Welcome to March 2022 edition of Xth Volume of Carnival of Blogs on Golden Era of Hindi Film Music.
March is the month when North India celebrates the festival of colours, the Holi. SoY celebrates the mood with Impossible Songs, the songs whose physical visualization seems impossible.
We now move on to our section on tributes and celebrations for the month –
Bhuvan Shome: When Mrinal Sen started Indian cinema’s New Wave with Amitabh Bachchan, paid him just Rs 300, who eventually became a poster boy for everything that mainstream cinema stood for, made his first income from the movies in a rather non-commercial film, recalls Sampadaa Sharma from Mrinal Sen’s book Always Being Born – A Memoir
Shashi Kapoor: The humble artist who once refused a National Award because he felt his ‘performance was not competent enough’ Sampadaa Sharma
Samaj Gaya Main Samaj Gaya – Dev Kishan, the role that he played so tellingly in Bees Saal Baad
While working on ‘Mujib – the Making of Nation, Shyam Benegal reveals his mantras while making biopics and documentaries: Shyam Benegal, a rare filmmaker who has successfully walked the fiction and non-fiction tracks in cinema, said it is never difficult for filmmakers to tell the story they want to.
Shailendra Sharma @ Golden Era of Bollywood has posted following memorial tribute posts:
In the series of articles on Sahir’s Songs of Romance, commemorating Sahir Ludhianvi’s birth centenary, we now take up Sahir Ludhianvi’s Eighteen-films association with N Datta.
February 2022 episode of Fading Memories, Unforgettable Songs takes up Ghulam Mohammed and His Singers : 1950-1952 to commemorate the death anniversary month of Ghulam Mohammed. Previously, in 2021, we have covered Ghulam Mohamamed’s songs with different singers for the years 1943 to 1949.
Here is Remembering I.S.Johar, one of Hindi cinema’s greatest comedians through a scene in Shrimanji (1968) with Shahida and Kishore Kumar on BollywooDirect
We now move on to posts on other subjects –
What brothel set design tells us about films that explore sex work – Nandini Ramnath – The better-considered Hindi movies about sex work pay close attention to the design and dynamics of the brothel.
हेतुहेतुमद्भूत songs are the songs that depict the one of the six forms of past tense in Hindi, and is used to describe situations of ‘insight in hindsight’.
Kucch aur zamana kehta hai: the freedom to not conform are a few songs from Bollywood movies that beautifully express the thoughts of a woman’s mind while pondering life dilemmas or decision making, or bring to life the hopes and desires, and the joy of freedom, beyond just the waiting for a knight-in-shining-armor.
Our best stories are the ones that provoke: Shekhar Kapur – “We’re not storytellers. We provoke. We never tell stories. Our best stories are the ones that provoke everybody in the room or anybody to imagine their own story and that’s the best story,”
When Madan Mohan and Majrooh Sultanpuri created magic in ‘Dastak’ – Nirupama Kotru – The spare soundtrack has four tunes – each of them a gem viz. Baiyyan na dharo, o balma; Mayee Ree Main Kaase Kahoon Pir Apne Jiya Ki; Tumse Kahoon Ik Baat Paron Se Salki, Raat Meri Hai Chhanv Tumhare Hi Aanchal Ki and Hum hain mata-e-koocha-o-bazaar ki tarah
Metaphors for the Lover in Songs, where both the lady and the gentleman use metaphors. Even if the song is a solo, metaphors have been used to describe both of them. Some common metaphors such as bhawra-phul (भवँरा-फूल), shama-parwana (शमा – परवाना), chaand – chaandni (चाँद चाँदनी) establish complementarity and an organic holism
From Bollywood Rewind – Sampada Sharma – Indian Express’s weekly column:
- Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Anupama: Untangling the complicated web of a father-daughter story, about the dysfunctional relationship of a father and a daughter who can’t survive with each other but find it hard to let go.
- Mera Saaya: When Raj Khosla pulled off a twist that can be best described as refined Abbas-Mustan – Raj Khosla’s 1966 film Mera Saaya gave Sadhana one if the most popular films of her career.
Arushi Jain, a millennial’s views:
- Angoor: In dark times, revisiting Gulzar’s cult classic –- Today, when Bollywood’s idea of comedies involve a fair degree of sexism, Angoor comes across as simple, clean, and a crisp comedy-drama.
- Deepti Naval-Farooq Sheikh’s Saath Saath: A film that aims for your heart 40 years after it released
In continuation to our tradition of ending the post with a few songs of Mohammad Rafi that are relevant to the topics covered in the present episode, we will institute a series wherein we continue to listen to Mohammad Rafi and Lata Mangeshkar’s duet with a music director for the first time in a Hindi film, every month for the rest of the 2022,
Hans Ke Na Teer Chalana Dil Khud Hi Banega Nishaana – Beqasoor (1950_ Ehsan Rizvi – Anil Biswas
Dil Awaaz Mein.. Ankhiyan Mila Ke Zara Baat Karoji – Pardes (1950) – Shakeel Badaayuni – Ghulam Mohammed
Mehfil Mein Meri Kaun Ye Diwana – Albela (1950) – Rajinder Krishna – C Ramchandra
Pativrata Sitamai..Zulm Sahe Bhaari Janak Dulari – Aawara (1951) – Sahilendra – Shaker Jaikishan
Yaad Aane Lagi Dil Dukhane Lagi – Daaman (1951) – Ehsan Rizvi – K Datta
I look forward to your inputs to enrich the contents of Carnival of Blogs on Golden Era of Hindi Film Music.
Disclaimer: This monthly series of posts is my best-effort-based compilation of posts on Hindi film songs that I normally visit regularly. As I record my sincere thanks to all the original creators of these posts, any other posts that I have nor covered herein shows my lack of awareness of existence of such posts and is by no means any disrespect to their work. The copyrights to the posts, images and video clips remain the properties of the original creators.
The world is too small? or Is it? 