SD BURMAN Dada and I..
Remembering S.D. Burman
on his 25th death anniversary,
which fell on October 31...

Dada Burman’s music for me was like a peg of liquor that hits you gradually, but rises to total intoxication due to its sheer potency. My initiation into film music was through the songs of Naushad’s Mughal-e-Azam and Mere Mehboob, Shanker-Jaikishan’s Junglee, Sasural and Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai, and Ravi’s Gharana, and initially I had little inclination for the exotica that was Dada’s true metier.

Not that I was unaffected by Dada’s music even then - I never knew that it was a Sachin Dev Burman delight that I was savouring when I heard the haunting Na tum hamein jaano (Baat Ek Raat Ki), Khanke kangana (Dr Vidya), Dil ka bhanwar (Tere Ghar Ke Saamne), Mora gora ang lai le (Bandini) and a little later, Pyar mein aag mein (Ziddi). On a lesser note, there was also Jaanu jaanu ri (Insaan Jaag Utha), but the two songs that really affected me, haunted me and did things I did not understand then to my sense were Roshan’s Parda uthe salaam ho jaaye (Dil Hi To Hai) and SD Burman’s Na tum hamein jaano (Baat Ek Raat Ki).

On reflection today, I realise why I did not identify these songs as Burman beauties, and that fact alone does wonders for SD’s standing. And the answer is, that while a certain similarity encompassed the compositions of the others, the music of Dada Burman was infinitely varied, each song being as fresh as a newly-fallen dew-drop. I was later to read somewhere that SD Burman once told his son Pancham to completely and consciously forget a song once it was recorded. And what a positive difference that would have made to Pancham’s already-fabulous ouevre had he headed this priceless advice!

While agreeing generally with the view that his son was far more gifted than him, I would still say that he lacked the greatest qualities of the senior Burman. This was just one of them. There were others, and had Dada lived on and not died on October 31, 1975, I dare say that he would have eclipsed his own son in the 1980s. His earlier struggles (Dada almost packed his bags and went back to Calcutta in 1949-50 as he was disillusioned with Mumbai) and final success with Mashaal, Baazi, Naujawan, Sazaa (1950-51) had armed Dada Burman with impregnable steel - he became and to the end he remained a fighter.

He brooked no compromise in his music. Pancham often left some work to his assistants who cared a hoot for RD’s interests. It is part of filmlore that Dada waited for a Nepalese drum for Honton pe aisi baat (Jewel Thief) and had a no-nonsense approach. Lata did not sing for him for six long years, years that saw him present music buffs with scores as precious as Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi, Pyaasa and Kala Pani. He was a man who simply did not believe in surrendering.

It is this doughtiness that was not only missing in Junior Burman, but also the courage in refusing to bow to trends that he did not agree with. If he did not want a 100-piece orchestra, it did not matter if everyone else did. He never believed in the holier-than-thou castigation and dismissal of junior composers. I remember the summer of 1974 when S.D. Burman’s Yeh laal rang kab mujhe chhodega (Premnagar) vied for the top slot of the charts with his son R.D. Burman’s Jai jai Shiv Shanker (Aap Ki Kasam), Kalyanji-Anandji’s Mera jeevan kora kagaz (Kora Kagaz) and Laxmikant-Pyarelal’s Gaadi bula rahi hai (Dost). That was Sachin Dev Burman. His music sparkled with joie de vivre because he had no insecurity or vitriol in his system. That is why he did not need to change with the times - he remained himself, forever young-at-heart, and his music always sounded state-of-the-art.

As a kid, I remember the craze for his songs in Guide and later for Jewel Thief. I cannot forget the magic that was Aradhana - the omnipresence of those songs on radio and loudspeakers was matched only by Bobby later - and never again. And I loved that quaint voice singing Wahaan kaun hai tera and Safal hogi teri aradhana, and a few months later, Prem ke pujari (Prem Pujari).
For me, as an evolving music lover, the discovery of Dada Burman and his wondrous and aromatic music came as a reverse journey from this era (and the wonderful scores of Gambler, Talash, Tere Mere Sapne, Ishq Par Zor Nahin, Naya Zamana and Sharmeelee that followed), on to Yeh Gulistan Hamara, Abhimaan and Premnagar. It was later that I went back into the Dada era of Kaagaz Ke Phool, Pyaasa, Tere Ghar Ke Saamne, Sujata, Funtoosh, Nau Do Gyarah, Kala Pani, Kala Bazar and the other peaks of that master’s creativity. In retrospect probably this was the best thing that could have happened, for it enabled me to understand that sheer genius and his extraordinary modernity. Place Dukhi man mere (Funtoosh) in the voice of either Kumar Sanu or Vinod Rathod, on someone as contemporary as Anil Kapoor, and it will not sound the least incongruous. And the same held true for countless other Burman spell-binders - they simply lacked the handicap of sounded dated. Amazingly, these timeless gems sound as apt in any decade.

And interestingly, his newest numbers seemed classic and solid enough to fit into the less market-driven era of film music - the ’50s and ’60s. What else could you term lovelies like Mera man tera pyaasa (Gambler/1971), Ab to hai tumse (Abhimaan/1973), Khilte hai gul yahan (Sharmeelee/1971) and O mere bairaagi bhanwara (Ishq Par Zor Nahin/1970) but solid, substantial and yet mass-friendly? Men and women, wine and concrete, age with the years. S.D.Burman never did so, and neither will his melodies.

R V

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