RMIM Archive Article "245".


From the RMIM Article Archive maintained by Satish Subramanian

#
# RMIM Archives..
# Subject: K.  L.  Saigal: "Fifty Years Later, Saigal Lives On" 
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# Posted by: ADhareshwar@worldbank.org (Ashok) 
# Source: The Hindu
#  	http://www.webpage.com/hindu/daily/970131/09/09310708.htm
# Author: Susheela Misra
#

Here is a recent homage to Saigal on the eve of the 50th anniver- sary of his death. It is available at http://www.webpage.com/hindu/daily/970131/09/09310708.htm Thanks to Sreenivas Paruchuri for brining it to my notice. The article gives Saigal's filmography at the end. I have added some films from the BFI Encyclopaedia entry on Saigal. Do note the year of Saigal's death as given in the article! Ashok --------------------------------------------------------------------- Fifty year later, Saigal lives on The Hindu Kundan Lal Saigal's music-soaked voice had that rare quality that would tug at the listener's heart-strings. On his 50th death anniversary tomorrow (January 18), Susheela Misra pays a tribute to this legendary actor-singer.... Today's youngsters are in the grip of "Michael Jackson" hysteria. What a world of difference from our younger years when all of us as college students were ardent Saigal fans! There was no hys- teria, but what lengths we went to, in order to see a New Thea- tres Films featuring Kundan Lal Saigal, Pahadi Sanyal, Kanan Devi, Pankaj Mullick, P. C. Barua, K. C. Dey and others, and to hear Saigal's songs! He was one of the earliest film-singers to win popularity all-India and a large fan-following in the South. In Kerala, we often travelled nearly 80 km. by trains or car from Ernakulam to Trichur where a certain theatre used to present those unforgettable New Theatres Films occasionally! "Pooran Bhagat", "Dhoop Chhaun", "Devdas", Chandidas", "President", "Street Singer Vidyapati" and many other films are still fresh in our memories _ especially those with Saigal's hauntingly sweet songs. Fascinated by his music under the batons of Raichand Boral and Pankaj Mullick we would see each film more than once. Obviosuly we were not the only ones. Much later I read somewhere that no less a music director than S. D. Burman went to see "Pooran Bhagat" scores of times, attracted by Saigal's soulful renderings of some songs in that film. Music directors like Raichand Boral and Punkaj Mullick used to go into ecstatic praise of the matchless golden voice of Saigal and the feelings he poured into each song, so that his renderings touched the hearts of his listeners deeply. Even classical maestros like Ustads Faiyaz Khan and Abdul Karim Khan appreciated the soulful and natural emotive quality of his songs. Among today's singers also Saigal has great admirers like Talat Mahmud and Lata Mangeshkar. Mukesh, for one, came into limelight (though under an assumed name) by singing a song in Darbari ("Dil jalta hai.." in the film "Pehli Nazar") which was moulded in the style of Saigal! C. H. Atma basked in popularity for a brief while just because his voice-quality was similar to Saigal's! Going back to our college years, we used to buy all available records of Saigal, try to learn as many of his songs as possible, and when someone rendered some of those songs at college func- tions in Madras (Presidency College, and Queen Mary's), how thrilled one used to feel at the resounding encores! Thus, Saigal played an important role in popularising Hindi film-songs in the South. For us of the senior generation. Saigal's songs still stir up hordes of nostalgic memories, and a longing to see those New Theatres Films with meaningful themes, subdued acting, and haunting music. Many of today's youngsters whose tastes have been moulded by those modern films with bizarre stories, ear-splitting and hybrid tunes, and often obscene un-Indian dances, find our tastes rather queer. "What is so special about Saigal's songs?" they ask with a tinge of contempt. How can one explain to them the effect of his songs on all stratas of society _ songs that could sadden and soothe the aching souls of listeners through the emotional inten- sity of his renderings. We felt grateful to those great music directors such as Boral and Pankaj Mullick and to B. N. Sircar the famous owner of New Theatres, who instantaneously detected the gold in the melodious renderings of this ordinary- looking person who is said to have started his career as an agent for Remington typewriters! With neither social position nor years of regular musical "taleem", nor any training in acting, and not even the handsome look expected from a hero, but with a gifted voice that rose above all these handicaps, he rose to the top both as an actor and as a singer, and achieved meteoric fame and popularity. One is reminded of poet Browning's great lines: " Talk not of genius baffled, Genius is master of man, Genius does what it must, Talent does what it can". The famous R. C. Boral under whose baton Saigal sang so many of those unforgettable songs and B. N. Sircar who discovered him, used to say with great feeling what a superb and natural actor Saigal used to be, and how he used to touch the hearts of his listeners deeply with his songs. Before Saigal joined New Thea- tres, All India Radio, Calcutta had already discovered him. Actu- ally it was Punkaj Mullick who discovered him for AIR. In 1931 when he first met Saigal and heard him, some magnetic quality in his voice impressed Mullick so much that he at once arranged for his audition with Calcutta, AIR. Saigal's ghazals with his own harmonium accompaniment had the same effect on the then Station Director Mr. Mazumdar who scheduled his broadcast for the same night and made him a regular broadcaster! Another fact that surprised everyone was his versatility. Not only were his songs tuned in numerous raga-raginis but he also sang them in Khayal ("Jhulana jhulao"), Thumri ("Babul mora" or "Kaahe guman karo ri gori"), bhajans ("Suno suno he krishna kaala" or "Din neeke beete jaate hain") and any number of ghazals in the typical Saigal style. When Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore heard him sing some Bengali songs he is said to have allowed him to record many of his (the poet's) own songs. Saigal acted and sang in several Bengali films and some of them like "Jeeban Maran" and "Saathi" are still remembered. His non- filmi songs _ mostly ghazals _ add up to quite a sizable number of records. The sad and romantic contents and the soulful manner of rendering ghazals suited his vocalism immensely, and among the poets whose ghazals he sang effectively were those of Ghalib, Arzoo, Hazrat Mohani, Zauk, Amir Minai and others. Whether he sang film-songs in purely classical ragas like Yaman ("Mai kya jaanoo kya jadu hain" or "Do naina matwale"), or Shankara ("Rum jhum rum jhum"), Bahar ("Baag lagaa do sajani"), Darbari ("Nain heen ko raah dikha prabhu"), Bagesri ("Chaah bar- baad karegi hamhen maalum na thha") and so on _ or in favourite light-classical (Thumri) ragas like Kafi ("Balam aye baso more man me") or Pilu ("Kaahe gumaan kare gori") or in rarer ragas like Madhuvanti "Ibne Mariam huwa kare koyi") or Miyan ki Sarang ("Raina gayi ab huwa savera") _ their appeal was always the same, at once deeply moving and sweetly saddening. Our sweetest songs are those that express saddest feelings. There were two ragas that acquired special appeals in Saigal's voice. That must have been the reason why so may of his film and non-film songs were based on these two widely loved-ragas _ Desh and Bhairavi. A few examples of these will prove the point. "Dukh ke ab din beetat naahi", "Hat gayi lo kaali ghata" (Lagan) and "Kadam chale aage" are some of his all-time favourites in Desh. "Babul mora" (Street Singer); "Aayi hai thu tho" (Kurukshetra); "E kaatibe taqdeer mujhe" (My Sister); "Madhukar Shyam hamaare chor" (Surdas); "jab dil hi toot gaya" (Shahjahan) and so on are some of the memorable numbers in Bhairavi. Millions wept when they saw and heard Saigal sing those evergeen numbers "Soja Rajkumari soja", "Tarpat beete din rain" and " Dukh ke din" and above all, that unsurpassed rendering of Nawab Wajid Ali Shah's last parting song from Lucknow _ "Babul mora naihar chhooto in jaay". This writer has heard innumerable renderings of this famous Thumri in Bhairavi by some great maestros and songs- tresses. But nothing makes Saigal's poignant rendering of it fade from memory. When Saigal was still in our midst, an oft-discussed question was as to what sort of musician he would have shaped into, if he had been trained for years in classical music?. Anti-classicists argued that classical training would have taken away the sweet, saddening quality of Saigal's music. Others feel that perhaps he might have become a classical singer with a lot of expressiveness in his gifted voice. His versatility lay not only in the varieties of ragas and types of songs that he has rendered, but also in the fact that he successfully sang songs in Hindi, Ben- gali, Punjabi and Persian! His rendering of the famous Thumri associated with Ustad Abdul Karim Khan _ "Piya bin nahi aavat chain" in "Devdas" in 1935 _ is said to have won the praise of the Ustad himself who admired the deep pain of the separated lover that Saigal had filled it with. Among Saigal's contemporaries there were a few carping critics who tried to prejudice film-goers against him by drawing more attention to his lack of handsome looks expected from a hero, and about his weakness for "the bottle", rather than to his captivat- ing voice and subdued acting talents. B. N. Sircar was really the discerning director who discovered the artistic potentials of this simple young man from Jalandhar. Saigal's phenomenal rise both as an actor and as a singer justified Sircar's shrewd choice. A Saigal film was always a guarantee for some unforgett- able songs, and for restrained and dignified acting. One hardly remembers any film songs prior to his entry into films. It was he who turned those songs into "a simple emotional poetry of the soul.." He came into limelight as the bard who echoed the long- ings and inexplicable sadness of the human heart, "the still sad voice of humanity". What could have been the secret sorrow which he always tried to drown in those "bottles" which hastened his premature end so tragically on January 18, 1947. The artiste, alas, is no more with us, but his music through gramophone records and rare revivals of his films, keeps stirring up many nostalgic musical memories of the past in many of us. List of Saigal's films 1932: "Subah ka sitara", "Mohabbat ke aansoo", "Zinda lash" 1933: "Puran Bhakt", "Rajrani Meera", "Yahudi ki ladki", "Dulari Bibi" 1934: "Chandidas", "Rooplekha", "Daku Mansur", "Mohabbat Ki Kasauti" 1935: "Dhoop chhaun", "Karwan-E-Hayat", "Devdas", "Bijoya" 1936: "Crorepati", "Poojarin" 1937: "Didi / President" 1938: "Desher Mati / Dhartimata", "Street Singer / Saathi" 1939: "Dushman / Jiban Maran" 1940: "Zindagi" 1941: "Parichay / Lagan" 1942: "Bhakta Surdas" 1943: "Tansen" 1944: "Meri Bahen", "Bhanwra" 1945: "Tadbeer", "Kurukshetra" 1946: "Omar Khayyam", "Shahzada" His last films were "Parwana" and "Shahjahan". --------------------------------------------------------------------
From the RMIM Article Archive maintained by Satish Subramanian