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How would our great old singers have fared today?
After several years of not having subscriptions to any Hindi channels, we recently got our own subscription to “Zee TV”. My lack of knowledge about all things “modern” in the world of cinema must have been seen by several of my observant readers, and now they know how I jealously guarded my ignorance for all these years. While pretty much all of my friends had some Hindi channel on their TVs when we visited, I stayed away.
Against this almost Rip-van-Winkle-esque backdrop, imagine me sitting comfortably in front of my TV and flipping channels on my newly purchased Z TV. Luckily, “Sa Re Ga Ma Pa – Ek Main aur Ek Tu” was playing. Oh! An opportunity to see talented young men and women sing. I perked up in my seat. Suffering from numerous C-grade ads promoting Ajmeri baba, I sat through the entire show. Well, imagine my total surprise when I found out about the staggering amounts of prize money and contracts awaiting the winner of the contest! 50 lakhs! Boy, had things changed! And somewhere through that show, I found my thoughts drifting, even as I listened to these very talented young people do their thing. Replace this with any other talent show like Indian Idol, and my point still stands.
This was no longer the old “Sa Re Ga Ma” that I remember seeing before leaving the shores of India. So, it was all about the singing, the quality of the voice, the training. Now, it’s all of that AND the ability to present, sing AND dance, being an “entertainer” not just a singer. Perhaps the bar has been raised in some respects, but perhaps it has been lowered in others. Then, of course, there’s this playful, ubiquitous text message that determines the winner, and not the panel of judges, who are, supposedly at least, there because of their knowledge and experience. Supposedly democracy at work, where the masses-with-cellphones-who-vote decide whether a singer (umm..performer) makes the cut or not.
I was thinking about the old brigade of our great singers and wondering how they would have fared in the current context. Imagine a young Lata Mangeshkar, singing with the same heavenly voice as hers, but not receiving SMS messages from the masses because she just stood there and she didn’t dance on the stage with a joyful smile on her face. (Not to mention the fact that Maharashtrians wouldn’t bother to text her to pick her up, but let it slide.)
Manna De, with the classically precise, golden voice, even if she had sung with her usual warm perfection, would she have gotten votes? Face it, while he sings fantastically, he was never known for his ability to dance on stage.
Mohammed Rafi: The smile would be just as soft to match his incomparable voice, but “Aapne aaj achha performance diya, lekin aapne stage ka upyog theek tarah se nahi kiya” would have been the only comment, berating his inappropriate use of the stage.
Same with Talat Mehmood: he looks great (after all, he got into movies as an actor, and actually acted in Sone ki Chidiya alongside Nutan), but could the audience put up with his sensitive voice when searching for “masti”? bhare gaane”?
Perhaps the survivors of the old guard would have been Asha Bhosale and Kishore Kumar. Ashaji has incredible stage presence and has the courage to make the cut, no matter what it takes. Kishore Kumar was always an excellent artist and could sing and dance with the best. And just in case, he also made jokes and jokes.
Runa Laila comes to mind as someone who could have passed the test even in today’s world. A crystal clear voice, a fantastic stage presence, the ability to “move” to her own music naturally, and a sultry, sultry look. (Remember we are talking about when they were YOUNG).
Mukesh: Again he looks great and has a winning smile (I thought he looked better than Raj Kapoor in the song Chhotisi yeh zindagani re from the movie Aah which was performed with him) but would he have made the cut with the generation of SMS? I’m not sure.
The whole new generation of extraordinarily talented young people must have that extra presentation ability, if they have any hope of making it in this industry. And that means, by its very nature, that we must be missing some Latas, some Mohammed Rafis, some Talats and some Manna Des.
Well, our loss. But life goes on. And what we don’t know doesn’t bother us. Who knows, there might have been someone (dare I suggest?) better than Lata and Mohammed Rafi, whom we simply never listened to and therefore simply didn’t know any better.
I, for one, would have been poorer if I had gone through life without listening to Rafi or Lata just because people who understand talent didn’t watch that particular channel, or didn’t have a cell phone handy, or couldn’t or they didn’t want to SMS your options.
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