the good world, upon surfacing after two years of hibernation, I would want to dwell on a topic as dry as elementary school curriculum. We all know that I threw away any intellectual pretensions very early in the game of blogging. This is not even a 'sunshine ' childhood memory that makes a good nostalgic blog post. Then why?

Well, my dear friend everything happens for a reason. Let me help you understand by revealing an intimate moment to you. Today morning as I sat over my morning cuppa browsing over musical tributes to SD Burman in the born-again Facebook avtaar of my old hangout Sangeet Ke Sitare, a sudden well of inspiration sprung from God knows which crevice of my being. It was this strong and now almost alien urge to write something. I had a laundry list of chores and activities sitting and waiting to get going but somehow they all went flying out of the window as I rummaged through my long neglected blog links to get to this blog composition page trying to start a new post. And immediately following it I was with struck a stab of introspection - when did this writing become such an intimate part of the being that it could turn up unannounced one fine day and consume my attention quite like a childhood friend turning up on facebook after years. How did this happen?

Rewinding to early life only reveals a strong disdain for essays and any form of 'creative writing'. The only sojourn I had as a writer in school was for a class magazine imaginatively named 'Bang' where I wrote a Spook Corner which was a collection of all the ghost stories we exchanged on dark summer nights lying on the terrace. That effort is best relegated to the 'dark room' from where those ghost stories first originated. Very forgettable. After that there was no writing. I remember getting through the essays one has to write for B-School and and other post-grad courses with less than passing marks. They were quite uninspiring and even while writing them I knew I could not count on them for getting me anywhere!

Then suddenly about seven eight years ago life took a turn. I got deeply involved in an interest which was on the side-burner till then - music! Slowly this interest flowered into a strong passion. As I started frequenting music forums, exploring musical opinions, discovering musical Gods and fighting battles for them, something happened. What was once a chore became a pleasure. I actually started to enjoy writing! In the early days it was just about writing posts on newsgroups. But one fine day I nervously toyed with the idea of writing a full-fledged article. I started writing a series on the Music in Navketan films and posting it on SKS. The first few chapters got favourable response, but that effort petered out somewhere. Even now I have it lying unfinished somewhere in my files.

The first full fledged article that saw the light of the day was this one : Bondhu Rangila -Inimitable

It was a tribute to SD Burman, which wonder of wonders actually got accepted by an online music magazine. It was a gushing tribute from a totally besotted fan and carries long term appeal only to die-hard SDB fans. But it was a beginning, that saw me grow into this new passion.

And here I am today, consumed by the same urge to put pen to paper all over again (or maybe I should say finger to keyboard, since I never put pen to paper successfully). I believe it is more than co-incidence that it is SD Burman's birth anniversary today.. his hundred and fifth!

To commemorate the occasion, let me leave you with a song that talks of awakening in more ways than one and holds special significance to the moment. This is a beautiful Bengali song, sung by the Dada in the 1935-1945 timeframe - Champaka Jaago Jaago. It is a song where spring gently cajoles the fragrant champaka flower to rise, shine and flower.

Thank you Burman Dada for this lovely meldody. It has brought a beautiful feeling back into my life today, I feel all fragrant....

The Symphony of Nature

Do you sometimes have those moments? Moments when a general feeling of well-being suddenly whips up into something more potent. Quite like an ecstacy that completely engulfs the being. These are those moments when there was no yesterday, there is no tomorrow, there is just that moment and the luminous beauty of the moment.... I have those moments once in a while. Born mostly out of appreciation for music or nature, sometimes of both and sometimes of things far placed from either. Something like that happened to me a couple of months back.

Now, in retrospect it seems that whole 3 minutes and 31 seconds of experience was the scripted by a divine hand.

It was Sunday and a brilliant day in my part of the world. Spring was in the air, the breeze was fresh, and crisp. It felt that everything in the atmosphere had devoured a mouthful of breath freshner. The day was painted using a palette that never fails to stir - azure sky dotted with brilliant woolly whites, lush green on the ground, pastel pink on the trees and yellows in the crevices. A vigourous breeze had charged the atmosphere with an electric optimism. It is always that way in spring. Everything seems upbeat and ready for a new beginning. As providence would have it the AC in my car gave away and I had to do something I do rarely - open the sun roof. So there I was trundling down in my car with the windows all down, playful breeze in the hair, lung full of fresh spring air and music for accompaniment . With a setting like that even the most sullen of God's creations would find it difficult to escape the feeling of good cheer. I being of a fairly 'unsullen' disposition was feeling quite kicked and content.

The music that I was playing is a collection of SD Burman's songs, that I greatly cherish. It is cherished not so much for my love for the old monk brand of music, but more for the way the CD has been compiled. There are about ten songs, placed in such a sequence that with a little help from the ambience they can create a delectable mood that lingers long after the music stops playing. By themselves the songs are great but when played together they are magic. This post, however, is not about that sequence. It is about one of the most lumniscent songs in that sequence -'Phaili hui hain sapno ki baahen'.

I had stopped at a traffic signal when the initial low notes of this gorgeous composition started streaming. At that very moment a stray plastic bag caught the corner of my eye. It had come into my eye-view sliding up the road pushed by the light breeze. As the vigourous sitar strings in the prelude picked up tempo, a sudden gust swept the bag into the air and took it on a merry dance across the road and into the greens. There it was, the plastic bag, waltzing away in the breeze in absolute synch to the music playing my car! And that was the moment. Suddenly everything in the universe snapped into a perfect symphony. The music playing in my car, the plastic bag, the birds, the trees, the breeze outside and along with all of them - me. We all fused into a single rhythm, the divine rhythm of life.

The breeze took a momentory lull and then renewed vigour gave the waltzing bag a last nudge and like a seasoned gymnast it took a final somersault and bowed out of view, just as Lata's voice started picking up the first few notes of the alaap. My eyes having lost the plastic bag, ran up the branches of a tree that stood where I had lost sight of it. Lata finshed her alaap right at the moment my vision touched the tree tops. There they were, swaying away in the breeze. The spring green of the trees caressed the brilliant of the blue sky as nightingale's dew soft voice sang 'Phaili hui hain sapno ki baahen, aaja chal den kahin door'. The voice siezed me and took me along - far far away on the wings of ecstacy. It was sheer magic and almost an out of body experience that lasted for all of the 3 odd minutes the song lasted. An exhilarating flight, up to magical lands beyond the clouds, swinging on rainbows, playing hide and seek in the mist..... and then as if on pre-ordained cue, the last notes of the song faded away just as the wheels of my car rolled to a stop at my destination.

I have heard this song many times before and many times since and many a time the song has lifted me off the ground into a merry flight but never has the experience reached the lofty heights it reached that day. As an ode to that magic I present this song as a part of the 'Song of the Day' series.

Eloquence falls short in supply when one ventures out to describe the beauty of this song. What should one describe? The restlessness sitar prelude fluttering like a bird ready to take flight? The enigmatic 'dhundhli fiza mein kuch khoyen kuch paayen' ? The gentle of rhythm of life in 'sanson ki laye par koi aisi dhun gaayen'? Or the final burst of nirvanic energy in the alaap before 'jhoola dhanak ka' ? And then there is Lata's voice -pristine, pure like a drop of fresh rain. The moments are so many and that one feels stunted. I would suggest that you click on the link below and discover your own.

A philospoher had once opined, music is the only innocent and unpunished passion. The ecstacy that people search for in LSD, Ecstasy and other stimulants, is right there, within easy reach and with a power of rejuvenation that is in many multitudes higher than the power destruction all these external stimulants hold. All it requires is a moment of tuning your inner-self with the greatest symphony of all - the symphony of the nature. I am sure Sahir, Lata, SD Burman and all the accompanying musicians were tuned in when they created this song and I am eternally grateful to them for tuning me into the same magical frequency on that lovely spring afternoon.

.. aaja chal den kahin door...

A Year in Flight - MPA Turns One

On May 30th, the flight of my fancy flew past it's first landmark - one whole year of flapping it's wings in cyberspace.

When I had started blogging last year, it was one of those sudden whims that suddenly consumed me and lo behold a blog was born with just 24 hours of gestation. It was hurriedly (and may I add sloppily) put together. The temporary name was a convoluted one - 'In the footsteps of my wanderlust'. Wanderlust, or the quest for the exotic, the mystic and the unknown has accompanied me ever since I remember. Nature, music, astronomy, religion, history, geology- the topics that I wish to discover this nectar in are diverse. The blog was meant to be a vehicle to explore all those and more. It came at a phase in my life, where I was going through a period of intense introspection and there were a lot of questions, thoughts, emotions and equations circling in my head. I wanted to sort them out using the method that works the wonders for me - putting it down on paper.

But then as our friend Robert Burns had observed a few centuries ago, the best laid plans don't always follow the road map they had set out with. And my blog like my mind just went wandering off its own path. A year later it looks nothing like I had intended it to look. The name is now 'Man Panchhi Albela' and it has been living up to it's new name with vigour. It is airy and flighty and talks about whatever whim has caught my fancy for long enough to generate a post. The equations and questions of last year have resolved themselves and new thoughts buzz in my head now. In some small way all those thoughts have found a place in my writings during the past year though they never managed to corner a complete post as I thought they would.

A one year landmark is a good excuse to indulge in the activity that comes rather naturally to me and I have been doing it consistently on this blog - analysis/paralysis. So then here are some observations and discoveries.

• 41 posts in a year, 38 of which were in 2008. 2009 has been a fallow year. The main reason is that I am off a job and have been travelling etc. Blogging is a guilty pleasure in the current state of affairs.
  

• Much as I would like to believe otherwise, I just have to accept the fact that music is the most motivating of my fancies. Most of my posts are on either music or cinema and it is of little surprise that those are also the posts that attract maximum feedback.
  

• The most popular posts, based on the number of hits and comments are

1. A New 'Bond'
   
2. Dev Anand at 85 - Triumphant!

As is apparent, in this universe, there is James Bond and then there is Dev Anand!

• The posts closest to my heart are on the subjects that I had intended to explore in the first place. Predictably, they haven't got much feedback. That is a woe that is common to most regular bloggers. The writings that attract most attention aren't usually the ones that they value greatly themselves. These are my ignored but cherished droppings.
  

1. The God in Small Things
   
2. The Heat, The Mosquitoes and New York Times
   

• The post where I expected a good discussion, but it did not happen was the series on Guru Dutt. This was probably the most serious, focused and academic writing I did last year. Given the proclivities of the people who visit my blog regularly, that surprised me, albeit only mildly. Remember I told you it was academic? : Guru Dutt: Genius?

• Search statistics tell me that most people who land on this blog are searching for mp3 of songs or for information on musical personalities - Geeta Dutt and Manna Dey, SD Burman etc. all have fair representation. But the real star of search related hits on MPA has been a candidate who appeared on this blog for her virtue of being a non-entity - Kalpana Kartik. She has grandly proved my notion of her being forgotten by history absolutely wrong. Ever since I did the article on her - there are a minimum of 5 hits a day on her name(with or without Dev Anand). Yesterday an optimistic soul reached my blog searching for 'Kalpana Kartik new film'! I must say Dev Saab has a solid reason to feel kicked with life. Even at 85 years the juicy details of his love life have so many seekers!
  

• Two series have been introduced here on MPA. The first is the List series that comprises of lists on a common theme(mainly of songs!) and the other is the Song of the Day series that highlights a song that has caught my fancy.
  

• MPA introduced a new feature of creating a reader's community. Please click on the 'Follow' section on the left bar to become a part of the community and recieve notifications.
  

• When I started out, I knew who exactly would visit my blog (they were all people known to me). But MPA has been in auto-pilot mode for a while now. Most people who visit the blog are now from places where I have no acquaintences and I am also getting used to the fact that unknown people are actuallly reading my thoughts. I would invite my regular reader to drop me a line so that I can get acquainted with them (and their blogs). Blogging is afterall nothing but connecting with kindred souls all over the world.
  

As I start Year 2 in flight, I am quite optimistic about continuing this blog, despite the lull in activity. The whole thing was certainly not a passing fancy the urge to write always returns. I thank all my readers and friends who have written in to the blog or to me personally with their valuable suggestions. I continue to look forward to their visits and comments.

As I set my sights on new horizons to span in Year 2, I leave you with another addition to the Song of the Day series. It is the song that inspired the title of this blog - 'Man Panchhi Albela'. The nightingale Lata Mangeshkar does the honours here to a sprighty and flighty tune created by the maestro who was as sprighty as this composition - Sachin Dev Burman. The lyrics by Sahir Ludhianvi speak the language of all the dreamers in this world. -Paon mere dharti par meri nazar chaand ko choome (पांव मेरे धरती पर मेरी नज़र चांद कॊ चूमे). For the poetry enthusiasts, I would like to turn your attention towards the meter of the song. It is quite imaginative and unusual.

Lyrics

man panchhi albela taaron ki nagari mein jaaye

mat poocho kisi laaye khabariya

man panchhi albela...

nayi nayi pehechaan hai uska naam na jaana maine

mein kaise kahun mera kaun sanwariya

man panchhi albela...

paanv mere dharti par meri nazar chaand ko chuume

nazar chaand ko chuume

paanv mere dharti par meri nazar chaand ko chuume

mera aancha ude hawaon mein mera tan jhume man jhume

kaisi uljhi najariya

man panchhi albela...

kya jaadu yeh kaisa tona yeh to samajh na aaye

yeh to samajh na aaye

kya jaadu yeh kaisa tona yeh to samajh na aaye

itna jaanu uski dhun par thumke naache gaaye

yeh man pii ki gujariya

man panchhi albela...

man panchhi albela taaron ki nagari mein jaaye

mat poocho kisi laaye khabariya

man panchhi albela...

nayi nayi pehechaan hai uska naam na jaana maine

mein kaise kahun mera kaun sanwariya

man panchhi albela...

हिन्दी

मन पंछी अल्बेला तारॊं की नगरी में जाए

मत पूछॊ किसकी लाऎ खबरिया

मन पंछी अल्बेला...

नई नई पहचान है उसका नाम ना जाना मैने

मैं कैसे कहुं मेरा कौन सांवरिया

मन पंछी अल्बेला..

पांव मेरे धरती पर मेरी नज़र चांद को चूमे

नज़र चांद को चूमे

पांव मेरे धरती पर मेरी नज़र चांद को चूमे

मेरा आंचल उड़े हवाऒं मे, मेरा तन झूमे मन झूमे

कैसी उलझी नज़रिया

मन पंछी अल्बेला...

क्या जादू यह कैसा टोना यह तो समझ ना आए

यह तो समझ ना आए

क्या जादू यह कैसा टोना यह तो समझ ना आए

इतना जानू उसकी धुन पर ठुमके नाचे गाये

यह मन पी की गुजरिया

मन पंछी अल्बेला...

मन पंछी अल्बेला तारॊं की नगरी में जाए

मत पूछॊ किसकी लाऎ खबरिया

मन पंछी अल्बेला...

नई नई पहचान है उसका नाम ना जाना मैने

मैं कैसे कहुं मेरा कौन सांवरिया

मन पंछी अल्बेला...

Lyrics courtesy

http://thaxi.hsc.usc.edu/rmim/giitaayan/files/rmim0400.isb

Chaand Se Preet Lagaaye - Khursheed

Many many moons ago, there was no Lata Mangeshker in the world of film music. Incredulous as it sounds, this is true. It was the great Kundan Lal Saigal who blazed the skies with his deeply expressive voice, outshining every other male singer on the firmament. But the corner of the sky occupied by female singers had many sparkling little stars. Each had her own strengths, character and personality. This was the era of singing stars and untrained and semi-trained voices ruled the roost. It was a fascinating period in the history of Hindi film music. There was an amazing variety of voices - varied timbres, tones and textures. These voices, even though rough on the edges, had a lot of emotive power very much in the folk traditions of the time. When Lata Mangeshkar made history with 'Mahal' and 'Barsaat' these semi-trained voices just got blown away. They could not keep up with the sheer range, virtuosity and polish of her voice. One by one they all faded away and soon history too sprinkled dust on their memories and moved on....

Khursheed Bano was one such voice. 

Born as Irshad Begum on April 14, 1914 in a small village near Lahore, Khursheed joined the film industry in its infancy. She was a popular actress in the era of silent films. When Indian cinema found it's voice with Alam Ara many leading lights fell by the wayside due to their inability to sing. Khursheed however made the transition to talkies effortlessly. She continued to enthrall the film-goers of her times both with her charismatic screen persona and with her dulcet voice which was expressive, earthy and robust at the same time.  This was the voice of the 30s and 40s. With the advent Lata this type of voice all but disappeared. It was not only the land of Punjab that suffered the wounds of partition but this school of singing also suffered a mortal blow with the  partition of the sub-continent. With most of the accomplished singers from this great Punjabi singing  tradition like Noorjahen migrating to Pakistan this style all but got phased out in favour of the softer singing styles from Maharastra and Bengal. It was only the spunky Shamshad Begum who held her own against the Lata wave all the way into the 60s. All other voices could just not keep up. Khursheed Bano's was one such voice that lost it's way and then perished during this tumultuous phase of Indian history.

The high noon of Khursheed's career was her pairing with KL Saigal in 'Tansen'. The film saw her hold her own against the mighty Saigal. Both in the duets as well as with her on-screen presence. Infact, I daresay in the acting department she actually outran Saigal by many miles. The songs of 'Tansen' remain popular to date with vintage music lovers.

On her birth anniversary today, I would like to showcase a song from her repertoire that I find most compelling - Panchhi bawara chaand se preet lagaaye.  It is from the classic 'Bhakta Surdas' which had a string of hit songs by the immortal Saigal. Hidden amongst this a slew of Saigal classics is this rare sparkler of a song by Khursheed.

The song is a wistful ode to one-sided love expressed through the age old metaphor of the 'chakor' and the 'chaand' - the love-crazed bird who continues to love the whimsical and elusive moon. The music is by Gyan Dutt and the lyrics by the legendary DN Madhok. The lyrics have many fine shades and strokes that makes it a fine piece of poetry. The sense of symmetry in the lines of the second stanza are particularly compelling. To sample :

kaun bataaye tujhe chakora
gore man ke kale
jyun jyun preet badhaayega tu
tyun tyun wo ghat jaaye
chaand se preet lagaaye ....

Khurshid renders the song in a simple, robust and straight style characteristic of the era, yet she manages to embellish it with little nuances that give the rendition multiple hues. It is a fine performance that will be remembered everytime one mentions the lost voices of the 30s and 40s.

So without further ado I leave you with the song.

Footnotes:

Here are a few articles on Khursheed on the internet

Biography of Khursheed

Remembering Khursheed - By Pran Neville

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Pavan Jha for bringing her birth anniversary to my notice. I suggest you read his excellent article on the Passion for Cinema blog to get a complete picture of this wonderful singer.

Ek Thi Khusheed

Leheren Apni Humjoli Hain

youTubing this fine saturday morning I bumped into an old favourite. It is a song from the 1952 film 'Jaal'. Having a compulsive weakness for fisherman songs there was no way this song would have escaped my radar (let me confess, in moments of intense introspection I have often wondered if I sat selling wares in a fish market in my previous life).

But it is not only the fragrance of the fish that draws me to the song, my usual landmarks are all there too - SD Burman, Dev Anand, Guru Dutt, Geeta Dutt, Geeta Bali and Sahir Ludhianvi.

The thing that always strikes me in the song is the spunk of the two Geetas. I have always believed that the actress and the singer were kindred souls. Geeta Bali lights up the screen and Geeta Dutt the aural space. There is SD Burman with his characteristic upbeat tune in one of the rare fisherman songs without the Bhatiyali touch. There is Dev Anand his usual charming self(though strangely singing in a female voice.. go figure) and there is Guru Dutt behind the camera and for a fleeting moment in front of the camera as well (spot him!).

My heroes in a song keep changing with every hearing. Today as I watched the song play out I was struck by a stab of reverence for Sahir Ludhianvi, the lyricist of the song. What Sahir has written here in this song is not mere filmy poetry. It is pure literature. To sample

janam janam se apne sar pe toofano ke saaye

lehren apni humjoli hain aur badal humsaaye

jal aur jaal hai jeevan apna kya sardi kya garmi

apni himmat kabhi na toote rut aaye rut jaaye.

'jal aur jaal hai jeevan apna'. What beautiful use of alliteration and how beautifully and succinctly he has captured the ethos of the hard working fisherman community that is the showcase of this film.

So without further analysis-paralysis and verbal diarrhoea here is song. Click on the link below to view it.

And here are the complete lyrics

aangan mein baithi hai machheran teri aas lagaaye
armaanon aur aashaaon ke laakhon deep jalaaye
bholaa bachpan rastaa dekhe mamtaa khair manaaye
zor lagaake khench machhere dheel na aane paaye

janam janam se apne sar par toofaanon ke saaye

lehren apni humjoli hain aur baadal humsaayejal aur jaal hai jeevan apnaa kyaa sardi kyaa garmiapni himmat kabhi na toote rut aaye rut jaaye.

kyaa jaane kab saagar umadhe kab barkhaa aa jaaye

bhook(h) saron par mandlaaye moonh khole par phailaaye
aaj milaa so apni poonji kal ki haath paraaye
tani hui baahon se keh do loch na aane paaye

Happy Birthday Burmanda - Video Tribute

A very Happy Birthday to our dearest Burmanda. The grand old man of Hindi film music is hundred and two years young today. The legendary music directory was born on 1st October 1906. The month of October marks SD Burman's birth anniversary as well as death anniversary. I shall make some uploads down the month to mark the occasion.

I am starting off with uploading a small video on his life and music. I have been working on this video off and on and this is an edited first chapter. The video was created using Adobe Premiere 6.5. The piece is based off a slideshow created on the occasion of SD Burman's centenary show in 2006 in Delhi. It traces Burmanda's journey from the remote backwaters of Tripura to his final moments of glory in Bombay. The video is still rough at the edges and I would welcome some technical advice on how to smoothen it out.

I would look forward to your feedback.

Here are the links

Sachin Dev Burman Biography - Part 1

Sachin Dev Burman Biography - Part 2

See Also

'Simply' Timeless - 100 Years of Sachin Dev Burman

Happy Birthday Burmanda - Video on Burmanda

The Burmans - Tribute 

Bandhu Rangila Re - Inimitable (Character Sketch of Burmanda)

Song of the Day - Jaisa Des Waisa Bhes

Jaisa Des Waisa Bhes (click to watch)

I stumbled across this song on you tube after a very long time. I am taken in by the strong philosophical strain in the lyrics

'..man ko dhakle gori tan ka dhakna hai bekar
phool na mehke jab tak uska khilna hai bekar..'

I can not help but marvel how Dev Anand sings these lines with a perfectly straight face. Who says he was not a good actor?

Dev Saab you rock!
;)