Talat Mahmood
Singer with a golden voice
How times have changed and, with them, tunes. The music we hear today bears not the remotest resemblance to the songs falling so softly, on our ears, from the golden era of Hindustani cine sangeet. And a performer who fell extra-softly, extra-sweetly on our ears was Talat Mahmood who, in keeping with his temperament, passed away, quietly, on May 9, at the age of 74.
Famed ghazal exponent Jagjit Singh, inheritor of this crooner's legacy, to this day believes that there has been none to rival Talat Mahmood. He argues that ''Talat Mahmood is the ghazal original'' and that all who followed, including himself, were inspired by his style and idiom.
To think that the pantheon of singers, on the male side, is all but no more as far as Hindustani cinema goes. First to pass was Mukesh; then we lost Mohammed Rafi; followed by Kishore Kumar and Hemant Kumar; and now Talat Mahmood. Only Manna Dey, the first to enter the field and the oldest of our legendary male playback performers in his 80th year, survives.
Indeed, a whole tradition died with Talat Mahmood. The ghazal never was the same, in Indian cinema, since Talat Mahmood lost ground. Progressively, his golden voice became, on the silver screen, a misty memory. But not for his millions of admirers for whom his voice lived on through those never-never nuggets of his. To that generation, ghazal is Talat and Talat is ghazal.
Anil Biswas' 'Tera Khayal Dil Se Mitaya Naheen Aabhi' ('Doraha'), Naushad's 'Husn waalon ko na dil do yeh mita dete hai' ('Babul'), C. Ramachandra's 'Mohabbat hi na jo samjhe' ('Parchhain'), Sajjad's 'Yeh hawa yeh raat yeh chaandni' ('Sangdil'), S. D. Burman's 'Bharan teri wafaaon ka' ('Armaan'), Roshan's 'Kisi soorat lagi dil ki behal jaaye' ('Naubahar'), Madan Mohan's 'Main paagal mera manwa paagal' ('Ashiana'), Shanker-Jaikishan's 'Hain sub se madhur woh geet jinhen' ('Patita'), Salil Chowdhury's 'Aansoo samajh ke kyun mujhe' ('Chhaya'), Ghulam Mohammed's 'Zindagi dene waale sun' ('Dil-e-Nadan'), Jaidev's 'Teri zulfon se pyaar kaun kare' ('Joru Ka Bhai'), Khayyam's 'Shaam-e-gham ki kasam' ('Footpath'), O. P. Nayyar's 'Pyaar Par bus to naheen hai mera lekin phir bhi' ('Sone Ki Chidiya') and Ravi's 'Sub kuchch loota ke hosh mein aaye to kya kiya' ('Ek Saal') - these Talat gems linger, now and forever, in the mindset. Why, even Sardar Malik you identify through a sentimental Talat offering like 'Tere dar pe aaya hoon fariyaad le kar' ('Laila Majnu'). The scene today belongs to Sardar's son Anu Malik. But then Hindustani cinema was just not Talat's scene after 1965. Well- bred voices were losing out by then.
Madan Mohan, as the ghazal king, made a brave attempt to resurrect Talat Mahmood through 'Jahanara' (1964), through such well-remembered solos as 'Main teri nazar ka suroor hoon', 'Teri aankh ke aansoo pee jaao' and 'Phir wohi shaam wohi gham wohi tanhaaii hai'. Madan Mohan had been hooked on to Talat over since this satin voice did the trick for him with 'Meri yaad mein tum na aansoo bahana' ('Madhosh') in 1951. And Talat, for his part, rated Madan Mohan's 'Bereham aasman meri manzil bata hai kahaan' ('Bahana') and 'Yaad jab aaye teri apnee guzari zindagi' ('Mohar') as his two best ever ghazals in cinema. Talat had no ready counter as to why he should have preferred those two ghazals over the same Madan Mohan's 'Hum se aaya na gaya' ('Dekh Kabira Roya') and 'Do din ki mohabbat mein hum ne' ('Chhote Babu').
Talat Mahmood was something extra special for Madan Mohan. But then Talat's voice was something special for almost all composers of that ambient era. Mention the humblest of music directors and he has come out with at least one stand-out ghazal in Talat's voice. Composers Babul, for instance, with 'Jab chhaye kabhi saawan ki ghata' ('Reshmi Roomal') and N. Dutta with 'Ashkon mein jo paaya hai' ('Chandi Ki Deewar').
Yet to pinpoint Talat's ghazals in films alone would be to overlook his oeuvre, as a super performer, in the richer realm outside cinema - of private ghazals. The effect Talat left here is peerless in a strain of 'Ghazal ke saaz uthaao badi udaas hai raat' and 'Jahaan mein koyi naheen hai apna har ek ko khoob aajmaaya'. But the scope for expanding this more 'lyrical' sphere (his 'private' ghazal contribution) was lost, once our film music turned shockingly hybrid towards the end of the Fifties/ early Sixties. As the glossy ghazal wave of the Eighties divested this song form of what little subtlety it had left, Talat spoke up, demanding to know:
''Why, may I ask, this stress, in the ghazal today, on 'saaqi' and 'sharaab' all the time to the virtual exclusion of finer feelings? Is there no place, any longer, for the gentle caressing style of ghazal I made famous in the shape of 'Nigahon ko chura kar rah gayi rah gayi hai'; or 'Gham-e-zindagi ka yaarab na mila koyi kinaraa'; or 'Dil ki duniya basa gaya hai kaun'? Why only ghazals, recall the impact I made with geets like 'Mera pyaar mujhe lauta do', 'Tasveer teri dil mera behla no sakegi', 'Ro ro beeta jeevan saara' and 'Kya itna bhi adhikaar naheen'? And I compressed, remember, each one of these ghazals and geets into the bare three minutes permitted by a 78 rpm record. Today, we have LPs and cassettes and all that technology by which a singer can spread himself out. But to what poetic end?''
Truly was poetry integral to the music that Talat Mahmood made. And it was this intrinsic poetic content in his vocalising that elevated a mere film song, in his crooning custody, to a near art form. Validly did Talat point out to me:
''At one time, I was singing for such divergent heroes as Dilip Kumar, Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand, on the one hand, Bharat Bhooshan, Shammi Kapoor and Ajit, on the other. Yet I always insisted on a certain standard of poetry in the music they created for me, no matter what the budget of the film. In fact, it was to give nuanced expression to such poetry that music directors sought me out. When 'Mirza Ghalib' came to be made by Sohrab Modi it went without saying that I was going to sing the theme for Ghulam Mohammed - viz 'Phir mujha deedaitar yaad aaya' 'Ishq mujh ko na sahi wahshat ki sahi' and 'Dil-e-naadaan tujhe hua kya hai'.''
If Talat alone was needed for such songs, why did music directors stop sending for him? Was it because he tried to turn 'singing star' - in the manner of K. L. Saigal - with 'Dil-e-Nadan' (1953), 'Waris', 'Ek Gaaon Ki Kahani', 'Lala Rukh' and 'Sone Ki Chidiya'? Talat promptly agreed that he lost his slot, as the No. 1 playback performer, because music directors mistakenly thought that he was more interested in being a hero than a singer.
''I wasn't really involved in acting as such,'' explained Talat. ''True, playing the leading man in some nine films did bring in more money than I earned as a playback singer. But then I had made it clear to every single music director, who mattered, that I was first a singer, then an actor. Yet they seemed already to have made up their minds about not bothering to give me a hearing. Remember, from the outset, our music directors had approached me, not I them. They would ring me each time the song had a very special romantic flavour, particularly if it happened to be a ghazal. For numbers like 'Hum dard ke maaron ka' on Dilip Kumar in 'Daag'; for 'Main dil hoon ek armaan bhara' on Raj Kapoor in 'Anhonee'; for 'Jaayen to jaayen kahaan' on Dev Anand in 'Taxi Driver,' Shanker-Jaikishan, Roshan and S. D. Burman instinctively decided that the voice had to be mine and mine alone. So now, when they suddenly stopped ringing me for even such 'specialist' mood numbers, I just didn't know what to do.''
''Maybe my aristocratic background came in the way of making the first move! Thus, as I failed to take off as a hero, I also lost my ranking of being the first choice of our music directors for ghazals. I played for high stakes and lost. There is no regret, no rancour. For, even after I ceased to be a hero, each time I was called upon to perform as a playback, I measured up. Even as late as in the case of Bimal Roy's 'Sujata', when it was with some hesitation that S. D. Burman summoned me for that 'Jalte hain jiske liye' ghazal so well written by Majrooh Sultanpuri, I put everything I had into it. I all but won the Filmfare Best Singer award for the rendition. Yet they had no sustained use for me after that. Romance was becoming more 'direct' in our cinema.''
The eternal romantic was Talat. Just think of the spell he cast through those duets with Lata Mangeshkar: Anil Biswas 'Seene mein sulagte hain armaan' ('Tarana'), C. Ramchandra's 'Mohabbat mein aese zamane bhi aaye' ('Sagaai'), Roshan's 'Dil-e-beqaraar so jaa' ('Raagran'), Madan Mohan's 'Teri Chamakti aankhon ke aagey' ('Chhote Babu'), S. D. Burman's 'Tere saath chal rahen hain' ('Angarey'), Salil Chowdhury's 'Dil deewaana dil mastaana maane na' ('Awaaz') and Khayyam's 'Raaz seene mein mohabbat ka chhipaye rakhna' ('Hum Hain Rahi Pyar Ke').
Truly was Talat Mahmood's a charismatic voice. Nurtured in the lap of the ghazal culture in Lucknow and exposed, in his salad years, to the artistic atmosphere of Calcutta and New Theatres, Talat Mahmood came to Hindustani cinema with the essence of music and poetry in his highly literary persona. With his impeccable Urdu diction and classy Bengal base (he spoke that language fluently), Talat Mahmood went on to achieve the stature of a ghazal icon for whom poets and music directors alike were eager to compose. They knew his lips had this gift of further refining their composition. Any wonder all other singers insisted on performing before Talat Mahmood at a 'mehfil'? They knew the 'mehfil' would want to hear none other once Talat cast his vocal sway.
Edited by Sur_Sangam - 19 years ago
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