JAZZ in Bollywood – Part II
A few of my favourite JAZZY things
(with HUGE INPUTS by NARESH FERNANDES, Editor, TIME OUT, Mumbai and Denzil Smith, actor and producer of JAZZ)
Sorry for the lecture, but here goes!
If you’re in a hurry, please scroll to the bottom of this post, straight away!
When Hindi film music entered a period of rapid evolution during the Second World War, composers realised that the small groups they’d previously used could not effectively convey the drama unfolding on screen. So they formed large orchestras that ranged dholaks and sitars along with rows of violins, swathes of trumpets and a Hawaiian guitar or two.
Since not many musicians from teh Hindu / Muslim communities knew how to play saxophones or clarinets, Goans came to form the bulk of the orchestras.
But the Goans had another, rather more influential role. Until then, composers would rehearse their groups (which usually had fewer than 10 musicians) until they’d memorised their parts before leading them into recording sessions.
But if the members of an orchestra were to play in unison and the tone colour of their instruments was to be employed most effectively, they needed to read the notes off scores, with each musician’s role clearly laid out. Few Hindi film composers, most of whom were trained in the Hindustani classical tradition, knew how to score music for the new ensembles.
That task was performed by a Goan ‘arranger’: Typically, the work proceeded thus. The producer would organise a ’sitting’ (as the Goans came to call the baithaks) at which the composer (most often a Hindu), the lyricist (usually an Urdu-speaking Muslim) and the arranger would flop down on comfortable cushions to listen to the director narrate the plot. When the director indicated the point at which a song was necessary, the composer would hum out a melody or pick it out on his harmonium.
It was the arranger’s task to note down these fragments, which the composer would later piece together into an entire song.
Even then, the composer would craft only the verse and the chorus. The arranger was responsible for fashioning the melodic bridges, for shaping the parts for individual instruments and often even wrote the background music. The arranger wasn’t merely a secretary.
As NARESH FERNANDES discovered while researching, the Goans drew on their BI CULTURAL heritage to give Bollywood music its promiscuous charm, slipping in slivers of Dixieland stomp, Portuguese fados, Elvis and Beatles, Ellingtonesque doodles, cha cha cha, Mozart and Bach themes; and above al JAZZ.
Long before fusion music became fashionable, it was being performed every day in Bombay’s film studios.
Between the 1940s and 1970s, Mumbai’s film companies, music halls and hotels offered employment opportunities for Anglo-Indian and Goan musicians who were well-versed in Western classical music and, most importantly, in jazz. Some of the most famous among them include Anthony Gonsalves, Chic Chocolate—well known as India’s Louis Armstrong—Sebastian D’Souza, Mickey Correa and Frank Fernand.
A big part of the migrant musicians’ story is their connections with Bollywood, where many of them worked as arrangers to supplement their otherwise meagre incomes.
Lots of Hindi music in that era was arranged and played by Goan and Anglo-Indian musicians, and you can see that influence in the Bollywood music of that time. They were unsung heroes of the times.
Musicians like Antony Gonsalves even taught composers such as R D Burman and Pyarelal, while Chocolate worked swing arrangements into compositions of music directors such as C Ramachandran and Madan Mohan.
PLEASE FIND BELOW A RANDOM SAMPLE OF BOLLYWOOD SONGS where the influence is more than evident:
1) Nazar Uthake, Chacha Zindabad, 1959
2) Aankhon mein tum, Half Ticket, 1962
3) Feel Chic, Aakhri Khat, Chic Chocolate
4) Ina mina dika, Asha, 1957
5) Sambhalo Sambhalo, Kala Bazaar 1960
6) Kismat, Asha Bhonsale, Mahendra Kapoor 1968
7) Hong Kong China Meena, OP Nayar
8) Besame Mucho, Sitar Goes Latin
9) Malkauns, Raga Jazz Style, Shankar Jaikishan
10) Gore Gore, Samadhi, 1950
11) Tickle Me Not, Aakhri Khat, Chic Chocolate
12) Quizas, Quizas, Quizas, Sitar Goes Latin
13) Todi, Raga Jazz Style, Shankar Jaikishan
14) Desafindao, Sitar Goes Latin
15) Tilak Kamod, Raga Jazz Style, Shankar Jaikishan
16) Aap Jaisa Koi, Sunny Jain Collective
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
JAZZ at Prithvi, 6 pm & 9 pm, 3rd & 4th Jan, 2008. After a rocking New Year Bash, here is a way to Jazz it up a bit !
Hi !
That was a very enjoyable lesson indeed
Goan influence reminded me of the Bachke Rehna song from Pukar.
Hi to Naresh too , worked with him briefly a few years ago.
Thanks , looking forward to more
abhi abhi kim ki-duk ki ‘the isle’ dekh ke khatam ki hai.
phad ke rakh diya. tum log bacche ho re.
yeah broadband ka jamana hai. ye mugalte chhod do ki tum teen char hollywood ke nam le doge to sab dar jayenge. =))
imdb sirf tumhare browser per nahien aati. @-)
do mahine bad yahi broadband mujhe apne gaon main mil jayega. 8-}
jazz in bollywood
well, its courtesy, and it is now out of fashion too to treat somebody as untouchable. but in private between you and me. that’s what classic music connoisseurs think of bollywood and there music directors.
about quality – you cater to mass.
did i mention that i am an amateur classical vocalist.
:-h
Hello Pay back, whose playing at prithvi tomorrow? can you give some detail?
Hey Suchita,
This is Shekhar here,
I know this is much delay ,
Was out of station , Hotmail is still not working,
sorry couldnt respond
Shekhar, its ok, we have thrown the project out of the window:) was on tight deadline, and even contacted Priyankar.. don’t know if you know him, but he was ill… and busy… obviously with so many big budget films etc.. never mind..
@ Suchita
Anyways I’ll Call you tommorrow:)
ok..will get some gyan on toonz, rhythm and hues so be prepared:d etc
he he , no gyan , I’m not Pandit,
just curious , about the Project you working on ,
30 seconds Animation thing:)
@ Suchita … Its a production called “JAZZ” at Prithvi today evening at 6 pm and then at 9 pm. And there are 2 repeats tomorrow…same timings !
PAY BACK YOU SURE ABOUT THE TIMING, MIDDAY SAYS ITS ONLY 8PM ONE SHOW
@ suchita,….gimme 2 mins
@ Suchita…MIDDAY is wrong ! I am right ! :D
Oh great…. congratulations!!!! and the award goes to….. ha ha .. thanx for the effort…. this should be reported to mid day …..
@ Suchita, …you could award me by going for the show
well I am, and sending ten more people… and telling them not to read midday and directly write to Pay Back.. or log on to PFC for the right info:”>
OZ, WE SHOUD HAVE A SCROLL OF EVENTS HAPPENING IN THE CITY ON PFC… this will also attract more traffic.. just a suggestion.. i know its a cinema blog… but wth
@ Suchita :D
piggybacking on this post with one more plug…lyricist-singer swanand kirkire’s musical aao saathi sapna dekhe…this sat (5th jan)/sun(6th jan)…..6pm n 9pm at prithvi theatre.
for more info can check out www.prithvitheatre.org
it premird at the prithi fest recntly and here’s a link to the review that appeared in mumbai mirror….
http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=TU1JUi8yMDA3LzExLzEzI0FyMDM4MDA=&Mode=Gif&Locale=english-skin-custom
Aao Saathi Sapne Dekhe is a very good play… they have been performing all over the country.. they just performed in Bhopal and it was a BIG HIT.. must watch…
mid summer night dream happenning at the NCPA sat sun 7:00pm [pls check the time at NCPA if interested]
i need an invite on bwtorrents website, wud really appreciate if someone cud send
(will give my email id then)
@ Suchita…u didnt come for the show ! :(
@filmibhai
I can help you with that.
JAZZ…the epiphany of life for me…saw it last night… was floored by the production values, the superb use of video, the performers on camera, Rhys, Bugs’ amazing portrayal of a jazz musician gone to dust, Rhys, the light design, Rhys, and did i mention I liked Rhys? hehhe, the music was just too good, and we did ask for an encore! and Got it too….Ramu sir, please pen down more plays of times we’ve forgotten, or never heard of…Jazz comes second only to Cotton, * i wonder who wrote that * ?
hey neeraja , if u r still here (my net was down) .. my email is slash_rahul022@yahoo.com
hmmmn…ok i was wondering why you vanished. Have sent the invite, check you mail.
the invite u sent aint working :/
@Filmibhai
There is post on BWT in bug report section that says invites are not working for some reason. Sorry. I think I still have one invite left, will send to you once they figure out what’s wrong and repair it.
ok, thanks !
@Ramu
Somehow this article reminded me of you. So I’m posting the link. I’m sure you’ll like reading it.
http://www.counterpunch.com/sainath01182008.html
@Filmibhai
Should I send the invite again? I think you have to use it within a week or so (may be 2 weeks, not sure) so hope your net is working fine now. I’ll send it only after you reply here.
@Mainak
Don’t know if Ramuji read that but I surely did. I just love reading P. Sainath. Another very well-written article on an important issue.
Thanks
neeraja
yes i’l appreciate that .. but is their bug fixed ? otherwise ur invite will get wasted
Ah! I don’t know yaar! Let me check. I’ll let you know tomorrow.
Of course, the erstwhile standout to this process of composing would be Ilaiyaraja, who has a habit of writing the complete score himself, including all the individual tracks without any trials. It just flows from his mind. As for the BGM, he writes the score just watching the raw reels, without even a stopwatch…and it’s perfect in terms of timing and score. Of course, he is a genius and he can do it that way!!
As shankar jaikishan had given tunes to all the leading singers of bollywood films, including Mukesh, Manna Dey, Kishore, Talat, Hemant Kumar, Mahendra Kapoor,