Manna Dey represents an era of Hindi film music that is in the lifeblood of every Indian movie and music fan. The Bollywood Film Industry started in the 1920's in the silent movie era, and soon by the 30's, with the advent of sound, music became an integral part of movies. 30's and 40's belonged to the pioneers of Indian Film music with very gifted composers and singers and towering among those initial giants was K.L. Saigal. The composers of note were Khemchand Prakash, R.C.Boral, Anil Biswas etc. With the late 40's came a new generation of composers and singers. Composers like Shankar Jaikishen, S.D.Burman, Naushad Ali ruled. There were many talented composers, but the above mentioned trio relentlessly and consistently belted out chart busters, many of which have endured as great classics till now, some 40-50-60 years later. Among the singers, we had Mohammad Rafi, Manna Dey, Mukesh, Kishore Kumar, Talat Mehmood to name a few. The ladies side was dominated by Lata Mangeshkar and her sister Asha Bhonsle. This second generation can be arguably called the greatest era of melodious and enduring music. The credit for this proliferous but high quality musical entertainment surely goes to these immensely talented and gifted singers along with the composers. Manna Dey has been one among those with many of his own immortal hits.

Manna Dey is the only living male singer from that era of singers. Mannada(as he is popularly referred to) thrived as an equal among these greats, with his own unique deep and melodious voice and a distinct bend towards classical oriented songs. His unmistakable voice is still amazingly as crisp and melodious as it was 30 years ago.

He started the evening with the melodious 'Miyan ki Malhar' based bhajan 'Bhay bhanjana vandana sun hamari' from the film Basant Bahar. This was followed by a number of hits from the late 50's including 'Sur na saje' another Basant Bahar hit, the evergreen soul stirrer 'Tu pyar ka sagar hai' from the movie Seema and followed by the Madan Mohan classic 'Kaun Aya mere manke dware' from the movie Dekh Kabira roya. After these initial songs, Mannada started to sing a non-filmi yamankalyan based thumri 'Nathni se tuta moti re'. Right from the outset, he was unhappy with rhythm (tabla) accompanist and stopped, saying there is some 'gadbad'. This was a very revealing and rare insight into the octogenarian perfectionist so steeped in his music that he couldn't take such 'gadbad' (miscues). In fact, throughout the concert we witnessed some interchanges between the singer and the accompanying artists, which I thought made the overall concert much more entertaining and memorable. No disrespect to the accompanying artists, who were assembled in the US with very limited time to work with the veteran. I am sure, they took it in the right spirit of a straight talking guru who was willing to instruct and chastise them on stage. After this, Mannada sang a lighweight song 'Tum besahara ho to' from Anurodh. This was a special dedication in honor of the organizer Mr. Robin Raina and the RRF.

While Manna Dey sang for all the major heroes from Raj Kapur to Rajesh Khanna etc. he had this unique rapport with comedians like Mehmood and has sung many many songs that are hilarous, entertaining and comic. From this genre, he sang 'Lapat Japat' from Boot Polish, followed by composer Roshan's bhairavi gem 'Phul Gendva na Maro' from the film Dooj Ka Chand. His mastery over the taal and raag was displayed with an enjoyable series of tans with some recognizable sequences and some new improvisations in sargam and word plays. More about the lighter mood songs later.

After these solos, Mannada invited Ms. Jafreen Oni to join him to some duets. She had started the evening program with a few solos. They started with 'Ye Raat bheegi bheegi' from the film Chori Chori. After this, they sang 'Masti Bhara hai Shama' from the film 'Parvarish'. This song is remarkable because the composer Dattaram, a former assistant of Shankar Jaikishen has very few movies to his credit. His claim to fame is this one movie wonder Parvarish which also has the famous Mukesh number 'Aansoo bhari hai ye jeevan ki rahe'. The Parvarish song was followed by a wonderful soft duet 'Tum gagan ke chandrama ho' from the movie 'Sati Savitri'. This was one of the early music compositions of Laxmikant-Pyarelal(L-P) who represent a newer 70's generation of composers that began to take over the parade of chart busters from the earlier stalwart composers. R.D.Burman and Kalyanji Anandji were the other popular composers of the 70's-80's. The young Ms. Jafreen Oni was very impressive and the rendition of the slow 'Tum Gagan ke' was wonderful. I think composers should take advantage of this amazing singer. She can give the current Bollywood singers a run for their money, without a doubt. The duo finished out this section with another Chori Chori number, 'Aa ja sanam madhur chandini me hum'.

After a brief intermission, Mannada sang the unfinished yamankalyan thumri 'Nathnise tuta motire'. Once again, our respect for the veteran and the young accompanists grew a notch more for working out their differences and come up with a perfect rendition. Manna Dey graciously applauded the tabalchi for a job well done. It was a wonderful display of musical transfer of knowledge real-time on the stage!!!. This was followed by 'Zindagi Kaisi hai Paheli' from Anand set to tune by Salil Chaudhary, 'Tujhe Suraj Kahun ya Chanda' from 'Ek phool do mali' set to music by Ravi. After this, the singer gave a brief intro to the Hindustani tradition and on the Raag Darbari Kanada and sang his famous 'Jhanak Jhanak Payal baje' from the film Mere Huzoor, set to music by Shankar Jaikishen. This was a song for which Manna Dey was awarded the President's award. For this song, he specially invited Atlanta's renowed Ms. Kumud Sawla on stage to perform an extempore Kathak dance accompanim ent. The 'Mere Huzoor' song was followed by 'Hasne ki chaah ne' from the movie Avishkar set to music by Kanu Roy.

Continuing our earlier discussion on songs in a lighter mood, the great composer S.D.Burman produced some masterpieces in association with Manna Dey like 'Banao Batiya hato kahe ko Jhoote' from the movie Manzil. Mannada briefly described his association with Maestro S.D. Burman and the actor Mehmood and the background on the Manzil song . This song was an imitation of Ustad Faiyyaz Khan's rendition and reminded us of the genius of S.D.Burman and Manna Dey in their heydays. I am fascinated with S.D.Burman's music and the Manna Dey classics he has produced from the 1944 hit Mashal to all the way to the 70's with songs like 'Poocho na kaise', 'Tere naina Talash mein'. In classical comedy variety, special mention should be given to two songs: the Manzil song 'Banao Batiya Hato' he sang here and 'Kisne chilman se mara' from the movie Tere Gharke samne.

The evening's final segment included a few non-hindi songs - the famous Malayalam song 'Manasa Mayile Varu' from Chemmeen which had music composed by none other than Salil Chaudhary, a Bengali number and two Gujarati songs written by Avinash Vyas. This was followed by the mega hit 'Kasme Vaade' from the film Upkar set to music by Kalyanji Anandji. Finally, we got to hear the quintessential Manna Dey number 'Laga Chunri me Daag'. Understandably some of the taans were less racy than in the original rendition, but nonetheless pure Manna Dey and very enjoyable. At 1:30 am, the 85 year old maestro concluded the recital with the unforgettable patriotic ditty 'Ae mere Pyare watan' from the film Kabuliwallah set to music by Salil Chaudhary.

All credits to Mr. Robin Raina and the Raina Foundation for organizing this fantastic recital.