Cross the Borders

Whoa... Just realized that it has been over 20 months since last I was here, A Lot of has happened since then, moved to California, started a new job, the family visited from India, went to India, and lately in the shelter in place.

Last week I was having a conversation with my coworker Shakeel who hails from Pakistan, post our work talks, we started having conversations related to situations in South Asia; that conversation took a nice turn when we started talking about Music. During the conversation, I realized what is the next topic of the blog would be.  Today I will be putting together pieces where the Bollywood has been inspired by cross borders. In the piece dream sequences I had briefly mentioned Khurshid Anwar who was a very highly respected Music director in Pre Partition India, and continued to be in India till 1952 and then moved to Pakistan where he gained huge popularity. He is also credited to revive Noor Jehan’s career in Pakistan. Noor Jehan like Khurshid was hugely popular in Bollywood and post-partition decided to migrate to Pakistan with her then-husband Shaukat Rizvi. The couple had differences and decided to part their ways in 1954, It was Khurshid Anwar as Music Director gave the Noor Jehan the renewal of long-lasting career as lead singer in movie Intezar in 1956.

These people who I have mentioned Noor Jehan and Khurshid Anwar are iconic people and both worked cross borders and are respected equally on both sides. They have been inspirations to many music directors and Singers at the time and today, Folks who were in India post-partition kept on inspiring singers and music directors in Pakistan as well.  What I am trying to say that India-Pakistan shares the same musical roots and it is a very grey area at least till the 1980s. Things changed a bit in the 1990s; post the emergence of Nadeem Shravan in Hindi Film Industry through the movie Aashiqui in 1990.

Aashiqui remains one of the most successful Hindi film soundtrack albums of all time. It transformed the careers of the musical artists involved in its making, all of whom had worked for years in Hindi films without much success. Music directors Nadeem - Shravan, singers Kumar Sanu ( who ended up winning for 5 consecutive times) and Anuradha Paudwal, and lyricist Sameer won Filmfare Awards for this film - one of the rare instances of a single film winning all music-related Filmfare Awards. The success of the film's music also established T-Series as the leading film music label and significantly expanded India's music business. Such was the impact of Aashiqui that it started a new genre in the Film Industry and had followed up music like that. All the songs in the album were superhit.

I would like to mention 2 prominent songs from this movie that comes from across the border. The first one being Jaane Jigar Janeman, Now this song seems to be inspired by the song Bas Ek Tere Siva from 1984 Pakistan movie Doorian composed by Robin Ghosh, a very noticeable Bengali music director from Bangladesh who composed a lot of music for movies from Lollywood till late ’80s. Speaking of Robin Ghosh, who was born as a child of Hindu Father and Catholic Mother in Iraq where his father was posted by the International Red Cross during world war 2. He moved back to Dhaka at the age of 6, still part of pre-partitioned India. Growing up Robin Ghosh, an avid music learner got into a job at Radio station in Dhaka and from here his music journey started. During his young age, he was assistant to another music stalwart from Bengal, Salil Chowdhury, and was part of Salil Chowdhury’s choir group. During his days in Radio Dhaka, he was introduced to Muslahuddin ( a fellow Bengali and 2 yrs. senior in college) who was chartered to give music for Pakistani film Humsafar (1960). The movie was directed by Shaukat Hashmi, grandfather of Emraan Hashmi.  This movie also had a song Raat Suhani Hai  from Hemant Kumar. Interestingly the song was recorded in Calcutta while film was being made in Karachi, showing a true example of art has no boundaries. Now coming back to Bas Ek Tere Siva, this song seems to be loosely inspired by Shankar-Jaikishan’s song from 1962 movie Professor Main Chali Main Chali.

Another song which I would mention here is Tu Meri Zindagi hai, Now this song was pure adaption (and picked word to word) not only by music composer Nadeem Shravan but also by lyricist Sameer. The entire Mukhda was used in newly created song by Nadeem Shravan. It originally comes from the film Mohabbat Mar Nahi Sakti (1977) composed by Nashad and Tasleem Faiz as a lyricist. The song had 2 solo versions one by Noor Jehan and another by Mehdi Hassan. Same time, Tassawar Khanum also voiced the same song.

 Nashad was originally Shaukat Ali. It is an interesting story on how Shaukat Ali got his name as Nashad which he carried for the rest of his life. In 1953 Director Nakshab Jarachavi was making a film, He approached Naushad Ali (who later Composed the Epic Mughal-E-Azam) to compose the music for the film. The artistic turbulence hit both Naushad and Nakshab Jarachavi and Naushad decided to not be part of the movie, this irked him who immediately signed Shaukat Ali to be the composer of the movie and changed his name to Nashad which was very similar to Naushad. By the way, movie name was “Nagma” with Ashok Kumar and Nadira as leading pair.

Nakshab Jarachavi is prominently remembered as the lyricist for songs of India’s first reincarnation movie Mahal (1949). The first song which comes to my mind is Aayega Aane wala which had the divine voice of Lata Mangeshkar. Mahal was directed by Kamal Amrohi who later also directed Pakeezah and Razia Sultan and was the dialogue writer for the Epic Mughal -E- Azam. Going back to Nakshab Jarachavi,  He is credited to bring the all-Female Qawwali to the audience in movie Zeenat (1945).  The qawwali Aahen Na Bhari Shiqwe Na Kiye sung by Zohrabai Amablewali, Noor Jehan, and Kalyani was very popular and remains so, the director of Zeenat was same Shaukat Rizvi, the then husband of Noor Jehan. Now, this qawwali has been inspiration to the famous Mughal-E-Azam qawwali Teri Mehfil Mein sung by Shamshad Begum and Lata Mangeshkar and not to mention music was composed by Naushad. Nashad on the other hand has been composing music for many Bollywood movies prominent being Bara-Dari (1955) and Zindagi Ya Toofan (1958) which was directed by Nakshab Jarachavi. Post this Nakshab Jarachavi migrated to Pakistan in 1962 and made a couple of movies there (Fanoos and Maikhana) before passing away in Karachi in 1967 at the young age of 42. While making the movie Maikhana in 1964, It was Nakshab Jarachavi’s insistence which made Nashad to migrate to Pakistan and remained there till his passing away in 1981.

Before I forget, another trivia on Aashiqui, it was Aditya Pancholi who voiced for Rahul Roy in the movie.

Well I have covered East and West, Should I cover the North as well, I will try to cover, though I will not make a very long one. Pancham, as he is called, is one of the most talented music directors of 20^th century and has a wide range of composition under his belt, whether it is Pyar Hume Kis Mod Pe Le Aaya or Duniya Mein Logo Ko or Roz Roz Ankho Tale or Khali Haath Shaam or Ek Ladki Ko Dekha. He covered the entire spectrum. Pancham was given his first break by Mehmood in Chhote Nawab, though the movie had good music but was not enough for Pancham to be in the mainstream. He needed a big banner film under his belt, it was Majrooh Sultanpuri and Sachin Bhowmick (Screenplay writer) who recommended him to Nasir Hussain for Teesri Manzil. Teesri Manzil and Baharon Ke Sapne both were Nasir Hussain movies, and both were composed by Pancham. With Baharon Ke Sapne, the deadly duo of Rajesh Khanna and R D Burman was formed. The pair was incomplete till Kishore Kumar entered with Aradhana.

Coming back to Teesri Manzil which was directed by Vijay “Goldie” Anand and was supposed to have the leading man as Dev Anand, but because of some misunderstanding the role went to Shammi Kapoor who had done a couple of Nasir Hussain directorial movies prior. Infect Nasir Hussain is credited to change the image of Shammi Kapoor with Tumsa Nahi Dekha and Dil Deke Dekho. When R D the newbie was given the chance by Nasir Hussain, Shammi had reluctance and in his own words he would have preferred Shankar Jaikishan or O P Nayyar for that matter in the movie. Nevertheless, R D was called for trial and was told to play the few compositions. In the first meeting with Shammi, the first tune which R D played was Deewana Mujhsa Nahin and Shammi completed the tune. This freaked R D out and was in complete shock with knowledge base with Shammi Kapoor carried. After all he was a Kapoor whose family has been involved with the Indian Movie Industry for about 90 years or so. Anyways R D was a champion by himself and he shared the compositions for O Mere Sona Re, Aaja Aaja Mein Hoon Pyar Tera, O Haseena Zulfowali, Tumne Mujhe Dekha and then rest was the history. Pancham became an integral part of Nasir Hussain productions since then all the way till Mansoor Khan (Nasir’s Son) made his directorial debut with QSQT and gave Anand Milind their first big breakthrough.

Coming back to Deewana Mujhsa Nahi, it is heavily inspired by Nepali folk song very famous in the Darjeeling area of India Eh Kancha Malai Sunko Tara. Prominent Nepalese Singers Aruna Lama and Amber Gurung have voiced this folk song as well. Both hail from Darjeeling.

Well that’s it for today folks..