2018

Remembering my father and the legend Madan Mohan

Madan ohan December 25, 2018

Guest article by Sangeeta Gupta, daughter of Madan Mohan, wishing Merry Christmas to the readers (Sangeeta Gupta discovered ‘Songs of Yore’ like any other person who stumbles upon this blog while searching for something relating to old film music, and started commenting like any other reader, without wearing her identity on her sleeve. Arvinder Sharma […]

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Rafi’s best duets by Madan Mohan

Madan Mohan and Rafi December 14, 2018

The best songs of Rafi for any music director would include a number of duets. So it is for Madan Mohan, despite the fact that his solos for Rafi are significantly more than the duets. That is an exception to the general trend of duets being far more in number than male solos. Since we […]

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Best songs of 1947: Final Wrap Up 4

Naushad_C Ramchandra_Husnlal-Bhagatram_Khursheed Anwar December 4, 2018

And the Award for the Best Music Director goes to? After the Overview post and the three category-wise wrap ups: Wrap Up 1 for the best male solo, Wrap Up 2 for the best female solo and Wrap Up 3 for the best duets – it is time to collate and discuss the dominant music […]

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In the Musical Memory of Meena Kapoor

Meena Kapoor November 23, 2018

Guest article by Shalan Lal as a tribute to Meena Kapoor (c. 1930 – 23 November 2017) on her first death anniversary (Meena Kapoor has not been acknowledged enough on SoY. Mumbaikar8 has drawn pointed attention to this omission, and was sore that I credited the songs of ‘Anokha Pyar’ (1948) like ‘Yaad rakhan chaand […]

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Roshan’s songs for ‘other’ singers

Roshan November 16, 2018

A tribute to Roshan on his 51st death anniversary (14 July 1917-16 November 1967) DP Rangan started a tandem series on Madan Mohan-Roshan on July 14 which, in a unique coincidence, happened to be the birth anniversary of one, and the death anniversary of the other. I have since written a number of posts on […]

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Rafi’s duets by Roshan

Roshan and Rafi November 5, 2018

My post on Rafi’s solos by Roshan appeared more than six years ago, several years before I started the series on the stalwart music directors. And the reason was simple: Roshan ranked among the top in my reckoning for Rafi songs, along with Naushad, SD Burman and OP Nayyar. Duets have no less importance in […]

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The Faint Echoes of the October Revolution: A Centenary of the Capricious Philosophy in the Socio-political life!

Communist star October 24, 2018

Guest article by Shalan Lal (No event in history has caused as much impact on the world of politics and ideas as the Russian Revolution of October 1917. And no revolution has strayed as much from its path, turning into a totalitarian regime and causing untold miseries on its people. The political edifice collapsed under […]

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Best songs of 1947: Wrap Up 3

Best films of 1947 October 11, 2018

And the Song of Yore Award for the Best Duet goes to? The total number of duets in the list of ‘Memorable Songs’ in the Overview post on the best songs of 1947 is about 30 out of 119. This is about 50% more than the male solos, but less than half the female solos. […]

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Madan Mohan’s tuning with Lata Mangeshkar

Madan Mohn and Lata Mangeshkar September 28, 2018

Wishing Lata Mangeshkar a very happy 89th birthday (b. 28 September 1929) Among all the music director-singer combinations Madan Mohan-Lata Mangeshkar ranks among the very top. This article by Anirudh Bhattacharjee and Srijit Mukherji quotes OP Nayyar as having once said, “It is difficult to figure out whether Madan Mohan was made for Lata Mangeshkar […]

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King of Ghazal Talat Mahmood with Ghazal Maestros Madan Mohan and Roshan

Roshan, Madan Mohan and Talat Mahmood September 18, 2018

DP Rangan set-off a tandem series on Roshan-Madan Mohan with their classical-based songs. I have since written on their songs for Rafi (Madan Mohan’s; Roshan-Rafi covered earlier); Qawwalis; Mukesh; and Asha Bhosle. Several readers requested that I write on their ghazals. Since I am covering them generally by singers, ghazal would have been an overlapping […]

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