One Song at a time: 61. Kaise Katte Rajani - Dedicated to Dr.Venugopal Garu

Continuing from last post where we saw the Carnatic great M L Vasanthakumari sing a film song, this post will have us listening to the redoubtable Amir Khan singing a film song. I knew that Amir Khan had sung in Baiju Bawra and had written about it in a post long time back. I did not know he has sung in this film called 'Khudito Pashan'.  Wiki says that this is a 1960 movie directed by Tapan Sinha. The music is by the sarod maestro, Ali Akbar Khan. So you have Amir Khan singing for Ali Akbar Khan. A nice combination.

This song is based on the raga Bageshree. There is a commercially available recording of Amir Khan singing Bageshree, which is top class. Here, even though the song is only around 3 mins in duration, he paints a lovely picture of Bageshree. A nice tune by Ali Akbar Khan and sung wonderfully by Amir Khan. Pratima Bandopadyay joins for a couple of lines. Enjoy the song:



Staying on the same theme, I will put up one more song. This time it is a song of Kishori Amonkar for the film 'Drishti'. Not sure who the music director is, maybe Kishori herself. This song is based on raag Bhoop (Mohanam). Kishori is known for her outstanding rendition of Bhoop. The commercially recorded 'Sahelare' is class beyond compare. This song is also very charming. A very soothing melody.



I remember an interesting tidbit about the songs in this movie and Kishori's reaction. This was a Govind Nihlani film. In an interview Kishori said that one of the songs was used as a background for a love making scene!! Her mother, the great Mogubai, saw it and was furious with Kishori for having sung the song for this movie.

I dedicate this post to the memory of my friend, senior and a great music lover, Dr. Venugopal Garu. He was a senior of mine when I doing my post graduation. Those days we used to listen to music together in the institute's music room and Venugopal would give some tidbits about the songs. He was a very knowledgeable person when it came to music. Unfortunately we did not get the time to hear more from him.

When I started writing serious about music on my blog and in e-zines, I wanted someone knowledgeable from whom I can get some information and bounce some ideas. My former room mate Siva was still in touch with Dr.Venugopal and he gave me his mail id. Thus started our correspondence.

Dr.Venugopal was a generous person when it came to music. When I told him that I was searching for a particular music book, which was out of print, he immediately photocopied the whole book and sent it to me. He also sent me a compilation of music articles about musicians of the past, which was very informative. He used to comment regularly in this blog and they added a lot of value to the post and also made people aware of the depth of knowledge that he possessed about Indian film music. He commented on my last post on MLV and asked me if I had heard a few of her other songs. When I replied in negative he immediately sent me the song. That was the last correspondence we had.

On 28th Dec I got a shocking mail saying the Dr.Venugopal expired suddenly due to heart attack while he was on a vacation to Kathmandu with his family. It was most unexpected and extremely sudden. I cannot but think of the family who would be in severe shock due to this sudden loss. May God give them the strength to bear this tragedy.

Once again I want to say that this post is dedicated to the memory of Dr.Venugopal Garu. He loved such classical numbers. Were he alive he would have given us much more information about this subject. His passing away is the passing away of a great music lover and is a loss to all of us. May his soul rest in peace.