Road to Paradise :
The saying goes "the journey is more important than the destination". But what happens if you
reach the wrong destination ?
Kalyan Kolachala did exactly that by managing to find "maruthi paradise" at the same
intersection as given in the address. It just happened to be in the adjacent suburb though.
By the time Kalyan arrived; Arun, Anup, Dharma, Sundeep reached from much greater
distances. Now who's Arun ? Obviously not Arun Sampath but a shorter version of
Arunabha. Kalyan was followed by Gajendra leading credence to the theory that the
nearest reach the last. Chetan's arrival after that only corroborated this.
Anup made the sojourn almost sound like "road to perdition" by mentioning all the other
places in the world he could have reached but barely avoided.The critical mass assembled
in time for some mouth watering food from Anand's and Mast Kalander. Anup and Chetan
pitched in with their contribution's that further whetted the appetite.
tum meri mehfil me na aao to koii baat nahiin, tum kisi aur ki..
Kalyan turned to Arunabha, 'So you finally showed up"prompting Arunabha to say
"you didn't show up last time". Obviously the work pressures and other responsibilities
take a toll. So a big thanks to all friends for taking time out and making this a big success.
It was a special occasion for us too, since we had guests for the first time in Bangalore.
Dharma and Sundeep:
They arrived to Bangalore form Kottayam and told us interesting stories of the Suuny
Matthews music library. The library includes pictures of some record collectors, including
that of Mr. G.N Khanna; who is better known as Gajendra among friends.
Sundeep Pahwa noted that ever since I moved from Delhi to Bangalore, I have almost
vanished from online music forums. Dharma's witty reply that I moved from the
out-laws to the in-laws, had everyone in splits. Sundeep ji told about his film connection
and the movies his father produced.
Celebrating Saawan:
We welcomed Saawan with Ghewar brought by Anup and "garjat barsat bheejat".
Shankar Jaikishan was the flavor of the day as far as discussions were concerned. Dharma
was reeling out anecdotes about the composer while the rest were busy assessing the
composers body of work.
Sticking to the theme we heard "kaare badra tuu na jaa na jaa"and unanimously appreciated
the SJ of the 50's. Opinion about 60's SJ was divided, as some friends were not fans of the
huge orchestra. What influenced Raj Kapoor move from SJ to LP for Bobby ? This was hotly
debated while Dharma pointed to some factual evidence like the poster of Bobby with SJ's
name, postponement of the muhurat due to Prithviraj Kapoor's illness.
We continued to listen to songs in the background and when I played "o varsha ke pehle
baadal" Chetan quickly reeled out the Pstats. He may have mellowed down with age,
but an instant failure to recall pstats of "ghir ghir ke aasman par" in the forum made him
to respond; "How can you forget that. Roshan. Bawre Nain". In a moment the clock
turned back more than a decade, and the firebrand, passionate man behind so many meets
came to the fore ! Those are the moments I wait for.
Kalyan's presence is equally welcome for different reasons. His witty interjections lightens even
the most serious of conversations. Here is his amusing take on RMIM meet commemorative.
When a section of the people say Lata Mangeshkar should stop singing, RMIM comes up with
a commemorative "abhi to main jawaan huun". And when another section says, Lata is the best;
they come up with 'Geet Kitne Gaa Chuki Huun" to show that Asha leads in numbers.
Soon we were transported into those days thanks to Sundeep ji's announcement
of an SJ program in Flint, Michingan. Discussion turned to how insignificant cities
are state capitals in US in contrast to India. We ended up rewinding the history of RMIM
and the first meet at Ketan's place.
Odd Man Out:
When I announced "Next song is for Anup", people started guessing what it can be.
Popular number ? Kishore Kumar song ? Song for Gentleman ?
Apparently Anup was complemented on another group "You are too nice to be an RMIMer" :)
My criteria was to pick a 70's song and Anup took us to his childhood days in Dehradun
where they had free shows of movies from that time in their housing society. The choice
"rim jhim gire sawaan" turned out to be apt in more ways than we thought as Anup had
some personal connects with the movie. He also mentioned about his Mama ji who was
associated with the movie Madmast.
The songs, food and discussions took the best part of the afternoon. Some friends
had already planned to go to Nalini Shah program. So we decided to part around 5:00 pm
after another wonderful session.
Sushmita was wondering why I played only a few songs and most of the time was spent
in discussions which weren't always musical.
I told her the full form of RMIM, rec.music.indian.MISC(ellaneous) :)
The saying goes "the journey is more important than the destination". But what happens if you
reach the wrong destination ?
Kalyan Kolachala did exactly that by managing to find "maruthi paradise" at the same
intersection as given in the address. It just happened to be in the adjacent suburb though.
By the time Kalyan arrived; Arun, Anup, Dharma, Sundeep reached from much greater
distances. Now who's Arun ? Obviously not Arun Sampath but a shorter version of
Arunabha. Kalyan was followed by Gajendra leading credence to the theory that the
nearest reach the last. Chetan's arrival after that only corroborated this.
Anup made the sojourn almost sound like "road to perdition" by mentioning all the other
places in the world he could have reached but barely avoided.The critical mass assembled
in time for some mouth watering food from Anand's and Mast Kalander. Anup and Chetan
pitched in with their contribution's that further whetted the appetite.
tum meri mehfil me na aao to koii baat nahiin, tum kisi aur ki..
Kalyan turned to Arunabha, 'So you finally showed up"prompting Arunabha to say
"you didn't show up last time". Obviously the work pressures and other responsibilities
take a toll. So a big thanks to all friends for taking time out and making this a big success.
It was a special occasion for us too, since we had guests for the first time in Bangalore.
Dharma and Sundeep:
They arrived to Bangalore form Kottayam and told us interesting stories of the Suuny
Matthews music library. The library includes pictures of some record collectors, including
that of Mr. G.N Khanna; who is better known as Gajendra among friends.
Sundeep Pahwa noted that ever since I moved from Delhi to Bangalore, I have almost
vanished from online music forums. Dharma's witty reply that I moved from the
out-laws to the in-laws, had everyone in splits. Sundeep ji told about his film connection
and the movies his father produced.
Celebrating Saawan:
We welcomed Saawan with Ghewar brought by Anup and "garjat barsat bheejat".
Shankar Jaikishan was the flavor of the day as far as discussions were concerned. Dharma
was reeling out anecdotes about the composer while the rest were busy assessing the
composers body of work.
Sticking to the theme we heard "kaare badra tuu na jaa na jaa"and unanimously appreciated
the SJ of the 50's. Opinion about 60's SJ was divided, as some friends were not fans of the
huge orchestra. What influenced Raj Kapoor move from SJ to LP for Bobby ? This was hotly
debated while Dharma pointed to some factual evidence like the poster of Bobby with SJ's
name, postponement of the muhurat due to Prithviraj Kapoor's illness.
We continued to listen to songs in the background and when I played "o varsha ke pehle
baadal" Chetan quickly reeled out the Pstats. He may have mellowed down with age,
but an instant failure to recall pstats of "ghir ghir ke aasman par" in the forum made him
to respond; "How can you forget that. Roshan. Bawre Nain". In a moment the clock
turned back more than a decade, and the firebrand, passionate man behind so many meets
came to the fore ! Those are the moments I wait for.
Kalyan's presence is equally welcome for different reasons. His witty interjections lightens even
the most serious of conversations. Here is his amusing take on RMIM meet commemorative.
When a section of the people say Lata Mangeshkar should stop singing, RMIM comes up with
a commemorative "abhi to main jawaan huun". And when another section says, Lata is the best;
they come up with 'Geet Kitne Gaa Chuki Huun" to show that Asha leads in numbers.
Soon we were transported into those days thanks to Sundeep ji's announcement
of an SJ program in Flint, Michingan. Discussion turned to how insignificant cities
are state capitals in US in contrast to India. We ended up rewinding the history of RMIM
and the first meet at Ketan's place.
Odd Man Out:
When I announced "Next song is for Anup", people started guessing what it can be.
Popular number ? Kishore Kumar song ? Song for Gentleman ?
Apparently Anup was complemented on another group "You are too nice to be an RMIMer" :)
My criteria was to pick a 70's song and Anup took us to his childhood days in Dehradun
where they had free shows of movies from that time in their housing society. The choice
"rim jhim gire sawaan" turned out to be apt in more ways than we thought as Anup had
some personal connects with the movie. He also mentioned about his Mama ji who was
associated with the movie Madmast.
The songs, food and discussions took the best part of the afternoon. Some friends
had already planned to go to Nalini Shah program. So we decided to part around 5:00 pm
after another wonderful session.
Sushmita was wondering why I played only a few songs and most of the time was spent
in discussions which weren't always musical.
I told her the full form of RMIM, rec.music.indian.MISC(ellaneous) :)
