Pritam’s recycles
It will be remembered that Vishal-Shekhar’s title-track from Golmaal—Fun Unlimited was added on and modified by Pritam, who went on to do Golmaal Returns, retaining the voice of Anushka Manchanda. The theme song was again improvised by him in Golmaal 3. Then S. Thaman came out with a version in Golmaal Again. The singers and lyricists also kept changing.
Trivia Tunes: Laxmikant Pyarelal had dissuaded Alka Yagnik’s mother from making her a child playback singer
With Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3, the reverse has happened. Pritam’s now cult-classic, ‘Ami je tomar’ from the 2007 original was redone by him in the 2022 sequel, Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2. But now, it is Amaal Mallik who has recycled Pritam’s song as ‘Ami je tomar 3.0’ in Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3. Shreya Ghoshal, evolving constantly over the last 18 years, has sung this version as well, with some add-on lyrics.
The loyal franchise!
I recall Pritam telling me that he turned down Ek Tha Tiger (which would have been his first film with Kabir Khan, now his loyalist) because Dhoom:2 was being simultaneously being made by Yash Raj Films and “it was my franchise”. Of course, the iconic title-track was redone by him in the voices of Vishal Dadlani and Dominique in the film. And Pritam was in Dhoom:3 as well with the song now rendered with variations by Aditi Singh Sharma and an Arabic version by Lebanese artiste Naya. However, Naya’s version did not go globally endemic, the way the original film’s English version by Tata Young, the Thai singer, had done. Of course, Sunidhi’s Hindi song remained a topper as well.
Dreams unfulfilled
Sanjay Leela Bhansali is considered rightly among the most musical filmmakers today, and has now turned composer in his directorial projects, come films or web. So it is obvious that this man brought up on Hindi film music since his formative years would have a wish to work with our legends. It was in 1994 that he choreographed the songs of R.D. Burman’s 1942—A Love Story and had planned his debut, Khamoshi—The Musical with the composer too. But Pancham passed away before that could happen.
And SLB was second-time unlucky: for his second film, Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, his wish-list was of Laxmikant-Pyarelal. Sadly, that too never happened, as Laxmikant was indisposed and finally passed away a year before the film hit the screen!
Child singer to adult singer
In the days gone by, it was considered axiomatic that a child singer could never make it big as an adult playback singer. Composers Laxmikant-Pyarelal had dissuaded Alka Yagnik from becoming one when her mother had brought her down to Mumbai in the mid-1970s. Of course, Sunidhi Chauhan broke this ‘tradition’ most successfully. Not only did she steal the show in Kalyanji-Anandji’s Little Wonders concerts by singing ‘Morni baaga maa bole’ (Lamhe) in both Lata Mangeshkar’s and Ila Arun’s style as a teenager, but her 1996 hit ‘Kya adaa kya jalwa tera Paro’ from Shastra was a chartbuster. And just three years later, she made a smash debut as an adult singer with ‘Ruki ruki thi zindagi’ from Mast.
The lone exception
However, L-P were not all that wrong. Preeti Uttam, who started out as Gurpreet Kaur in Masoom, never made it big. Other child singers who failed to make the adult grade were names like Laxmikant’s own daughter, Rajeshwari, Vanita Mishra, Antara Salil Chowdhury, Anmol Anu Malik and Rema Bappi Lahiri. And in this case, Sushma Shrestha, who began with the chartbuster, ‘Hai na bolo bolo’ with Mohammed Rafi, Suman Kalyanpur and child singer Pratibha (who was never heard of again) became the first exception.
The daughter of composer-musician Bhola Shrestha succeeded big-time and sang a plethora of hits under composers as varied as Kalyanji-Anandji, S.D. Burman, R.D. Burman, Ravindra Jain, Sonik-Omi, Naushad, Madan Mohan and Salil Chowdhury!
Sushma shrewdly changed her name to Poornima as an adult and again had a great innings in the 1990s making item numbers and especially raunchy songs her special forte, like ‘Oonchi hai building’ (Judwaa) and ‘Chane ke khet mein’ (Anjaam).
Bridging the gap!
Composer Bappi Lahiri, who himself began his career as a composer as a teen prodigy, however, managed to bridge the age gap, so to speak, between Sushma (‘Aao tumhein chand pe le jaaye’ in Zakhmee) and the adult Poornima (in Bengali films and possibly a Hindi movie or two). He also was the only composer, apart from Gurpreet Kaur’s father, composer Uttam Singh, to utilize her vocals as both a child (‘Paheli chhoti si’ from Bhavna) and as the adult Preeti Uttam (‘Meri mehboob tu’ from Jodidar)!
Singers ‘uncredited’
In many cases, struggling or minor singers were never credited in the film titles and (rarely) even on records and cassettes. And of course, faux pas or even late recordings (after the music inlays were sent for print) could not be ruled out! Johny Mera Naam’s credit titles saw three names: Lata Mangeshkar, Kishore Kumar and Asha Bhosle. But the popular ‘Govind bolo Hari Gopal bolo’ was sung (with Lata) by Manhar. And ‘Pal bhar ke liye koi hamein pyar kar le’, the Kishore hit, had lines hummed and sung by Usha Khanna!
In Main Tulsi Tere Aangan Ki, the credit titles only mention Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammed Rafi and Shobha Gurtu. However, Asha Bhosle, Anuradha Paudwal (then finding her niche) and Hemlata also had songs in the film!
Also Read: Trivia Tunes: When Anuradha Paudwal replaced Lata Mangeshkar in Subhash Ghai’s Hero
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