Youtube - "kaThaputale kachh ke"

Is it a coincidence that the Bengali singers in Bombay like Hemantda and Mannada excelled in the devotional genre? This song is a more obscure one from a soundtrack that rates as one of the best from Shankar Jaikishan and more renowned for a host of Lata and Talat beauties.

Ae jaan-e-jigar

There are times when words fail. I had the pleasure of seeing this song today morning and it made it my day. This song never fails to move me. One of the most deeply romantic songs, yet so melancholic. Mukesh is at his very best here. No one but he could have sung this song. Truly, Mukesh sounds so brilliant when he sings the compositions of Anilda. One cant help but wish that Anilda had not been so Lata-fixated and had given more songs to his favorite male singers during his peak years. Ab.. but then you hear "man me kisii kii priit basaa le".. and one goes back to wishing for more Lata-Anilda :) The dilemma of great music..

"main apane dil kaa afsaanaa" - A gem

Genius is a lot about astonishing an audience. A musical genius is one who manages to create something that hits the listener out of the blue, whose notes seem to have been crafted on thin air. C.Ramchandra is definitely one such man.

I spent most of today listening to "main apane dil kaa afsaanaa sunaa luu.n phir chale jaanaa". What a creation it is. When you hear such compositions, you are astonished that this man crafted his tunes after getting the lyrics. What perfect harmony exists between the lyrics and the composition. Not one filler.. every word has been carefully crafted to a melody. The opening line:

<code>
mai.n apane dil kaa afsanaa sunaa luu.N phir chale jaanaa
</code>

doesnt seem to offer many oppurtunities for innovation. But by pproviding a sudden downward murki at <i>phir chale jaanaa</i>, CR creates a completely different mood altogether. The melancholy is doubled.. sadness suddenly seems to flood out. The lament of the character turns into a cry.. what images this simple murki provides. Thats genius for you. Of course, one need hardly  mention that Lata's rendition is simply perfect !!

Guru Dutt, my idol

Guru Dutt is today renowned as one of the greatest directors of Indian cinema, to such an extent that he is often touted as the greatest ever in the Bombay world. It is a curious reflection of the sentiments he so unforgettably evoked in his masterpiece, Pyaasaa. The sole difference is that the real Guru Dutt did not live to see the steady rise in his popularity with time and also that he did not have a Gulabo to fade into the horizon with. He died a lonely man caught in the web of his own dark artistry.

Watching Guru Dutt's films is an experience. My exposure to Guru Dutt started unforgettably. In 1984, when I was touching 10, I went to Dubai with my parents a die-hard Amitabh Bachan fan. Like any youngster then, I did not know that cinema existed beyond him. My father was a Guru Dutt fan and he used to enact sequences from "Pyaasaa" to us. In my imagination, I visdualized Guru Dutt to be a turbaned man, rather old, perhaps thick spectacles. I was not too enthused by the image, especially when I had Amitabh Bachan to admire. Then Dad got "Mr & Mrs 55" saying that was a good, lighter introduction to Guru Dutt. "Lets not jump in directly to Pyaasaa", he said. I enjoyed the film immensely. It was a ncice, light-hearted satire. Of course, it is rather cliched but that didnt matter then. The stage was set for "Pyaasaa". It was on a week-day that Appa got the film. We watched the film right through.. I didnt budge through the film and it was all I could do to keep from crying at the end of the film. My life was changed forever.. everything about the film clicked with me. The brilliant performances by one and all, the vivid images, even at that age I could admire the suicide scene which goes on for almost 3 minutes without a dialogue, the music.. it was unforgettable.

I have since then lapped up all Guru Dutt's films multiple times. While his serious films are his best, his lighter efforts like "Mr & Mrs 55" are thoroughly enjoyable for their sophisticated humour, something uncommon in our films. Pyaasaa continues to wow me whenever I give it a see and Kaagaz ke phool has only improved with time. I saw it again a week ago and was again bowled over by the sheer mastery of the camera work and the story-telling. Though morose, the film actually moves at a fast pace and is overall very enjoyable.

I can honestly say that Guru Dutt changed my taste in cinema and music in Indian cinema forever. His films opened the window to the music of S.D.Burman and O.P.Nayyar from where I have slowly graduated to Anil Biswas and Pankaj Mallick. Through his films, I learnt to appreciate the finer points of cinema and have acquired the taste to enjoy the films of Orson Welles, Bergman, Satyajit Ray etc. He remains my favorite, and I hope future generations would continue to be inspired by his art and films.

Youtube - vo dekhe.n to unakii inaayat

An auspicious first post to the month which marks the half-year. A glorious melody su beautifully rendered by Kishore and Asha. This is the kind of Kishore I love - soft, gentle and oh-so-romantic. I wish he had sung more such beauties during this period.

Youtube - ham to jaanii pyaar karegaa

This song has captivated me for the past couple of weeks. I have never given "Baarish" much of a hear but I finally did and this song has since then kept me dancing. Chitalkar exudes so much fun into the song. Its a natural exuberance which is at once captivating and charming. At times, he sounds a lot like Kishore Kumar too.

A joyous song fit to join the likes of "sholaa jo bhaDake", "o baabuu" and "mausam_e_bahaar"

Drunken songs in our films

An interesting genre of music in Indian films has been the drunken songs, songs picturized on inebriated actors. The list of such songs is pretty long because this genre has been in vogue almost from the beginning of film music. It usually demonstrated either the hero going through bad times and hence resorting to alchohol as a means of escape, or the nasty man or woman who is going to play the bad person. Bad persons and drinking go together obviously :)

One of the earliest example of such a song is piye jaa aur piye jaa rendered by K.L.Saigal for the film Pujaarin. Its a beautiful melody that aptly captures the state. Saigal's Devdaas is still considered by many to be the greatest version of Sarat Chandra's novel on screen. When you hear Saigal emoting dukh ke ab din biitat naahi, you cant help but agree with that.

Anaarkali's mohobbat me aese qadam Dagamagaaye was the song that brought this genre into prominence and remains one of the finest songs in this genre. Lata's depiction of the inebriated lover is unforgettable. Not far after this came the near-definitive drunken song. Talat's ae mere dil kahii.n aur chal immediately brings to mind a "high" Dilip Kumar walking through the village streets at night with a foolish grin on his face. This song perhaps endures as one the finest drunken songs ever. Interestingly, Talat never resorts to the drunken gimmicks in his singing. During his Jaimala presentation on Vividh Bharati, Talat mentions that while he has sung a lot of drunken songs, it is upto the actor to enact the song on screen. The singer is responsible for delivering the melody. But then, he did make an exception to some extent when singing kisako khabar thii kisako yakii.n thaa from Devdaas going on the same Dilip Kumar. And he rendered the song to perfection.

An obviously drunk Motilal with a garland around his neck wandering across the dark streets of Calcutta singing zi.ndagii khvaab hai is another abiding image of a drunken song in our films. But all these great singers - Lata, Talat or Mukesh - did not sing the song as a drunkard. Occassional edges here or there,, that was all. It was Mohd Rafi who really brought into fashion a playback singer singing as a drunkard, this despite the fact that he was a tee-totaller. The string of songs he did for comedian Johnny Walker - like ham tum se kahataa hai shaadii or dekhataa chalaa gayaa - were huge hits of their time.

The 1960s were much more liberal times than the 50s and Rafi ruled the roost during that decade. mujhe duniyaavaalo.n sharaabii na samajho, saavan ke mahiine me, mai.n ne pii sharaab, chhalakaaye jaam etc. were some Rafi popular songs during this time. One of the most unforgettable depictions of a drunkard on screen was by Meena Kumari in Saabib biwi aur gulaam - and Geeta Dutt's na jaao saiyaa.N chhuDaake baiyaa.N remains one of her enduring melodies. Asha's ham hai.n nashe me is one of my favorite nashaa songs - I am not sure if this is a "drunken" song or just a "nashaa" song. In any case, its a truly beautiful melody.

Subsequent decades have continued to keep this genre in vogue, though the quality keep in sync with the overall musical quality of the times. Today however, this genre is almost obsolete primarily because drinking has lost its age-old implications. Drinking wine is no longer looked on as a "bad" habit. Its notmal to drink now. So cinematically, it conveys nothing. The era of drunken songs is indeed behind us now.

The genre in Tamil films in my next post...

Youtube - "ye sa.nsaar ye sa.nsaar"

A beautiful Talat melody, a melody right down Talat's lane in fact. This film was made as "Samsaaram" in Telugu and Tamil as well where this song was rendered by A.M.Raja. A pleasing melody..

Youtube - "manidan enbavan" from "Sumaithangi"

One of the more perfect songs in Tamil films. Great lyrics by Kannadasan, superb composition and orchestration by Viswanathan-Ramamoorthy, beautifyllu rendered by P.B.Srinivas, well enacted by Gemini Ganesan and unforgettably picturized by Sridhar. The Marina Beach has rarely been as enigmatically shown on screen.

Chitalkar.. a singer of a kind

Chitalkar Ramchandra was one of ttowering cinema personalities of his time - well built with the style of a leading man. It was difficult to believe that this man indulged in music and crafted some of the most heart-searing melodies of all-time. He is of course famously known as C.Ramchandra. While this name may ring a bell even for the modern generation,  the first name "Chitalkar" may not be as familiar. Not unless the person has dived at least a little into the ocean of old music. While Annasaab (as the man was fondly called) could sing pretty well, his musical obligations forced him to focus primarily on his composing skills. His singing hence took a back seat. But even with the limited time, he has sung some of the most well-remembered songs of Indian  films. In fact, he was good enough a singer to be used as a playback singer by other leading composers of the time like Anil Biswas, S.D.Burman and Roshan !! Lets take a peek into some of my personal favorites of Chitalkar the singer.

Albelaa, 1951 - Albelaa deserves a header all to itself here because this was where the singer and composer together hit their peak. The songs were the craze of the times, and continues to remain enduringly popular even amongst the youngsters. C.Ramchandra decided to make himself the voice of the hero Bhagvan in the film, and with Lata created some of the most popular songs ever - sholaa jo bhaDake, bholii suurat dil ke khoTe, diivaanaa paravaanaa, dhiire se aajaa rii akhiyan me and going solo in qismat kii havaa kabhii naram kabhii garam.

When I say that he vocalized for the hero in the film, dont think this was an isolated instance. In fact, Chitalkar is one of those few singers who playbacked for the three superstars of the time - the crazy, fun-filled mombaasaa on Raj Kapoor in Sargam, the zamaane-kaa daane daane pe likhaa hai and the soulful phir vahii chaa.Nd vahii Gam on Dev Anand in Baarish and perhaps most famously, rendering so stylishly kitanaa hasii.n hai mausam for Dilip Kumar in Aazaad. Most listeners take this to be a Talat rendition. In fact, Dilipsaab wanted this to be renndered by Talatsaab who couldnt make it to the recording. Chitalkar stepped in and sang it giving it the necessary Talat touch. Its one of the most successful C.Ramchandra compositions ever.

There is no doubt that Chitalkar's prime forte were the songs of fun where the singers needed to be as uninhibited and energetic as possible. It is wondrous to note that an otherwise serious Lata rendered some of CR's craziest songs with the man himself. baabaDii buubaDii baabaDii bam in Hangaamaa, yaar vaii vaii and mombasaa in Sargam, are baabaa in Shin shinaa ki booblaa boo, jhukatii hai duniyaa in Sagaai, dil kaa ye i.njan siiTiyaa.N maare from Ustad Pedro, o chaai machhuaa from Naadaan and so many more. Mohammed Rafi also joined Chitalkar in many a fun songs as baap baDaa naa bhaiyyaa,

But in equal measure has Chitalkar numerous classy romantic numbers - mostly duets with Lata. vo hamase chup hai.n from Sargam, ae aa.Nkh ab naa ronaa and lagaa hai kuchh aesaa nishaanaa kisii kaa from Sipahiyaa, chalii bhii aa ki teraa i.ntazaar kab se hai from Shatranj, jhuum jhuum jhuum jhuum rahii pyaar kii duniyaa from Hangaamaa, kahate hai.n pyaar kisako and phir vahii chaa.Nd vahii Gam from Baarish, and to round off with Albelaa, shaam Dhale khiDakii tale and mere dil kii ghaDii kare Tik Tik Tik.

What melodies these are !! Such a repertoire would make the best singers proud ! But then, C.Ramchandra did not expand his singing abilities much. As a result, once he slid as a composer, his singing also faded away. But his songs continue to delight us till this day..

Radio mysteries

My iPod is primarily filled with radio dramas these days, particularly the BBC radio productions of the Agatha Christie mysteries featurnig Hercule Poirot. The dramas are quite brilliantly done and the dramas owe their appeal in no small measure to John Moffet's voicing of Poirot. The man is quite brilliant - he sounds exactly how I imagined Poirot to speak as I read the books more than a decade ago. David Suchet did a superb job in the TV series and I think John Moffet has done equally well, if not better, in the radio series.

There are not too many Miss Marple mysteries reproduced and having heard Joan Whitfield as Miss Marple in the drama, I can understand why. The lady was good on TV but she doesnt have the same appeal on radio.

The great news is that the radio dramas are available for free as iTunes Podcasts !! Yup siree.. quite a few are already there and more are being updated every week. Its one podcast I make sure to keep updating.

"Sagaai" - an under-appreciated gem

When talking of C.Ramchandra and his great soundtracks, "Sagaai" gets usually overlooked. If so, its more to do with the utter luminousness of tracks like "Yasmeen", "Parchhaain" and "Albelaa" than with any deficiency with "Sagaai", for on repeated listens, I find myself becoming more and more enthralled with the quality of the soundtrack. This is a soundtrack worth treasuring. It has the usual CR-Lata heavenlies but also showcases, IMO, Rafi at his melodious best !! My favorites from this track :

i) o baabuu kaise dil pe kare.n kaabuu batalaaye jaa : This film followed the runaway success of Samaadhi which boasted of gore gore o baa.Nke chhore. CR has obviously tried to repeat the success of the song here using the same singers - and IMO, he succeeds brilliantly !! Its a total fun song where both Lata and Ameerbai sound wonderful. Where I occasionally skip gore gore o baa.Nke chhore, I never do o baabuu. Its a much livelier song..

ii) aa.Nkho.n se jo bhii aa.Nsuu bahegaa
iii) dil kii kahaanii kahanaa to chaahe.n
No track of CR can be complete with some Lata beauties and what beauties these are !! A slightly nasal tinge to Lata's voice make these songs extra sweet. Amongst the best of this great combo..

iv) udhar se tum chale aur ham idhar se : I saved my favorite for the last. Oh, what a song this is !! I can never ever tire of hearing this. Rafi was meant to sing like this. What flair, what melody and what style he brings into a simple and effortless rendition. Yes, Lata is sweet as ever but to me, its Rafi's singing that makes this song ultra-special to me. I might have no hesitation in nominating this as the best ever Lata-Rafi duet. CR managed to keep Rafi under restraint and hence got some of his best renditions.

The song has other nice songs too - a pleasing Lata-Talat duet mohobbat me aese zamaane bhii aaye, a bunch of fun songs, Lata's o DaDDiijii and her chorus backed triplet with Chitalkar and Rafi, jhukatii hai duniyaa jhukaane vaalaa chaahiye. Overall, an evergreen gem of a soundtrack.

Tere saath chal rahe hain yeh zameen - Angaarey

A charming duet from one of S.D.Burman's less successful yet fondly remembered tracks from the early 1950s. Talat and Lata dazzle here, clearly at their respective peaks. Lata sounds deliciously sweet..

Lata - "bahaaren phir bhii aaye.ngii"

One of the finest of Lata's melodies ever. This is indisputably great composer Shyam Sundar's biggest claim to eternal fame. An early Lata voice in all its raw beauty. Cant get enough of this..

"Paava manippu" - A timeless soundtrack

Director Bhimsingh had established a nice team around making simple, family themed melodramas usually starring Sivaji Ganesan in the lead with Savitri, Gemini Ganesan, Devika, Balayya, Ranga Rao, Thangavelu and Chandrababu making regular appearences as well. "Paava manippu" came after "Pathi bhakthi" which was the director's first big success. But this was the film which really established the Bhimsingh theme of "small family stories". And of course, it boasted of sensational music.

Viswanathan Ramamoorthy had delivered brilliantly for Bhimsing in "Pathi bhakthi" but even by their own exalted standards, "Paava manippu" was a stunner. Every song in the track is worth treasuring for centuries and milleniums.. TMS, P.Suseela and P.B.Srinivas all at the peak of their powers. My favorites from this track :

vandha naaL mudhal : TMS is awesome. Kannadasan pens a critical take on humans and even a Tamil illiterate like me is wondered by these words :

paravaiai kaNdaan vimaanam padaiththaan
paayum meengalil padaginaikkandaan
edhiroli kaettaan vaanoli padaiththaan
edhanaikkandaan panamdhanaip padaiththan

A poor translation :

<i>he saw the birds and invented planes
the leaping fishes gave him the idea of boats
echoes he heard and created the radio
what did he see to create money</i>

I have always felt that the last line in the stanza we hear is an edited or a resung version - a badly done one at that. If you hear the stanza, the sound of the last line stands out obviously. What did Kannadasan actually pen in there ? I recall having heard somewhere "madhangaLai padaiththaan" instead of "panamdhanaip padaiththan" (meaning religions or castes). I wonder...

paal irukkum [Youtube] : A superlative Suseela solo going on Devika. The prelude music to the melody is a representative of the composers duo's orchestral finesse and the reason why they were such a revolution in Tamil cinema. So breezy, yet it hits you where it should.

aththaan ennaththaan : Perhaps the most famous Tamil song ever. Lata Mangeshkar's statement at the time to this song being one of her favorites raised this song's popularity all over the country and it has acquired a cult status, a song synonmous with the romance of a shy girl. Wonderful lyrics . superlative composition and subdued orchestration and beautiful singing.. perfection.

Other superb songs in the track include TMS' "silar siripaar silar azuvaar" and P.B.Srinivas' "kaalangalil aval vasantham". It is interesting that though this film has Gemini Ganesan in just a supporting role, the PBS song has become the definitive Gemini Ganesan song. No retrospect of PBS or Gemini Ganesan can ever be complete without a mention of this hugely popular melody.

A stellar soundtrack.. one of my all-time favorites !!

Jab jab phool khile tumhe yaad kiya - Shikast

A stunning beauty from Shankar Jaikishan during the pair's creatively peak years of the early 1950s. Lata and Talat sang a number of songs for SJ during this period and this duet is one of their very best. One of the definitive melodies of the time..

Noorjehan "Badi mushkil se" _ Lakhon me ek

A Pakistani song for a change. Noorjehan of course is the singer. I have heard and much enjoyed the song earlier. Nice to see it here..

Sapno ki suhani duniya ko - Shikast

One of Talat's most beautiful melodies in a film that is sadly forgotten today. I thought it was one of the best Dilip Kumar films of the time. Nalini Jaywant looks lovely as ever. Talat sounds his best and goes perfectly on Dilip. A melody forever

Reducing the size of a movie file for Youtube

I am rather new to uploading files on Youtube. I love the site and hence was surprised at how long it took to upload a song I had extracted from the "Garam coat" VCD movie. Took forever. On investigating, I found that the size of the song file was over 30MB !! No wonder it took so long. Then started my hunt to find tools that compressed a movie file on Windoze. I know a few apps on the Mac which could do this but not on Windoze. I downloaded plenty of apps which promised to do this but either they were too unfriendly or just didnt work. Finally, I was referred to this great tutorial where the author demonstrates how you could use the inbuilt Windows Movie Maker for this. I then experimented by reducing the size of this song to just 3MB and it worked just great. So a big thanks to the author of the tutorial..

Man mein kisi ki - Aaraam

My all-time favorite song can now be viewed on Youtube. Lata is sweet as honey, piano just out of this world, Madhubala so fresh and lovely though she falls short on acting the song on screen. Enjoy this song..

Anilda - thou art my God !

Yeh kis manzil pe le aayee - Main Suhagan Hoon

A wealth of videos of rare, old songs is available on Youtube. I will link to some of the ones I found and much enjoyed. Hope you like em as well. Thanks go to the kind souls who shared these videos with the rest of the world.

A delicious Talat gem. This is from a 1966 film and Talat's voice was still good enough to lend the perfect ambience to rhis melody. This shows that had the music of the times been along the lines of the 50s when Talat dominated, we could well have seen Talat's career continue with success till the late 1960s.

"Milan"- a classic soundtrack

Watched the 1946 Dilip Kumar starrer “Milan” again yesterday and lived through the gorgeous Anil Biswas melodies all over again. There is no question that this is amongst the greatest of all Anilda sioundtracks and belongs to the top league of soundtracks like “Taraanaa”, “Aaraam” and “Kismat” by the same man. Parul Ghosh rules the track with four stunners and Shankardas Gupta, if I remember right, makes his first appearence in Anilda's music.

The film starts with a very young Dilip Kumar walking down the street and hearing "gun gun gun gun bole bha.Nvaravaa" being sung by his lady love - rendered so beautifully by Parul. You can almost feel a gentle breeze wafting across you when you hear Parul singing this song, so effortless and simple is her style. Then that masterpiece of a melody "suhaanii beriyaa biitii jaaye".. what a song that is !! Parul breezes through the melody.. at her best. The two other Parul songs are heavier, more melancholic but no less beautiful. "mai.n kisakii laaj nibhaauu.N" captures the dilemma of the heroine to a nicety while "jisane banaadii baa.Nsurii giit usii ke gaaye jaa" is one of my personal favorites. All in all, a veritable Parul Ghosh treasure here. Amidst all these treasures, it may be a trifle difficult to remember the two male-voiced songs in the film "vo kahe.n aap se" and "uupar hai baadriyaa kaarii". The latter is a masterpiece which captures the boatman's philosophy and the composition conveys the dark looming clouds and impending tragedies without going overboard. This is Anilda's genius - he captures the mood of the sequence without resorting to melodrama.


All in all. "Milan" is one of the treasure tracks of Hindi cinema and worth a million hears !

A gorgeous melody.. not as good a picturization

Roshan stands no 3 on my list of best composers for Lata which is no mean feat considering the people just below him are legends like Salil Chowdhury, Sajjad Husain. Sachin Dev Burman, Madan Mohan etc. and one of the prime reasons for this exalted position is demonstrated in the sublime melody from "Zindagi aur hum" - "tuu hamako dekh aur hamaarii nazar se dekh". The song is a musical triumph of Lata's divine singing, Roshan's simplistic, ethereal melody creation and the romantic lyrics. I imagine a moonlit night with Nalini Jaywant gently caressing her lover's hair as he lies on her lap.. a gentle breeze blows across the trees.. Nalini Jaywant because for one she is the heroine of this film (as per the titles) and more importantly, I think she is one of the best emoters to Lata's singing. "Naubahaar" is an example. But I was sorely disappointed to see (thanks to a kind soul at Youtube) that the song was picturized on Chand Usmani and the picturization itself was patchy and hardly as romantic as the song intends to me. Where is the gentleness, that subdued but undoubtable sensuality that the song sings ? Ah well.. just another instance of the picturization and the song being in different directions altogether...

The CR series - held up a bit

I switched jobs last week and going to my new office this week so time has been too insufficient to do sufficent justice to the musical flights of C.Ramchandra during the 1951-55 period I had started. However, I have created a complete list of songs that CR composed during this period - derived of course from the Geet Kosh. I will share this document as well in my next post when I get to expanding on the memorable melodies that this great man created in 1952.

Till then, adieu.

C.Ramchandra - A tribute

Jan 5th was C.Ramchandra's 26th death anniversary. I had wanted to start a run through the musical legend's compositions a little earlier so that at least a start is made by that time. But unfortunately, I got a little busy in other things and I am able to provide a first instalment of my series almost a week after the aniversary. However, that in no way diminishes the intent of the series which is to focus on Annasaab's career through his zenith years of the early 1950s.

What is unique about Annasaab is that while the other leading composers of the day like Naushad only worked with big banners, C.Ramchandra lent his musical talents to all kinds of films - be it for bigger directors like V.Shantaram or for B-grade stunt films of Sheikh Mukhtar. The quality of his music is consistently great regardless of the directors or the stars. His music was the prime reason for the success of films like Albelaa and Khazaanaa.

Lets start looking at the music that C.Ramchandra delivered during his peak years between 1951 and 1955. Each article takes one year at a time and looks at each film he composed during that year and the melodies therein. I hope it is of interest to you :)

1951
Naushad, C.Ramchandra and Husnlal Bhagatram ruled the box office with Anil Biswas the undisputed Emperor who had relinquished the race. C.Ramchandra staked his claims as the Numero Uno in no uncertain as he delivered three stellar soundtracks during the year, one of them becoming a definitive soundtrack of the period. His tuning with Lata Mangeshkar scaled higher peaks. Talat Mahmood entered his musical realm for the first time while he himself had a hugely successful year as a singer. So all in all, 1951 was a very happy year indeed for C.Ramchandra.

Albelaa- There is very little introduction required to this soundtrack. 57 years later, the songs of the film still resound across the country. The marriage bandwallahs still use these songs extensively, feet start dancing of their own accord as the charming Lata & Chitalkar duets play out. The soundtrack also acts as a showcase of all C.Ramchandra's music. There are the fun songs, the sweet, romantic Lata melodies, and the pleasing romantic duets.

Its well known that C.Ramchandra was inspired immensely by Benny Goldman's music and used that form in many of his songs and most successfully in Albelaa. His duets with Lata, diivaanaa ye paravaanaa and sholaa jo bhaDake are both such inspirations. . mere dil ki ghaDii kare Tik Tik Tik and shaam Dhale khiDakii tale are amongst the most popular duets ever, while the now-mandatory Lata solos took the forms of such beauties as dil dhaDake nazar sharamaaye to samajho pyaar ho gayaa and balamaa baDaa naadaan re and that lullaby-of-lullabies dhiire se aajaa rii akhiyan me. Add to those the pure Chitalkar fun in o beTaajii qismar kii havaa kabhii naram and bholii suurat dil ke khoTe. All in all, truly one of all-time great soundtracks.

List of songs :
Gazab kii nii.nd..mahafil me merii kaun ye (Mohd Rafi & Lata Mangeshkar)
dhiire se aajaa rii akhiyan me (1) (Lata Mangeshkar)
diivaanaa paravaanaa shamaa pe aake (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar)
hasiino.n se muhobbat kaa (Chitalkar)
kabhii kaalii ratiyaa.N...o beTaajii qismat kii (Chitalkar)
mere dil kii ghaDii kare Tik Tik Tik (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar)
dil dhaDakae nazar sharamaaye (Lata Mangeshkar)
shaam Dhale khiDakii tale (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar)
balamaa baDaa naadaan re (Lata Mangeshkar)
bholii suurat dil ke khoTe (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar)
dhiire se aajaa rii akhiyan me (2) (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar)
sholaa jo bhaDake dil meraa dhaDake (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar)


Khazaanaa : This Madhubala-Nisar Khan starrer was an amazing cascade of melodies. CR didnt need big banners to inspire him. Always open to experimentation, he used a lot of African folk music sound in the film.

muhabbat pe itanii javaanii na hotii (Lata Mangeshkar) : A typical Lata-CR melody. Focus on just the sweetness of Lata's voice bringing out the coyness of the character.
bam biyaanaa..do diivaano.n ka afsaanaa (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar) : Starts with the sounds of African tribal drums then eases to a typical Lata duet. A very pleasing one at that.
soii soii chaa.Ndanii hai(Lata Mangeshkar) : One of the contenders for the top-10 Lata-CR melodies. A charming, melodious, romantic number. Lata doesnt sound this sweet with any other composer :)
baabaDii buubaDii bam bam bam (Chitalkar & Lata Mangeshkar) : A rock-and-roll style song well before the advent of rock and roll. This is one of my very favorite CR songs because of the sheer energy it exudes but its not noisy at all. Its all about the beats and not the volume. A sheer joy.
dhiire dhiire Gam kaa zamaanaa gayaa (Lata Mangeshkar) : Pleasing chorus backed Lata melody
mujhe tumase bahut hai pyaar (Mohd Rafi & Lata Mangeshkar) : CR always does the Rafi-Lata duets very well. I always get the feeling that he has ordered Rafi not to vent "too much emotions" in his songs which is why perhaps Rafi sounds so restrained and hence unjarring in CR's songs :) While the "Sagaai" duet remains my Rafi favorite melody with CR, this is not too far behind.
ae chaa.Nd pyaar meraa tujhase ye (Lata Mangeshkar) : An absolute stunner. CR was a master at orchestrating his songs and the thrilling violin pieces in the song are worth travelling miles to hear. The way the violin moves after Lata sings "tum bevafaa na honaa" is so wonderful. An easy walk-in to my top 10 CR-Lata list.
zambo chii kolaa..kar de zaraa ishaaraa (Lata Mangeshkar) : One would hardly expect a sad melody when hearing the prelude music to the song. But it turns out to another charming piece.

More to come...