Lata Mangeshkar: The Melody in Us 

Barring the immortal Kundanlal Saigal we know of no other singer who achieved near immediate recognition, at the top of a musical career as did Lata Mangeshkar. While she initially drew attention with Bombay Talkiies’ Majboor (1948) in which she sang for mentor Master Ghulam Haider the very hummable ‘Dil Mera Toda, Mujhe Kahinka Na Chhoda…’, it was the very haunting ‘Ayega, Anewala…’ that she sang for her ultimate supporter Khemchand Prakash in Mahal (1949) that drew attention to her. Raj Kapoor’s Barsaat and Mehboob Khan’s Andaz followed in quick succession in 1949 and listeners and critics alike of the late 40s did not take long to realize that a phenomenal singing sensation was beginning to emerge. She would never look back again. 

The film music world was at a crossroads. The old order was changing, gradually ceding its place to the new. In a newly independent India, the film scene too was changing, and a new breed of music directors was experimenting with the music of the world.

Little did Lata at that moment know herself and her capabilities. Groundbreaking composers like Shankar-Jaikishan, C. Ramchandra and O. P Nayyar among others were stepping into grooves of their own (although Lata and OP had nought to do with each other) each with their own brand of western concepts in music. They were quick to recognize the flexibility of Lata’s vocal cords and composed to challenge her abilities.

There was a radical ambivalence in our music of that time. Tradition bound composers like Anil Biswas, Sajjad Hussain, Naushad Ali, Husnlal-Bhagatram (the first-ever composing duo in our films) and Sachin Dev Burman on the one hand and the new breed on the other were challenging Lata in different ways so that she had to contend with genres different:  classical, folk and a wide variety of popular trends. This only helped her to evolve more rapidly. These giants in music grew to be her mentors and she learned the techniques in playback singing from all of them.

And then there was the language barrier. Critical, nay sometimes nasty remarks from film folk made her conscious of inaccuracies in her articulation of the Urdu language. This entailed hard work but over a period she mastered that language of poetry and its Persian intricacies and was able to face and articulate the works of great poets in filmland like Sahir Ludhianvi, Shakeel Badayuni, Majrooh Sultanpuri among others. Much later she even took on the works of classical poets like Mirza Ghalib (the LP ‘Lata Sings Ghalib’ is worth a mention). It was not enough for her to be able to murmur like a brook or sing like a koel. Her impending career would demand more. By its end she would have sung in every major regional language of India, with Marathi, Bangla and Gujarati topping the list!

There were professional conflicts with contemporaries! Singing legends of the previous era were still quite dominant but their market was plainly receding. The very composers who had groomed them began to fall under the Lata spell. I take no pleasure in mentioning this because the glorious Shamshad Begum who is still a personal favourite of mine began to lose ground, as did Amirbai Karnataki, Zohrabai Ambalawali and Suraiya, all of them top notch singers whose songs are still played among private collectors. There was nothing lacking in their singing even at that point. It was simply that the generation was changing, and their time was nigh. The days of Master Ghulam Haider, Khemchand Prakash (both her initial mentors and supporters), Kamal Das Gupta, and other stalwarts were waning, as would wane the days of Shankar-Jaikishan, S. D. Burman and Naushad Ali, in due course of time.  Rahul Dev Burman (scion of the legendary Sachin Dev Burman) and Lakshmikant-Pyarelal would rule the roost for about three decades in the declining period of film music.

I will not go into the songs she made popular, nay immortal. They are just too many: besides, it would be an exercise in futility to jump into her oeuvre to retrieve a few from the numerous! Let history speak for itself. Her father Dinanath Mangeshkar having died while she was still young, the mantle of familial responsibility fell upon her shoulders, and she wore it with dignity and determination.

 Of Yore

However, even while we are still reflecting upon the passing of Lata Mangeshkar my thoughts cannot help but shift gears and move back into the past. For, in her passing, Latabai has enhanced the immortality of all those who left before her. Not that we ever forgot them but thoughts of them surface more vividly at this poignant moment, even as all of us realize that the generation of great singing, music composition and lyrics in our films is slowly but surely receding into history.

For the rest of our lives, we shall draw comfort from the fact that we have lived contemporaneously with them, more than enjoyed the music they created and perhaps wipe a wistful tear as we remember the memories a song will evoke.

This music made us aware of the depths within ourselves. They will be memories of our childhood, Radio Ceylon, our teenage, the smells, the sights and the sounds of the city and its people that each of us hailed from and best, memories of our own parents who enjoyed the music of our generation long after their own was past.

We are luckier than they were in that we have a renewed access even at this late stage to most of the music of our childhood and beyond, thanks to advances in preservation technology. In the mid-60s I remember Dad, on one occasion, becoming emotional as I surprised him with a 78r.p.m. record of Pankaj Babu’s ‘guzar gaya woh zamana kaisa’. And then it was mum’s turn when one late Saturday evening I quietly slipped onto the Garrard a 45r.p.m. recording of Kanan Devi’s ‘ai chand chhup na jana’. All of us will have memories of this kind. We could not have them had we not listened to this music with our parents.

There is a certain finality in Lata-ji’s passing. It may not toll the death knell for our film music but it certainly draws the curtain across the stage against an age of music that my generation has revered for the better part of 75-odd years. We are not going to get the kind of composers and singers that we have been used to, not in the foreseeable future.

That generation is now spent but the songs that we have loved will bring, as they always have, the solace so needed to go on. We shall smile as we think back to the fabled names (I will not attempt to mention them here, for fear of missing any among them!) that we grew up with and see their faces as they swim out of the melody we may happen to be listening to. I have hanging on my living room wall a gift from a dear friend: it is a framed recording of a 78r.p.m. disc. Each groove bears testimony to so many memories both, ethereal and earthly.

And Lata leads them all. In Time, as the years go by, we will remember her singing ‘Jago Mohan Pyare’ for Salil Chaudhury, or ‘Allah Tero Naam, Ishwar Tero Naam’ for Jaidev and a declining faith will be revived.  

Even as we listen to her, other tunes will emerge from within, each asserting itself to be heard. And we will remember names of beloved music directors and her fellow singers that may otherwise have needed a stronger prod for us to recall.

I wonder if all those departed names are aware that she is now among them. 

I wonder if the great Sachin Dev Burman called out to her ‘Lota Tum Aao…’ as she was leaving us. He once had, beckoned to her when he wanted her to sing those wonderful tracks that he had created just for her for his ‘Bandini.’

I wonder…

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