Comments on: Salil Chowdhury’s relationship with Mohammad Rafi http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html It's all about Mohd Rafi Wed, 20 Aug 2008 22:42:23 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.4 by: myk http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-17816 Sun, 02 Dec 2007 22:40:54 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-17816 Ref Post 60: Dear P Haldar, What a fantastic post you have written. Your list clearly shows that Dada created much better songs for Lata than Salil. Look at the range and variety in your list, absolutely excellent. Would like to add my comments on two songs: Number 15 on your list is not only special for its tune, singing and tabla, but look at the way Dada starts off the song with western instruments and then proceeds to add indian elements after (i.e the sitar) after, and then in the first interlude there's the electric guitar, very haunting and well done. A combination of the east and west, fusion at its best, and it also shows Dada was great at it as well. Number 12 on your list is one of my favourite Lata compositions, the melody, orchestration, singing is fantastic. The whole Talash album was a winner all the way. Ref Post 60:

Dear P Haldar,

What a fantastic post you have written. Your list clearly shows that Dada created much better songs for Lata than Salil. Look at the range and variety in your list, absolutely excellent.

Would like to add my comments on two songs:

Number 15 on your list is not only special for its tune, singing and tabla, but look at the way Dada starts off the song with western instruments and then proceeds to add indian elements after (i.e the sitar) after, and then in the first interlude there’s the electric guitar, very haunting and well done. A combination of the east and west, fusion at its best, and it also shows Dada was great at it as well.

Number 12 on your list is one of my favourite Lata compositions, the melody, orchestration, singing is fantastic. The whole Talash album was a winner all the way.

]]> by: Souvik Chatterji http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-17041 Thu, 22 Nov 2007 04:08:28 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-17041 The discussion regarding Salil Chowdhury and Sd Burman went in the wrong direction, I have talked about casting and synchronisation of lyrics with melody where Salil Chowdhury's academic excellence puts him in a separate category. Returning back to Rafi, he used to mark and understand the film sequence better than other singers before making playback. An example in Bheegi Raat, after the last paragraph of the song dil jo na keh saka, Meena Kumari left the hall in wheelchair. Roshan just played the tune, Rafi returned back with wohi raaze dil in a way showing his exclamation that Pradeep Kumar was wondering where had Meena Kumari gone. With the demise of Rafi, Roshan and their team these creations cannot be repeated again. Souvik Chattejri The discussion regarding Salil Chowdhury and Sd Burman went in the wrong direction, I have talked about casting and synchronisation of lyrics with melody where Salil Chowdhury’s academic excellence puts him in a separate category. Returning back to Rafi, he used to mark and understand the film sequence better than other singers before making playback. An example in Bheegi Raat, after the last paragraph of the song dil jo na keh saka, Meena Kumari left the hall in wheelchair. Roshan just played the tune, Rafi returned back with wohi raaze dil in a way showing his exclamation that Pradeep Kumar was wondering where had Meena Kumari gone. With the demise of Rafi, Roshan and their team these creations cannot be repeated again.
Souvik Chattejri

]]> by: Rafifan http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-16945 Wed, 21 Nov 2007 04:37:15 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-16945 Re: Post 60 You are absolutely right, Mr. Haldar. Lata does give a good competetion to Rafi. I love both of them but I am partial to Rafi Sahab. Other singers, no matter how good they are, do not come anywhere close to the legend. My second most favourite male singer - Manna Dey was once asked to rate himself on the scale of 1 to 10. His reply, "with a singer like Rafi around, the entire space from 1 to 10 was occupied. Everyone else started from 11", shows great respect to a legend by a legend. We will keep Lata out of this. For others I will say, "khaak ko aasman se kya nisbat" Re: Post 60

You are absolutely right, Mr. Haldar. Lata does give a good competetion to Rafi. I love both of them but I am partial to Rafi Sahab. Other singers, no matter how good they are, do not come anywhere close to the legend.

My second most favourite male singer - Manna Dey was once asked to rate himself on the scale of 1 to 10. His reply, “with a singer like Rafi around, the entire space from 1 to 10 was occupied. Everyone else started from 11″, shows great respect to a legend by a legend. We will keep Lata out of this. For others I will say,

“khaak ko aasman se kya nisbat”

]]> by: P. Haldar http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-16509 Sat, 17 Nov 2007 05:17:43 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-16509 ref post 54: myk, sorry for the delay in responding. I was waiting for the bajrang dal type activism that was going on this forum to subside; one of the jokers has written an article on another forum that will put even the best conspiracy theories to shame. Anyway, here's a list of 17 Lata songs under SD's baton, which I consider to be a sample of their best work together. 1. Thandi hawaye lehrake aye rut hai jawan http://youtube.com/watch?v=cbZk7-Juga4 2. Tum na jaane kis jahaan me kho gaye http://youtube.com/watch?v=QOwgLWVgmV8 3. Chand phir nikla magar tum na aaye http://youtube.com/watch?v=OZ-Gb4moQcw 4. Jogi jab se tu aaya mere dwaare,mere rang gaye http://youtube.com/watch?v=GPLF3sKEAH4 5. Mora gora ang laile,mohe sham rang daide http://youtube.com/watch?v=Jz75iUT77L4 6. Yeh tanhai hai re hai jaane phir aaye na aaye http://youtube.com/watch?v=zvI-3EwDZEw 7. Piya tose naina laagere http://youtube.com/watch?v=3koQIDoNGMU 8. Aaj phir jeene ki tamanna hai http://youtube.com/watch?v=CgHEJYGjD9g 9. Rulake gaya sapna mera,baithi hun kab ho savera http://youtube.com/watch?v=75n_qE4gbgQ&feature=related 10. Hothon mein aisi baat main dabake chali aayee http://youtube.com/watch?v=nGaDuXQNPp4 11. Khayi hai re humne kasam sang rehne ki http://youtube.com/watch?v=U2DtsrKnSIw&feature=related 12. Kitni akeli kitni tanha si lagi unse milke main aaj http://youtube.com/watch?v=TN42K66WFBg 13. Rangeela re tere rang mein yun ranga hai http://youtube.com/watch?v=kywPrDj-W34 14. Rama rama gazab huyi gaware http://youtube.com/watch?v=t4tzs4fQIYY 15. Megha chaye aadhi raat,bairan ban gayi nindiya http://youtube.com/watch?v=N9g4S6HHRS4 16. Ab to hai tumse har khushi apni http://youtube.com/watch?v=Bpb5BNvmPCI 17. Piya sang khelo holi phagun aayore You can add another 10 without sacrificing any quality, such was the magic they produced together. Please note that they didn't work together for 5 years but see how Lata bounced back immediately with nos. 4 & 5 after they patched up, thanks to the services of chhote nawab. No. 4 was composed in the bengali kirtan style, akin to geeta's "aaj sajan mohe ang laga lo" in pyaasa, and No. 5 is reminiscent of geeta's "jaane kya tu ne kahi" from the same film. If no one told you who the composer for no. 6 was, whom would you suspect? Salil, right? No. 7 is an all-time favourite of so many film and music personalities that I can't list them all. Only thing to note is that in the same film, Dada produced no. 8, which marked the beginning of the feminist movement in hindi films. In a Lata concert that I attended a year after Dada passed away, this was her opening song, sung in his memory. Nos 8 to 14 can be aptly termed as "magic" with the unlucky no. 13 encapsulating the Dada-didi magic to perfection. This forum is for Rafi saab's fans and so folks might be wondering why I'm singing in praise of the nightingale. Well, there are two reasons. First, to point out to Souvik, that with Salil's favourite and only real weapon, Dada created better magic (in hindi films). And, second, to point out to fellow Rafians, to stop targeting Kishore, because the real battle is elsewhere. Between the two tallest titans the music world has seen. ref post 54:

myk, sorry for the delay in responding. I was waiting for the bajrang dal type activism that was going on this forum to subside; one of the jokers has written an article on another forum that will put even the best conspiracy theories to shame. Anyway, here’s a list of 17 Lata songs under SD’s baton, which I consider to be a sample of their best work together.

1. Thandi hawaye lehrake aye rut hai jawan
http://youtube.com/watch?v=cbZk7-Juga4

2. Tum na jaane kis jahaan me kho gaye
http://youtube.com/watch?v=QOwgLWVgmV8

3. Chand phir nikla magar tum na aaye
http://youtube.com/watch?v=OZ-Gb4moQcw

4. Jogi jab se tu aaya mere dwaare,mere rang gaye
http://youtube.com/watch?v=GPLF3sKEAH4

5. Mora gora ang laile,mohe sham rang daide
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Jz75iUT77L4

6. Yeh tanhai hai re hai jaane phir aaye na aaye
http://youtube.com/watch?v=zvI-3EwDZEw

7. Piya tose naina laagere
http://youtube.com/watch?v=3koQIDoNGMU

8. Aaj phir jeene ki tamanna hai
http://youtube.com/watch?v=CgHEJYGjD9g

9. Rulake gaya sapna mera,baithi hun kab ho savera
http://youtube.com/watch?v=75n_qE4gbgQ&feature=related

10. Hothon mein aisi baat main dabake chali aayee
http://youtube.com/watch?v=nGaDuXQNPp4

11. Khayi hai re humne kasam sang rehne ki
http://youtube.com/watch?v=U2DtsrKnSIw&feature=related

12. Kitni akeli kitni tanha si lagi unse milke main aaj
http://youtube.com/watch?v=TN42K66WFBg

13. Rangeela re tere rang mein yun ranga hai
http://youtube.com/watch?v=kywPrDj-W34

14. Rama rama gazab huyi gaware
http://youtube.com/watch?v=t4tzs4fQIYY

15. Megha chaye aadhi raat,bairan ban gayi nindiya
http://youtube.com/watch?v=N9g4S6HHRS4

16. Ab to hai tumse har khushi apni
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Bpb5BNvmPCI

17. Piya sang khelo holi phagun aayore

You can add another 10 without sacrificing any quality, such was the magic they produced together. Please note that they didn’t work together for 5 years but see how Lata bounced back immediately with nos. 4 & 5 after they patched up, thanks to the services of chhote nawab. No. 4 was composed in the bengali kirtan style, akin to geeta’s “aaj sajan mohe ang laga lo” in pyaasa, and No. 5 is reminiscent of geeta’s “jaane kya tu ne kahi” from the same film.

If no one told you who the composer for no. 6 was, whom would you suspect? Salil, right? No. 7 is an all-time favourite of so many film and music personalities that I can’t list them all. Only thing to note is that in the same film, Dada produced no. 8, which marked the beginning of the feminist movement in hindi films. In a Lata concert that I attended a year after Dada passed away, this was her opening song, sung in his memory. Nos 8 to 14 can be aptly termed as “magic” with the unlucky no. 13 encapsulating the Dada-didi magic to perfection.

This forum is for Rafi saab’s fans and so folks might be wondering why I’m singing in praise of the nightingale. Well, there are two reasons. First, to point out to Souvik, that with Salil’s favourite and only real weapon, Dada created better magic (in hindi films). And, second, to point out to fellow Rafians, to stop targeting Kishore, because the real battle is elsewhere. Between the two tallest titans the music world has seen.

]]> by: Souvik Chatterji http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-16429 Fri, 16 Nov 2007 07:11:51 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-16429 Salil Chowdhury hardly had any affiliation towards blindly backing up playback singers even if they had regional background. Lata's extraordinary association with him include songs like "aja re pardesi", "daiyare daiyare jangal papi bichuya", "jare, jare ur jare panchi", "jago mohan pyare," etc. Souvik Chatterji Salil Chowdhury hardly had any affiliation towards blindly backing up playback singers even if they had regional background. Lata’s extraordinary association with him include songs like “aja re pardesi”, “daiyare daiyare jangal papi bichuya”, “jare, jare ur jare panchi”, “jago mohan pyare,” etc.
Souvik Chatterji

]]> by: Souvik Chatterji http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15782 Tue, 06 Nov 2007 09:25:17 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15782 Another factor I did not reflect in my writing, that is Naushad or Shankar Jaikishan were absolute admirers of Rafi, in fact Naushad was also Rafi's creator, but they were spot on their casting of singers, where there was no compromise. Naushad inspite of giving Madhuban me Radhika nache re in Kohinoor, 1960, used Bade Ghulam Ali khan in Mughal -i-azam, 1960, the producers did not have the capability of thrusting singers on these giants. Shankar Jaikishan sued Rafi's clasical andaz in awaaz deke hume tum bulayo or ajahu na aye balma, swasn buta jai, but used Bhim Sen Joshi and Manna Dey in Basant Bahar. Producers digested SJ's choice because they knew their expertise commanded regard and respect. Souvik Chatterji. Another factor I did not reflect in my writing, that is Naushad or Shankar Jaikishan were absolute admirers of Rafi, in fact Naushad was also Rafi’s creator, but they were spot on their casting of singers, where there was no compromise. Naushad inspite of giving Madhuban me Radhika nache re in Kohinoor, 1960, used Bade Ghulam Ali khan in Mughal -i-azam, 1960, the producers did not have the capability of thrusting singers on these giants. Shankar Jaikishan sued Rafi’s clasical andaz in awaaz deke hume tum bulayo or ajahu na aye balma, swasn buta jai, but used Bhim Sen Joshi and Manna Dey in Basant Bahar. Producers digested SJ’s choice because they knew their expertise commanded regard and respect. Souvik Chatterji.

]]> by: Souvik Chatterji http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15781 Tue, 06 Nov 2007 09:05:44 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15781 Inspite of making adverse comments on Sd's casting of singers, his singing capability has not been glorified in my writing.I were addressing all india forum. Sd's own basic discs, ami chinu eka, tajmahal, ghum bhulechi, mono dilona bodhu, barne gandhe chandhe geetite, bashi shune ar kam nai, alo chay dola utala, are masterpieces. I cant translate the bengali version to the all india listeners, nor can explain the passion with which sd had sung them. When I make adverse comments on his casting, it hurts me that a man with such classical and folk skills could utilise only 50% of his capability due to wrong casting. Souvik Chatterji. Inspite of making adverse comments on Sd’s casting of singers, his singing capability has not been glorified in my writing.I were addressing all india forum. Sd’s own basic discs, ami chinu eka, tajmahal, ghum bhulechi, mono dilona bodhu, barne gandhe chandhe geetite, bashi shune ar kam nai, alo chay dola utala, are masterpieces. I cant translate the bengali version to the all india listeners, nor can explain the passion with which sd had sung them. When I make adverse comments on his casting, it hurts me that a man with such classical and folk skills could utilise only 50% of his capability due to wrong casting.
Souvik Chatterji.

]]> by: P. Haldar http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15773 Tue, 06 Nov 2007 04:54:54 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15773 ref post 54: myk, you've provided a wonderful output of songs from the Salil-Lata combo. As always, I am amazed at your knowledge level. I'll wait for Souvik and others to revise the list before I provide my 10 best SD-Lata songs. ref post 54:

myk, you’ve provided a wonderful output of songs from the Salil-Lata combo. As always, I am amazed at your knowledge level. I’ll wait for Souvik and others to revise the list before I provide my 10 best SD-Lata songs.

]]> by: P. Haldar http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15772 Tue, 06 Nov 2007 04:37:00 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15772 ref post 53: Souvik, I'd urge you to seriously study the history of hindi film music before making unfounded statements. SD's innings with Kishore had started much earlier than with Rafi's; in fact, SD was using Kishore when most md's, including your favourite Salil, did not even consider Kishore to be a singer. Some of the films that you mentioned, like Funtoosh, Munimji and Paying Guest, were made before Rafi entered SD's orbit. SD's relationship with Rafi started sometime in the mid 50s, but in a really big way with nau do gyarah and pyaasa in 1957. In the 1947-57 period, he had already created major hits with Geeta (Mera sundar sapna beet gaya), Manna (Upar gagan vishal), Lata (Thandi hawayen lehrate aaye), Kishore (Jeevan ke safar mein rahi), Talat (Jayen to jayen kahan) and Hemant (Teri duniya mein jeene se). In short, SD was already a hit md before his relationship with rafi began. As much as I respect your views on Salil -- and I also love his music -- there will be very few takers on your views of him vis-a-vis SD. Let's not bring Salil's bengali oeuvre here and focus only on hfm. SD, along with Naushad and SJ, will remain one of the three greatest md's the film world has seen. I've talked with enough knowledgeable people to realise that most pick one of them as the greatest ever md. And when you talk about playback, very few md's understood the idiom better than sd. I am totally surprised that you consider one of his major strengths to be his weakness. Genuine Rafians might not go gaga over SD the way they go over Naushad, SJ or LP -- the reasons are understandable -- but deep inside they know that the SD-Rafi combo was one of the best ever to happen in film music. Listen to Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaye to kya hai and Din dhal jaye and tell me if playback singing can get any better. Unlike some enthusiasts, I don't maintain any databases, so I might make an error or two in reporting. But check it out for yourself and let me know who were the favourite singers for SJ, Madan Mohan and Roshan -- all considered to be Rafi loyalists -- till around 1955. And then check out what happened in the 1955-60 period with these md's -- they, along with sd, switched en masse to rafi. This didn't happen in a vacuum; there was one md who sent shivers down the spine of every other md, the man who fixed Rafi's voice on Dev, on Shammi, Johnny Walker and, yes, on Kishore. If you are a true Rafian, you should do some serious analysis before making the kind of statements you are making. You have written some very good articles on rafi saab's association with a host of md's, and that's why I'm responding to your posts, so I hope you'll take in that spirit. ref post 53:

Souvik, I’d urge you to seriously study the history of hindi film music before making unfounded statements. SD’s innings with Kishore had started much earlier than with Rafi’s; in fact, SD was using Kishore when most md’s, including your favourite Salil, did not even consider Kishore to be a singer. Some of the films that you mentioned, like Funtoosh, Munimji and Paying Guest, were made before Rafi entered SD’s orbit. SD’s relationship with Rafi started sometime in the mid 50s, but in a really big way with nau do gyarah and pyaasa in 1957. In the 1947-57 period, he had already created major hits with Geeta (Mera sundar sapna beet gaya), Manna (Upar gagan vishal), Lata (Thandi hawayen lehrate aaye), Kishore (Jeevan ke safar mein rahi), Talat (Jayen to jayen kahan) and Hemant (Teri duniya mein jeene se). In short, SD was already a hit md before his relationship with rafi began.

As much as I respect your views on Salil — and I also love his music — there will be very few takers on your views of him vis-a-vis SD. Let’s not bring Salil’s bengali oeuvre here and focus only on hfm. SD, along with Naushad and SJ, will remain one of the three greatest md’s the film world has seen. I’ve talked with enough knowledgeable people to realise that most pick one of them as the greatest ever md.

And when you talk about playback, very few md’s understood the idiom better than sd. I am totally surprised that you consider one of his major strengths to be his weakness. Genuine Rafians might not go gaga over SD the way they go over Naushad, SJ or LP — the reasons are understandable — but deep inside they know that the SD-Rafi combo was one of the best ever to happen in film music. Listen to Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaye to kya hai and Din dhal jaye and tell me if playback singing can get any better.

Unlike some enthusiasts, I don’t maintain any databases, so I might make an error or two in reporting. But check it out for yourself and let me know who were the favourite singers for SJ, Madan Mohan and Roshan — all considered to be Rafi loyalists — till around 1955. And then check out what happened in the 1955-60 period with these md’s — they, along with sd, switched en masse to rafi. This didn’t happen in a vacuum; there was one md who sent shivers down the spine of every other md, the man who fixed Rafi’s voice on Dev, on Shammi, Johnny Walker and, yes, on Kishore. If you are a true Rafian, you should do some serious analysis before making the kind of statements you are making. You have written some very good articles on rafi saab’s association with a host of md’s, and that’s why I’m responding to your posts, so I hope you’ll take in that spirit.

]]> by: myk http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15747 Mon, 05 Nov 2007 19:07:14 +0000 http://www.mohdrafi.com/meri-awaaz-suno/salil-chowdhury%e2%80%99s-relationship-with-mohammad-rafi.html#comment-15747 When I mentioned that I sometimes feel Salil is over-rated I meant in the sense that he is still held in high regard to the likes of SD, MM, SJ when they produced in my view better music than him. Also, take for example his Lata songs. True Lata's songs for Salil are excellent, but take those three MD's I just mentioned, as well as others like LP and RD etc., and I feel they created better songs for Lata than Salil did. Yet, many a times I see the Lata-Salil combo getting put ahead of everyone and hyped to a big extent. Even with that I still find their combo excellent (as I mentioned above), and Hemant Kumar also created wonderful songs for her, he was another master, his tunes were fantastic, remember Rafi's "Tera husn rahe" from Do Dil. The argument here is that SD failed to give folk-type songs to Rafi. If you look into their combination (SD-Rafi) there are many examples of songs in the folk genre or being influenced by folk music. That was an SDB fort, and Haldar-ji, even though Salil was a master at western classical music, I feel SDB was also strong on that front and was also great at using many western instruments as well. Let me take a stab at giving you my opinion of the Top 10 Lata-Salil songs off the top of my head: Aaja Re Pardesi - Madhumati O Sajna Barkha Bahar - Parakh Na Jiya Lage Na - Anand Jaago Mohan Pyare - Jagte Raho Mila Hai Kisi Ka Jhumka - Parakh Raaton ko jab neend ud jaaye - Mem Didi Raaton Ka Saaye - Annadata Ja re ja re ud ja re - Maya Aa ja ri nindiya - Do bhiga zameen Aa ha re magan - Honeymoon There are others that could make this list (the list could keep on changing), but these ten are all fantastic songs. Btw, talking about MD's, I believe Lata chose SDB to conduct the orchestra for her silver jubilee in 1967, and chose Roshan for her home production that was later shelved. I am looking forward to your list Haldar-ji of the top 10 Lata songs by SDB. If you don't mind, please make a top 10 for Lata-RDB as well, would like to know your opinion on the father-son and what they composed for Lata. Salil's comments on Rafi are as follows: "Another versatile singer, skilled in the art of infusing happiness, pathos or comedy into a song as the situation demanded. His ability to sing songs based on rapidly changing Western scales was limited, though." Ofcourse we know Rafi saab was the best when it came to singing songs based on rapidly changing western scales, he proved it many times, so in this case I don't think Salil knows what he is talking about. I think he had a bias against Rafi which is why he used him so little, yet who could have sung "dil tapa tadpaye", "koi sone ke dilwala" or "toote hue khwabon ne". I remember an interview where I believe Salil mentioned if KK had classical training, he could have been as good as Rafi, which is so far from the truth. Anyhow judging from the above comments, he seems to have respected Rafi's talents, with the "versatile" and "as good as Rafi" parts in his comments even though his comments on western scales is rubbish. When I mentioned that I sometimes feel Salil is over-rated I meant in the sense that he is still held in high regard to the likes of SD, MM, SJ when they produced in my view better music than him. Also, take for example his Lata songs. True Lata’s songs for Salil are excellent, but take those three MD’s I just mentioned, as well as others like LP and RD etc., and I feel they created better songs for Lata than Salil did. Yet, many a times I see the Lata-Salil combo getting put ahead of everyone and hyped to a big extent. Even with that I still find their combo excellent (as I mentioned above), and Hemant Kumar also created wonderful songs for her, he was another master, his tunes were fantastic, remember Rafi’s “Tera husn rahe” from Do Dil.

The argument here is that SD failed to give folk-type songs to Rafi. If you look into their combination (SD-Rafi) there are many examples of songs in the folk genre or being influenced by folk music. That was an SDB fort, and Haldar-ji, even though Salil was a master at western classical music, I feel SDB was also strong on that front and was also great at using many western instruments as well.

Let me take a stab at giving you my opinion of the Top 10 Lata-Salil songs off the top of my head:

Aaja Re Pardesi - Madhumati
O Sajna Barkha Bahar - Parakh
Na Jiya Lage Na - Anand
Jaago Mohan Pyare - Jagte Raho
Mila Hai Kisi Ka Jhumka - Parakh
Raaton ko jab neend ud jaaye - Mem Didi
Raaton Ka Saaye - Annadata
Ja re ja re ud ja re - Maya
Aa ja ri nindiya - Do bhiga zameen
Aa ha re magan - Honeymoon

There are others that could make this list (the list could keep on changing), but these ten are all fantastic songs. Btw, talking about MD’s, I believe Lata chose SDB to conduct the orchestra for her silver jubilee in 1967, and chose Roshan for her home production that was later shelved.

I am looking forward to your list Haldar-ji of the top 10 Lata songs by SDB. If you don’t mind, please make a top 10 for Lata-RDB as well, would like to know your opinion on the father-son and what they composed for Lata.

Salil’s comments on Rafi are as follows:

“Another versatile singer, skilled in the art of infusing happiness,
pathos or comedy into a song as the situation demanded. His ability to sing songs based on rapidly changing Western scales was limited, though.”

Ofcourse we know Rafi saab was the best when it came to singing songs based on rapidly changing western scales, he proved it many times, so in this case I don’t think Salil knows what he is talking about. I think he had a bias against Rafi which is why he used him so little, yet who could have sung “dil tapa tadpaye”, “koi sone ke dilwala” or “toote hue khwabon ne”. I remember an interview where I believe Salil mentioned if KK had classical training, he could have been as good as Rafi, which is so far from the truth. Anyhow judging from the above comments, he seems to have respected Rafi’s talents, with the “versatile” and “as good as Rafi” parts in his comments even though his comments on western scales is rubbish.

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