Recapturing an era 
Her name figures in the Guiness Book Of World Records for singing the highest number of film songs, which are more than 25,000. And she is among those few singers who has sung in all Indian languages. She has been honoured with the Padma Bhushan and the Dadasaheb Phalke award for her achievements. Lata, while expressing her gratitude to her fans, had once said, “I believe that music has no boundaries and no religion. I consider music to be the voice of God. I have sung all over the world to people of all nationalities. I have received the same love and appreciation from Pakistanis and Bangladeshis as I have from Indians.”

No one had imagined that this petite singer, who was given her big break by maestro Ghulam Hyder in Majboor, would end up as a singing phenomenon. Producer S. Mukerji had rejected Lata for Shaheed saying her voice was too thin and shrill. But Hyder had warned him saying, “You can turn her down today, but there will come a time when producers and composers will go crawling to her.” The prophecy did come true. Another legendary singer, Mallika-e-Tarrannum Noorjehan, had said, “Lata has reached that unattainable position today that she will be justified if she decides to abstain from looking at the multitude. But her feet are firmly rooted to the ground.”

Lata’s concerts have always commanded the maximum attendance, in India and abroad. And if the mass euphoria that her concert in Mumbai on March 9, 1997, evoked is any indication, then the singer, at 67 years of age, needs to be saluted for appealing to the young and the old alike. Lata sang some of her favourite songs, the choicest of her old and recent hits at the concert, which has been captured by Sony Music in a digitally mastered double cassette series titled In Concert - Lata An Era In An Evening. The two albums include songs spanning almost her entire singing career, songs which she sung for Madhubala, to songs which she sang for Kajol and Tabu.

Volume 1 of the two-cassette series has Ajeeb dastaan hai yeh, Dil deewana and Sun beliya. But the most interesting part is the 20-minute medley of 18 songs Ek shaam ek yug, which leaves you awestruck. You can’t help but wonder at the amazing range of this singer. Volume 2 includes the evergreen oldeies Aaja re pardesi and Naina barse alongwith the recent Yaara seeli seeli and Didi tera devar deewana. It rightly ends with popular and the most-revered patriotic song Ae mere watan ke logon, which had Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru in tears. It won't be an exaggeration to say that even after hearing this rendition, it leaves your eyes moist, such is the impact of the song. The two albums also include numbers by S.P. Balasubramaniam, Sudesh Bhosle, Usha Mangeshkar and Adinath Mangeshkar, who featured in the concert. An added bonus is the rare, unreleased photos of Lata Mangeshkar which have been put together on the cassette inlays.

In Concert - Lata An Era In An Evening; Sony Music; Rs. 150 (two cassettes).