July 3rd, 2010

Talat Mahmood – Part 1

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Talat Mahmood

Talat Mahmood

The year is 1949. A young singer from Calcutta named Tapan Kumar who was soon to earn fame as Talat Mahmood in the music world, decided to come to Mumbai; the mecca of success. “A few well-wishers advised me to go to Mumbai,” recalls Talat Mahmood. “The Mumbai of those days was far removed from the Mumbai of today. The people were friendly and respected each other. The competition was there all right but it was healthy and good. All the composers in Mumbai were familiar with my voice. But some of them protested that I had no experience in films. I became a little depressed. But Anil Da composed a song for me”. Talat Saab concludes gratefully.

Born on 24 February, 1924, in Lucknow, young Talat began his singing career at the age of 16, by singing on All India Radio in Lucknow. HMV offered him his first singing assignment in 1941. The song, was ‘Sab din ek samaan nahin tha’. In 1944, Talat sang the first smash hit of his career ‘Tasveer teri dil meri bahla na sakegi’ The super success of the song turned the spotlight on the handsome singer. Not only was he flooded with singing offers he even had the opportunity to play the lead in three Hindi films produced in Calcutta before he migrated to Mumbai.

Anil Biswas who gave Talat Saab his first of many film Ghazals ‘Ae dil mujhe aisi jageh le chal jahan koi na ho’ for the film Aarzoo, recalls his first encounter with Talat Mahmood. “A singer named Tapan Kumar had come from Bengal after having sung many numbers there. He said he desired to become a hero in films. I asked him to sing for me and I was bowled over when he did. I discerned a special quality in his voice which wasn’t there in any other playback singer of those times. I thought it would be nice if such a distinctive voice was given a chance, and that perhaps the voice might become successful. Until I was active the voice never lost ground”.

It would be in the fairness of things to designate the veteran composer Anil Biswas as Talat Mahmood’s mentor in Mumbai. To those in the know, Talat Saab was already a star in Calcutta before Mumbai beckoned. To others, Anil Da sent out a loud and clear message when he chose Talat Mahmood as the voice of Dilip Kumar in Aarzoo.

There’s an interesting aside to the historic coming together of Talat Mahmood and Anil Biswas. Lata Mangeshkar fondly remembers how young Talat, a struggler in Mumbai, would be found sitting patiently at –Anil Da’s door, waiting for a break. Some people warned Talat Saab that Anil Da would never tolerate the famous Talatesque tremble. Striken with a newcomer’s insecurity, young Talat worked day and night to get rid of the trademark tremble in his voice. Anil Da was horrified. He ordered Talat to re-acquire his distinctive tremble before returning to sing for him. Anil Da could never stop marvelling at the way Talat Saab could hold a musical note in place in spite of the tremble that made listeners hearts tremble in anticipation.

Anil Biswas’s ‘Ae dil mujhe aisi jagah le chal’ was the first of many Ghazals that Talat Saab sang for Dilip Kumar. In fact their voices became so interwoven in the public’s mind that people often thought the thespian had sung his own songs when infact it was Talat’s tremulous throat, in songs like ‘Ae mere dil kahin our chal’ and ‘Mitwa lagi re’. Later when Dilip Kumar sang, ‘Lagi nahin choote’ for himself in Musafir, listeners thought it was Dilip Kumar’s glorious ghost voice Talat Mahmood doing the needful. Interestingly Talat Saab sang a song called ‘Lagi nahin choote rama’ for a film of that name with Lata Mangeshkar five years after Dilip Kumar sang a song of that title, with The Nightingale.

The voices of Dilip Kumar and Talat Mahmood were destined to be associated for all times to come. Though the singer came to be identified as the Thespian’s voice, his voice created an enduring charisma for other leading men. Think of Sunil Dutt, and we immediately remember the bashful hero courting Nutan over the telephone with Talat Saab’s ‘Jalte hain jisske liye’ in Sujata. And though Kishore Kumar was Dev Anand’s voice, whenever we visualize the evergreen star in a pensive mood we remember him by Talat Saab’s ‘jayen to jayen kahan’ in Taxi Driver.

Playback Singers . Singing Stars