Babul Mora___
K.L. Saigal
in 'Street Singer’ (1936)
- Satish Chopra
Wajid Ali Shah, the Nawab of
Awadh was banished from his beloved Lucknow by the British during
eighteenth century. A true lover of dance and music; he was himself a
composer of great merit. He expressed his pain of parting in his
lyric-‘Babul mora naihar chhuto jaye’, which was indeed a soulful
depiction of the agony of his heart.
Ages have passed and the
memory of his spiritual expression through
portrayed in these
lines by the maestro became a history.
And, there came the film
‘Street Singer’ in the year 1936 and world
listened to these immortal lines of ‘Babul Mora’
in the golden voice of one and only -Kundan Lal Saigal,
the singer of the century. The music was composed by Rai Chand
Boral, who is rightly considered as the father figure amongst cine-music
composers.
Phani Majumdar the director of
the film, once observed that Saigal was very deeply immersed in the
feelings of the lyrics of Babul Mora.
Thereby, he wanted to sing the song while acting on the sets. It was a
very difficult task to record the song while singing on the road. As
during such acting and singing, recording of the instruments played
alongwith the golden voice of Saigal was not an easy job for the
sound-engineers. But, Saigal did a great job. He was completely immersed
in the totality of the song. Everything looked so real. Any other actor
could not have done so well. It was certainly in view of the fact that
perhaps he rightly understood the anguish of Wajid Ali Shah.
Shambhuji
Maharaj of Lucknow , the well known musicologist trained a large number of
singers of his time. Notable amongst them was Jagmohan, popularly known as
‘Sursagar’. In one of his interviews Jagmohan recalled a very
interesting incident, wherein he narrated that a young man of about 30
years of age came to Shambhuji Maharaj to learn the singing of ‘Babul
Mora’. The maestro
taught him within three days. At this Jagmohan was upset and little-bit
annoyed with his master. Dejected, he asked him as to how he guessed that
he (Jagmohan) will take at least six months to learn the singing of this
song, as against just three days taken by that young
person.
To
this Shambhuji Maharaj replied- “You know who was this young man?
He was Kundan Lal Saigal.”
That
is how the story of ‘Babul Mora’ goes on.
And,
the fact remains that for all times to come
‘Babul Mora____’ has
proved to be the most popular lyric in the annals of history of music of
India, may it be amongst film, light-classical and or classical. In view
of such amazing applause of the listeners of Saigal’s ‘Babul
Mora’ a galaxy of singers singing ‘Babul Mora’
followed.
Kanan
Devi, the golden melodious voice of yester years was amongst the earliest.
She sang a sketch of this song in the film for little over a minute’s
time. Because of the short duration, no recording of this master-piece was
made on a gramophone record
and it is only available on the sound track of the film-‘Street
Singer’.
The
list of luminaries who sang ‘Babul Mora’ includes- Bhim
Sen Joshi, Kesarbai Kerkar, Siddheshwari Devi, Rasoolan Bai, Khadim
Hussain Khan, Mushatq Hussain Khan, Girija Devi, Kishori Amonkar,
Jagmohan, Padma Talwalkar, Shanti Vaidyanathan Sharma, Mahender Chopra
(son-in-law of K.L.Saigal) and none other than ghazal queen Begum Akhtar.
Ustad Faiyaz Khan as well sang in the year-1932 i.e prior to Kundan Lal
Saigal.
Jagjit
Singh, the well known ghazal singer came to limelight by ‘Babul
Mora’ which he sang along with his wife Chitra Singh in early
seventies. He recorded ‘Babul Mora’ yet another time, which was
his solo version.
All
these renderings of ‘Babul Mora’ sung by these legends
in the last three decades have
been put together by me in three discs can be termed as a ‘Collectors’
Treasure’. I am obliged and
express my heartfelt gratitude to the melody admirers, who provided me
these priceless recordings.
I
am equally thankful to a large number of music lovers, who encouraged,
motivated and appreciated my efforts in collecting these echoes of golden
voices, when I offered them these soulful renderings. At this moment, I am
remembered what Shelley once observed about music and said- “__soft
voices vibrate in the memory”.
It is generally debated as to
who sang ‘Babul Mora’, the best?
To me, it is a ridiculous subject; similar to the comparison of a
Rose flower with Jasmine
and Jasmine with Lily.
Once I discussed different
versions of ’Babul Mora’ with the music maestro Anil Biswas, on
such aspect of comparison. To this his remarks
were simply fascinating, when he said- “Betey, Saigal key
alawa kisi ka naiher nahin chhuta”.
Anil Biswas is no more; but so
casually, what he said, left me speechless.
The fact remains that ‘Babul
Mora’ sung by Saigal will be listened by ardent music lovers again
and again for ages to come.
About the others, no one can
predict. Rest, I leave it to
the listeners; let them evaluate.
.
Satish Chopra,
BA/26B Ashok Vihar-I, Delhi-110052 # 27134229/27450869
Email:
satishchopra@rediffmail.com
