Songs

film song

More than anything the phenomenon of song and dance gives Indian Cinema its unique identity. Unlike Hollywood, where the 'Musical' was a separate genre by itself, song and dance has been an integral part of the narrative in Indian Cinema be it in any language or whichever genre often leading the Western world describing our films as those 'Indian musicals.' Over the years, the Indian film song has evolved and has been developed and perfected to a T. Further, film songs have pervaded all aspects of Indian life - weddings, funerals, state occasions, religious festivals, parades, parties or political conventions. Consequently Film music is by far the most popular brand of music in India. Filmmakers too have realized the importance of the song and dance in their films. Even today, with its stunning camerawork, eye-catching locales and sets, colourful costumes and energetic choreography, the Indian film song is at times singularly responsible for the success or failure of a film giving it that so called 'repeat value.' But then the use of Music and dance in Indian Art forms is nothing new. The use of song, dance and music was inseparably linked to drama in India for centuries be it the Golden Age of Sanskrit Theatre in ancient India, Indian Theatre in Bengal under the British in the 19th century, the tradition of Jatras in Bengali Theatre or the Ojapali of Assam, the Jashn of Kashmir, the Kathakali of Kerala and the Swang of Punjab. Thus when the first Indian Talkie Alam Ara was made, it inherited a river of music that had flowed through unbroken millennia of dramatic tradition. March 14, 1931 saw the release of Imperial Film Company's Alam Ara. The Indian Film song was born as along with 'talking' the Indian Film also 'sang', the wafer thin plot merely serving as a rope to string together the dozen or so musical numbers. The film's director, Adershir Irani, himself chose the lyrics and the tunes. For recording the songs, just a harmonium and a tabla were used out of the camera range and the singer sang into a hidden microphone. The film was a smash hit and all the songs were extremely popular particularly the fakir song sung by W.M. Khan - De De Khuda ke Naam Par Pyaare. With Alam Ara's phenomenon success other 'All Talking All Singing All Dancing' productions were hurriedly put into production. Alam Ara was followed by Jamai Sashti, the first Bengali Talkie and then by Shirin Farhad featuring the most popular singing pair of the Urdu Stage - Jahan Ara Kajjan and Master Nissar. It is said that a Punjabi Tonga driver in Lahore pawned his horse to see the film 22 times! Recorded on RCA photophone sound system, the film was not only technically superior to Alam Ara but also contained three times as many songs. In fact, all early sound films produced in India had a profusion of songs - it is said that Indrasabha starring Master Nissar and Jahan Ara Kajjan had as many as 71 songs! With the advent of the Talkie Film, the Hindi film song gave birth to a whole new song writing and music composing industry. Each of the major film studios had their own Music Directors who had associations with Marathi Parsi and Bengali Theatre. Saraswati Devi, perhaps India's first woman composer, composed the songs of the films made by Bombay Talkies. Her real name was Khurshid Minocher-Homji and she was trained by the well-known musician Pandit Vishnunarayan Bhatkande. She then studied at Lord Morris college in Lucknow with music as her subject. With the setting up of the radio station in Bombay in 1925-6, every month Khurshid and her sisters would present a programme on the radio. Known as the Homji sisters they were extremely popular. A chance meeting with Bombay Talkies owner Himansu Rai at a musical performance in Bombay led her to work at Bombay Talkies where she was re-christened Saraswati Devi. Once she joined Bombay Talkies, Saraswati Devi was taken to an empty room and told that this was her music room! Relishing the challenge, she got to work immediately. Small stools and stands were made for musicians and a tall stool for her to stand on and conduct the orchestra. Her songs at Bombay Talkies mainly with Devika Rani and Ashok Kumar proved to be extremely popular. Two other major Studios that left their mark on Indian Cinema in the 1930s and early 1940s were the Prabhat Film Company at Pune and the New Theatres at Calcutta. The former studio's musical repertoire was shaped mainly by Bal Gandharva'a Gandharva Natak Mandali providing its two most famous music composers Govindrao Tembe and Master Krishnarao. New Theatres at Calcutta was one of the most elite banners of pre-independence India. The studio with its richly educated personnel, unlike those at Prabhat who were uneducated, aimed for a cinematic equivalent of literature. New Theatres attracted major creative and technical talent and made some of the finest films of the Studio era. New Theatres has such stalwarts like R.C. Boral, Pankaj Mullick and Timir Baran on its musical payroll and introduced Rabindra Sangeet to the Cinema. Producers now tried to get artistes from the stage because now voice was the chief criteria and not many actors of the silent films could adapt themselves to sound. Anglo Indian stars like Sulochana who did not speak fluent Urdu or Hindi were the worst hit. Also those who could not sing suffered the same fate since playback was not invented. And those who did survive and yet could barely get a note right still had to sing their own songs. Ashok Kumar, Devika Rani, Leela Chitnis all had to do their own 'singing'. Thus the era saw the rise of several 'singing stars' that went on to become extremely popular. Undoubtedly the greatest singing star of them all was the legendary Kundan Lal Saigal. A school dropout, heworked first as a railway timekeeper and then as a typewriter salesman before B.N. Sircar recruited him at New Theatres. Saigal's first film was Mohabbat ke Aansoo made in 1932 but it was with the success of Chandidas in 1934 that he became a star. The following year, 1935, saw Saigal's career-defining role - the title role in P.C. Barua's masterpiece, Devdas. The film was a triumph for Saigal and took him to dizzying heights as he brought alive the character of Devdas creating the archetype of the relentlessly luckless, tragic hero. His brooding looks, the vagrant lock of hair, the resonant voice filled with love and despair drove the nation into a frenzy. Crowds thronged to hear him sing Balam Aaye Baso More Man Mein and Dukh ke Din Ab Beete Nahin. Seeing Saigal's phenomenal success, a rival studio Sagar Movietone went ahead and launched their own singing star as an answer to Saigal - Surendranath and though he was a reasonably popular star in his own right, Saigal was still Saigal. If Saigal was the leading male playback singer then without a doubt the reigning diva of the Indian film scenario was Kanan Devi whose singing style in rapid tempo was responsible for some of New Theatres' biggest hits. Born Kananbala in 1916, she made her debut as a child actress with Joydev in 1926. She later worked with Radha Films in films mainly by Jyotish Banerjee. P.C. Barua's Mukti made her a star and led to a fruitful association with New Theatres. The success of Vidyapati (1937) in which she gave perhaps her finest performance, made her the studio's top star, Saigal notwithstanding! The early film songs were extremely simple in terms of music, lyrics and orchestration. Often, just a harmonium and a tabla would accompany the actors and the lyrics too were almost like nursery rhymes. Music Directors used to compose simple little songs, which could fit into the range of the actor's voices. Soon however more and more instruments began being used in film songs - a sitar, jaltarang, and clarinet accompanied the tabla at different pitches. And as most of the music directors had a classical music background, the instruments were mainly Indian musical instruments. Early on a handful of people, many of them carefully handpicked by the Music Directors, from all over the country comprised the orchestra, which rose gradually in number to 20 or 30. In the early days of the Indian talkie, direct recording meant that not only did artists had to sing their own songs but due to technical and initial teething problems the picturizations of songs had to be done in a single static shot live as the artist actually sang during the shot! (A far cry from today when often a single beat constitutes a single shot!) But 1935 saw the biggest revolution in the development of the Hindi Film song. At New Theatres in Calcutta, Nitin Bose along with his younger brother Mukul Bose and music director R.C. Boral introduced pre-recorded singing where the song was first recorded and then played back and picturized thus freeing the artiste and the camera from the bondage of the microphone. This was for the film Dhoop Chaon. (Though there is some debate on this as Bombat Talkies claimed to invented the sytem with Jawani ki Hawa). Initially, even as songs were recorded and picturized in this manner, artistes continued to sing their own songs. However slowly this process paved the way for trained musicians and singers to enter the film industry. Now songs could be recorded in the voice of a different singer while picturizing it on a totally different artiste thus being a boon in disguise to those artistes who could not sing. Thus one artist sang the song while another enacted it on screen. With the advent of playback the Indian film song was poised at a very delicate yet exciting stage of development. From here on the possibilities were endless. Indian film music was still in its infancy but was moving ahead by leaps and bounds. The Best was undoubtedly still to come…