Singing their own song
Hear Chhed na mujhko mere mehboob jaane de (sung by Kavita Krishnammurthy and Hariharan in Rahul) and you can almost hear its composer Anu Malik singing it in your mental ears. You can also similarly hear him sing Churake dil mera goriya chali (Main Khiladi Tu Anari), Chura lo na dil mera (Kareeb), Tere dar pe sanam (Phir Teri Kahani Yaad Aayi) and Tan tanaatan tan tan tara (Judwaa).

Now why is this seemingly fruitless and even idiotic exercise significant? To me it does have one use - it often, in these ‘inspired’ days, helps sort out the originals from the copies, believe it or not.

There are obvious limitations to this. Firstly you have to have heard the composer sing (not necessarily in films alone) to audio-‘visualize’ this. Like this just cannot be a test for composers like, say, Anand-Milind (Anand has sung sporadically and only a few lines), Viju Shah or even A.R. Rahman, whom one just cannot imagine singing out a song that he has composed in Hindi, unless he sings it himself later.

But in the other cases, a positive test (that is, the fact that you can imagine the composer singing it out to the singer) invariably rules out a copy, though a negative test does not rule in a musical ‘chori’. So in a way, this also becomes a fascinating test of originality. Take for example, a song like O mere sapnon ke saudagar, whose mukhda was purloined by Nadeem-Shravan from Cliff Richards’ Bachelor Boy. You just cannot imagine Nadeem (as the composing half) singing out this tune to teach it to Anuradha Paudwal, though obviously he must have done so. But those who have heard Nadeem sing in the album Sayesha can definitely imagine him put across the title song from this film, and other numbers like Badi udaas hai zindagi (Kasoor), Sochenge tumhein pyar (Deewana) and Mera dil bhi kitna paagal hai (Saajan). In fact, those who have heard the album Sayesha will immediately realise why Kumar Sanu plays such a major role in N-S’s music.

Strangely enough, it is extremely difficulty to imagine Bappi Lahiri sing even his best original numbers, save for an occasional vintage number like Chalte chalte (Chalte Chalte) or Maana ho tum (Toote Khilone). But one on definitely ‘hear’ R.D. Burman in so many of the songs that have not come to us in his voice. One can effortlessly imagine Pancham’s distinctive and punchy voice sing Sili hawaa chhoo gayi (Libaas) out to Lata, Rimjhimm gire saawan to Kishore and Lata, Aanewala pal to Kishore or Jaanejaa dhoondta phir rahaa to Asha and Kishore.

C. Ramachandra (Aadha hai chandrama/Navrang) and Laxmikant of Laxmikant-Pyarelal (singing - among many others - So gaya yeh jahaan (Tezaab) and Hum se tum dosti kar lo (Narsimha) are also pictures that can be effortlessly conjured up.

And we can be sure everytime we experience this that the composers are singing their own song.

Rajiv Vijayakar

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