18 January, 2007

Everlasting classical old songs

Why the old songs/compositions are everlasting, I realized when my 7 year old daughter took a fancy to the song "Laaga chunari main daag", sung by Mana Dey from the film - Dil hi to hai. It so happened that I selected this particular song for singing in our annual college gathering. When I first switched on the CD player and the opening bars were played, my daughter wrinkled her nose in disgust at my selection. She probably expected me to sing some of those God awful "Reshammiyasque" songs. However, my daughter is a keen listener and was playing nearby in the adjacent room, when the famous Taraana at the end began. Now my daughter is undergoing training for Bharatnatyam dance and therefore just could'nt resist the furious Teen taal and came into the room and started dancing wildly to the rhythm. As soon as the song ended, she then immediately went away and I too did not reflect too much over the incident.
Next day when I started to practice the song along with the CD track, she was present in the room with me and somehow sat through the entire song. Thus ended the 2nd day. Now on the 3rd day, my daughter paid more attention and began to sing snatches of the song along with me. This forced me to pay more attention to the entire scenario as 7 year old kids showing undue attention to a 50 year old song is quite unusul to me at least! After that day, there was no stopping her and she used to pester me to practice the song every day, and was the one, most wildly cheering me during the entire performance on the college day. Things have come to such a pass now, that she has forced me to download the entire song into my Cell's mp3 player and she's listening to it whenever we go out on a drive (I don't have a cassette/CD deck in my car).
There's more to come ! After having once "tasted" this song, my daughter's now turned her attention to Manna Dey's another classic(al) "Jhanak jhanak tori baaje paayaliya", from the film - Mere huzoor!!! This song too has been downloaded into my cell's mp3 player and I'm being forced to listen to the song as well as her vocal exertions along with it. Not that I am complaining !!!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Dear Dr. Sundeep Bhagwath,

I am really overwhelmed to know the enchanting relationship between the Padmabhusan Manna Dey's immortal songs and your little daughter's attitude towards those songs. I have taken the printout of that article and will give to Padmabhusan Manna Dey.

Thank You very much.

With Regards,
Dr. Gautam Roy
Secretary,
Manna Dey Sangeet Academy
E mail: gautamroy1234@yahoo.com
admin@mannadey.in
Website: www.mannadey.in