Mehfil completes 4 years!

Today I'm ecstatic as my blog turns four. I can't believe it's been four years and this is my 165th post. Quite an achievement for me. Before I begin today's post, let me extend my gratitude to my family, including my eight year old daughter and my sister, Anagha. All of them help me directly …

Triad of Singers

Let me first explain my idea behind the title Triad of Singers. Usually a single playback singer sings all the songs for a particular character in a movie. There are instances where a couple of singers lent their voices for a single actor or actress. This is relatively common and usually doesn't evoke an interest …

Stage Performances at College or School Festivals

Our Hindi films always revolve around young generation. We usually don't accept older main leads, though the scenario is changing for good, of late. But it was mandatory for old Hindi film heroes to be a college student, who would always pass B A with distinction. Even if they look old enough to have a …

Romantic Songs by Sahir

Whenever I think of Sahir, I remember his poignant social songs about women exploitation, corruption, hypocrisy and sufferings in the society, especially, the songs close to a woman's heart (I instantly remember, Tere Bachpan Ko Jawani Ki Dua). Many of his songs were actually from his book, Talkhiyan. Those were taken up as a film …

Suman Kalyanpur – Duets

In my last post about Suman Kalyanpur, I talked about her solos. Today I'm planning to overview her duets and trios. Actually she has sung duets with all the male and female singers of the Golden Era. So her duets actually need special posts,such as her duets with Rafi,so is her duets with other male …

N Datta – A Tribute

One of the forgotten music directors from the golden era, he was more often remembered as S D Burman's assistant in the beginning. N Datta, born as Dattaram Baburao Naik on 12nd December 1927 in a small village in Goa. He ran away to Mumbai (then Bombay) at the age of twelve and learnt classical …