The build up to this mehfil had more twists and turns than the
average fare. We had to change the venue a few days before the event and
Sundeep ji graciously came forward to host it.
A day before the event, Anand's concerns about possible metro service disruption due to a perceived dharna turned into a sawal jawab sequence; ranging from "kaise aauun Jamuna ke tiir" to "nadi naare na jaao shyaam". Eventually Anand took my offer of coming from Gurgaon to "Jamuna ke is paar" (my place in Noida) and then again go to "Jamuna Ke Us Paar (Sundeep's house in Delhi).
Anup also decided to come to my place first although Sundeep's house was closer. It was later revealed that Anup didn't want to risk crossing "Jamuna" on his own. We all met at Sagar Ratna Restuarant and found that Subhas who was going to pick us up was running late. In a change to the original plan, Anup then revealed that he got his car and a driver, who apparently was an expert in crossing the "Jamuna".
We decided to leave and were the first group to reach Sundeep's house and settled in. Soon Bakshish Singh ji arrived. Bakshish ji had just come back from a trip to Mumbai (were he stayed in Nalin Shah's house)and updated us about his visit. We also discussed about the theme for the event, Unsung composers, which was suggested by Bakshish ji. Bakshish ji got along a set of songs for the theme and noticed on the way that first 3 songs didn't get transferred onto his player. So he called his son and asked him to email the to Sundeep. Sundeep was caught by surprise as he cudn't recollect sharing his email with Bakshish. Bakshish then revealed that he got the email from the Calendar that Sundeep distributed and were amazed that Bakshish ji was so Tech Savvy.Soon Bakshish ji pulled out a minature Speaker from his wallet and started setting it up with his player. When I questioned "aap speaker leke ghuumte hain" he said
"jab morcha ko jaana hai, sirf bandook se kaam nahiin chalta. Goli bhi saath men leke aana paDta hai!"
Naveen and Bimal ji then arrived and discussed a little about the recent OPN show that they had organised along with Sandeep.We all warmed up with Chai and Namkeen. Bakshish ji then started the theme with an introduction. He mentioned that there are a few composers who are regarded very high in hindi film music. Master Gulam Haider, who brought the music out of the Rabindra Sangeet and Natya Sangeet influence, and is called "master" in respect of his statue. Hansraj Behl was called 'chhoTe master" and is also well respected.
K.Datta respectfully addressed as Guru ji was the first composer of the theme. We started with "diyaa jalaakar aap bujhaaya" and Bakshish ji pointed out that the Mukhda consists of 3 ragas including "Bilawal". The next song was also from Badi Maa, "aa intezaar hai tera". Bakshish ji pointed out that when these songs were composed, several composers were so impressed that they went to K.Datta to congratulate him. These were Ghulam Haider, Hansraj Behl, Naushad and OP Nayyar. We then movd to Daaman and noted how Lata's aalaap ends immediately followed by Rafi's aalaap and vice vera.
We were then joined by Subhas Ghosal.
The next composer on the agenda was Jamal Sen and Bakshish ji started with "sapna ban saajan aaye" from Shokiyan. I then played the song the was also recorded for the same movie but did ntot find a place in the film, "beeta hua ek sawan". We then turned to Daera and enjoyed "devta tum ho mera sahara".
Preeti Ranjan called to inform that he had a long day and wanted to know how long the mehfil was going to last. I told him that we were still covering the second composer and he could make it even if he had to "cross the jamuna".
I then played "rut jawaan jawaan" and asked people to guess the next composer. The clue was that this composer can be seen playing the Saxophone in the video of "rut jawaan jawaan". The first guess was Manohari and then Bakshish ji got it right as Chic Chocolate."chanda to sitara mila" from Rangili and "aa tasveer banaluun" from Nadaan were the samples chosen. Anand pointed out that there's a Kishore song in Rangili in which he sings in male and female voice similar to half ticket. Anand also revealed an article which claimed that CR composed some movies under the name of Chic Cholcate to evade taxes. Bimal ji recalled an old picure in which CR and Chic were dressed as Fisherman in Goa.
The famous poet "maqdoom mohiuddin" and the history behind "ek chameli ke mandve tale" was the next topic. My good friend Nishant researched this and I summarized it to everyone. In a Nutshell Maqdoom composed it as a sad poem remembering a former jail mate whose love story had a sad ending. However Iqbal Qureshi composed the song to a happy tune. Anand then farmais'hed the other Iqbal Qureshi number which has the same tune "aaj mausam ki masti men". Bimal ji mentioned that the name Qureshi originated from a very noble tribe of muslims.
We were then treated to Tikki ordered from "Bittu Tikki Wala" which all of us relished and had multiple servings.
We took a little detour during this time and Bimal ji told a little about his family background and thathe was privy to several film parties as he was nephew of actor Shyam. He recalled some of the old Mumbai surroundings where these personalities lived and Anand chimed in saying that some of the roads in the areas have been renamed after them. Bakshish ji played a rare version of the Anarkali song "ai baad-e-sabaa aahista chal" which had lovely Sitar inteludes and our resident Classical expert Subhas suggested a couple of possible artist names and ruled out Rais Khan.
The next composer was Dhaniram, whose name was suggested by Anand. Anand's research on Asha's early output is documented in youtube and I picked a stunner from this sample "sapne tuut gaye".Soon Preeti arrived and I played a song in praise of his favorite singer Mukesh "hamko india bahut pasand". The next song was "kaaton men rehne waale" also from the same movie Matlabi Duniya. This has several unsung composers including "Jayanti Joshi". Preeti was challenged to guess the year of the recording based on Mukesh's voice quality but he didn't take the bait. I always felt that Mukesh'svoice sounds more like early 50's than early 60's in this song.
I wanted to pick some 70's Kishore songs by unsung composers for Anup and asked for suggestions. Pavan suggesed a few on facebook but I found only one of them to my liking, "Badal kaala koyal kaali" by Pradeep Roy Chowdhury. Anup immediately noted that the songs quality was much better than the earlier ones. Prof. Preeti retorted " as the music quality degraded from 50's to 70's, the recoridng quality improved".
We then had a little of flaming session as to who spoilt the vintage music. Was it OPN with his Ghoda Ghadi, CR with "shola jo bhake" and other wing songs or "junglee" type shouting songs of SJ. Some of these controversial jibes are better left for private consumption :) Bimal ji and Bakshish ji took turns to explain the story behind Sardul Kwatra lodging an FIR on Mohd Rafi. Anup and Preeti recalled their meeting with the composer in the US back in the 90’s at an RMIM meet.
We then went back to the 50's with Manohar's Chingari. I played "adi mushkil hai" and Bakshish ji playeda catchy number "ya rabba peri peri ?". Next on the list was Shailesh Mukherjee whose "jal ke dil khaak hua" and "aansuon ki chaanv me" from parichay were lapped up. "maane na maane na" and "chhupa chuppi" from Savera rounded off Shailesh's works.
We were then joined by Asad Kidwai who works for NDTV. There was a brief discussion about Naveen’s Ibadat Foundation which is doing programs on lyricists and Asad mentioned that he had an Urdu book that had valuable information about lyricists. Asad also talked about his blog ‘hamkalaam” .
Anup's farmaish V Balsara was next on the agenda."kab beet gaii jeevan" and "sunaaye haal-e-dil kya" from Madmast were enjoyed and Anup pointed out that the movie was directed by his uncle.
We had another round of Chai and Namkeen and as Anup was helping with the serving, Sundeep commented "you should post this photo and then people will think before coming to my place" to which Anup said "maine isko apna hi ghar samajh liya" :)
Mukul Roy was the next composer with "do chamakti aankhon men" by Geeta and Hemant's "hai ye duniya kaun si".We then enjoyed GS KOhli compostion "tumo piya dil diyaa" and it was pointed out that several songs songs of Shikari were popular. We rounded up the evening with the beautiful Talat-Asha duet composed by SK Pal "mere jeevan men aaya hai kaun".
As we were leaving Bakshish ji inquired if Anup was in LA ealier as he was planning to visit. Anup pointed that he was in Bay Area but Preeti had graduated from UC Irvine in the LA area. Anup tried to correct himself by saying " Preeti actually got his doctorate from Irvine" to which Preeti replied "These days people say my I am attending my Kids's graduation party and you then find out that the kid is 10 years old". I was about to walk out with Subash and head home, Anup asked "tum mere saath nahiin aa rahe ho. Dhoka de rahe ho" to which Preeti replied "Didn't you just listen to songs of "Matlabi Duniya!". (Naveen) Anand aur Anand (Juvekar) decided to go together which meant that Anand Juvekar. didn't have to cross the "jamuna" during the return trip !
See you all again "Jamuna Ke Paar".
A day before the event, Anand's concerns about possible metro service disruption due to a perceived dharna turned into a sawal jawab sequence; ranging from "kaise aauun Jamuna ke tiir" to "nadi naare na jaao shyaam". Eventually Anand took my offer of coming from Gurgaon to "Jamuna ke is paar" (my place in Noida) and then again go to "Jamuna Ke Us Paar (Sundeep's house in Delhi).
Anup also decided to come to my place first although Sundeep's house was closer. It was later revealed that Anup didn't want to risk crossing "Jamuna" on his own. We all met at Sagar Ratna Restuarant and found that Subhas who was going to pick us up was running late. In a change to the original plan, Anup then revealed that he got his car and a driver, who apparently was an expert in crossing the "Jamuna".
We decided to leave and were the first group to reach Sundeep's house and settled in. Soon Bakshish Singh ji arrived. Bakshish ji had just come back from a trip to Mumbai (were he stayed in Nalin Shah's house)and updated us about his visit. We also discussed about the theme for the event, Unsung composers, which was suggested by Bakshish ji. Bakshish ji got along a set of songs for the theme and noticed on the way that first 3 songs didn't get transferred onto his player. So he called his son and asked him to email the to Sundeep. Sundeep was caught by surprise as he cudn't recollect sharing his email with Bakshish. Bakshish then revealed that he got the email from the Calendar that Sundeep distributed and were amazed that Bakshish ji was so Tech Savvy.Soon Bakshish ji pulled out a minature Speaker from his wallet and started setting it up with his player. When I questioned "aap speaker leke ghuumte hain" he said
"jab morcha ko jaana hai, sirf bandook se kaam nahiin chalta. Goli bhi saath men leke aana paDta hai!"
Naveen and Bimal ji then arrived and discussed a little about the recent OPN show that they had organised along with Sandeep.We all warmed up with Chai and Namkeen. Bakshish ji then started the theme with an introduction. He mentioned that there are a few composers who are regarded very high in hindi film music. Master Gulam Haider, who brought the music out of the Rabindra Sangeet and Natya Sangeet influence, and is called "master" in respect of his statue. Hansraj Behl was called 'chhoTe master" and is also well respected.
K.Datta respectfully addressed as Guru ji was the first composer of the theme. We started with "diyaa jalaakar aap bujhaaya" and Bakshish ji pointed out that the Mukhda consists of 3 ragas including "Bilawal". The next song was also from Badi Maa, "aa intezaar hai tera". Bakshish ji pointed out that when these songs were composed, several composers were so impressed that they went to K.Datta to congratulate him. These were Ghulam Haider, Hansraj Behl, Naushad and OP Nayyar. We then movd to Daaman and noted how Lata's aalaap ends immediately followed by Rafi's aalaap and vice vera.
We were then joined by Subhas Ghosal.
The next composer on the agenda was Jamal Sen and Bakshish ji started with "sapna ban saajan aaye" from Shokiyan. I then played the song the was also recorded for the same movie but did ntot find a place in the film, "beeta hua ek sawan". We then turned to Daera and enjoyed "devta tum ho mera sahara".
Preeti Ranjan called to inform that he had a long day and wanted to know how long the mehfil was going to last. I told him that we were still covering the second composer and he could make it even if he had to "cross the jamuna".
I then played "rut jawaan jawaan" and asked people to guess the next composer. The clue was that this composer can be seen playing the Saxophone in the video of "rut jawaan jawaan". The first guess was Manohari and then Bakshish ji got it right as Chic Chocolate."chanda to sitara mila" from Rangili and "aa tasveer banaluun" from Nadaan were the samples chosen. Anand pointed out that there's a Kishore song in Rangili in which he sings in male and female voice similar to half ticket. Anand also revealed an article which claimed that CR composed some movies under the name of Chic Cholcate to evade taxes. Bimal ji recalled an old picure in which CR and Chic were dressed as Fisherman in Goa.
The famous poet "maqdoom mohiuddin" and the history behind "ek chameli ke mandve tale" was the next topic. My good friend Nishant researched this and I summarized it to everyone. In a Nutshell Maqdoom composed it as a sad poem remembering a former jail mate whose love story had a sad ending. However Iqbal Qureshi composed the song to a happy tune. Anand then farmais'hed the other Iqbal Qureshi number which has the same tune "aaj mausam ki masti men". Bimal ji mentioned that the name Qureshi originated from a very noble tribe of muslims.
We were then treated to Tikki ordered from "Bittu Tikki Wala" which all of us relished and had multiple servings.
We took a little detour during this time and Bimal ji told a little about his family background and thathe was privy to several film parties as he was nephew of actor Shyam. He recalled some of the old Mumbai surroundings where these personalities lived and Anand chimed in saying that some of the roads in the areas have been renamed after them. Bakshish ji played a rare version of the Anarkali song "ai baad-e-sabaa aahista chal" which had lovely Sitar inteludes and our resident Classical expert Subhas suggested a couple of possible artist names and ruled out Rais Khan.
The next composer was Dhaniram, whose name was suggested by Anand. Anand's research on Asha's early output is documented in youtube and I picked a stunner from this sample "sapne tuut gaye".Soon Preeti arrived and I played a song in praise of his favorite singer Mukesh "hamko india bahut pasand". The next song was "kaaton men rehne waale" also from the same movie Matlabi Duniya. This has several unsung composers including "Jayanti Joshi". Preeti was challenged to guess the year of the recording based on Mukesh's voice quality but he didn't take the bait. I always felt that Mukesh'svoice sounds more like early 50's than early 60's in this song.
I wanted to pick some 70's Kishore songs by unsung composers for Anup and asked for suggestions. Pavan suggesed a few on facebook but I found only one of them to my liking, "Badal kaala koyal kaali" by Pradeep Roy Chowdhury. Anup immediately noted that the songs quality was much better than the earlier ones. Prof. Preeti retorted " as the music quality degraded from 50's to 70's, the recoridng quality improved".
We then had a little of flaming session as to who spoilt the vintage music. Was it OPN with his Ghoda Ghadi, CR with "shola jo bhake" and other wing songs or "junglee" type shouting songs of SJ. Some of these controversial jibes are better left for private consumption :) Bimal ji and Bakshish ji took turns to explain the story behind Sardul Kwatra lodging an FIR on Mohd Rafi. Anup and Preeti recalled their meeting with the composer in the US back in the 90’s at an RMIM meet.
We then went back to the 50's with Manohar's Chingari. I played "adi mushkil hai" and Bakshish ji playeda catchy number "ya rabba peri peri ?". Next on the list was Shailesh Mukherjee whose "jal ke dil khaak hua" and "aansuon ki chaanv me" from parichay were lapped up. "maane na maane na" and "chhupa chuppi" from Savera rounded off Shailesh's works.
We were then joined by Asad Kidwai who works for NDTV. There was a brief discussion about Naveen’s Ibadat Foundation which is doing programs on lyricists and Asad mentioned that he had an Urdu book that had valuable information about lyricists. Asad also talked about his blog ‘hamkalaam” .
Anup's farmaish V Balsara was next on the agenda."kab beet gaii jeevan" and "sunaaye haal-e-dil kya" from Madmast were enjoyed and Anup pointed out that the movie was directed by his uncle.
We had another round of Chai and Namkeen and as Anup was helping with the serving, Sundeep commented "you should post this photo and then people will think before coming to my place" to which Anup said "maine isko apna hi ghar samajh liya" :)
Mukul Roy was the next composer with "do chamakti aankhon men" by Geeta and Hemant's "hai ye duniya kaun si".We then enjoyed GS KOhli compostion "tumo piya dil diyaa" and it was pointed out that several songs songs of Shikari were popular. We rounded up the evening with the beautiful Talat-Asha duet composed by SK Pal "mere jeevan men aaya hai kaun".
As we were leaving Bakshish ji inquired if Anup was in LA ealier as he was planning to visit. Anup pointed that he was in Bay Area but Preeti had graduated from UC Irvine in the LA area. Anup tried to correct himself by saying " Preeti actually got his doctorate from Irvine" to which Preeti replied "These days people say my I am attending my Kids's graduation party and you then find out that the kid is 10 years old". I was about to walk out with Subash and head home, Anup asked "tum mere saath nahiin aa rahe ho. Dhoka de rahe ho" to which Preeti replied "Didn't you just listen to songs of "Matlabi Duniya!". (Naveen) Anand aur Anand (Juvekar) decided to go together which meant that Anand Juvekar. didn't have to cross the "jamuna" during the return trip !
See you all again "Jamuna Ke Paar".
