Delightful evening of Classical Raag songs

Anupama Chandratrey
Anupama Chandratrey

MILPITAS: Sangeet Dhwani hosted a Special Music Event at the Milpitas Library Auditorium, with choicest movie songs based on the Hindustani Classical Raags, with the support of professional award winning artists, spearheaded by the Bay Area popular vocalist Anupama Chandratrey.

The event was attended by over 150 music lovers. The primary goal of the event was to celebrate “Friendship Day” being observed in US on August 2, and also simultaneously to commemorate India’s Independence Day falling on 15th August.

The event started with two popular Movie songs which had patriotic fervor – “Aye Watan ke Logo” originally sung by Lata Mangeshkar. Hetal Brahmabhatt sang this song, soulfully, which generated patriotic spirit amongst the audience. Another popular melodious song “Jis Desh me Ganga Behti Hai” was sung by Nidheesh Dubey.

Sangeet Bahar” is one of the three chapters that popularizes Hindi and other language movie songs which are based purely on Classical Raags. Sangeet Bahar events are held from time to time by the Sangeet Dhwani and in the last five years, more than twenty concerts were held periodically to the delight of movie goers.

The invited guest of the day, Anupama Chandratrey, who is a popular Bay Area Hindustani Classical Vocalist described how knowledge, learning and practice of scientific Classical Raags helped in voice control with Aroha and Avaroha, i.e., maintaining the appropriate pitch and scale that will surely enhance the melody of the songs.

It was amazing that Classical Raags were adapted by many well-known music composers, lyricists and music directors to produce some of the melodious tunes in the film industry. Anupama selected Raags “Yaman” and “Yaman Kalyan” for illustration for this event and sang a few semi-classical lyrics to demonstrate as to how these helped composers to produce melodies. She emphasized that if the singers learnt the rudiments of Classical Raags, they would certainly improvise their performance.

She sang a few selected movie songs, ghazals in order to establish her point. Some songs she briefly presented were: “Jab Deep Jale Aana” by Yesudas, “Ranjish hi Sahi” by Mehdi Hassan, “Woh Sham Kuch Ajeeb thi” by Kishore Kumar ( Movie Khamoshi), “Mousam hai Ashiqana” by Lata in Movie Pakeeza, Jare Jare Badra -( Lata in Movie Bhabhi), Jindagi Bhar nahi Bhulegi by Mohd. Rafi (Barasaat Ki Raat), Abhi Na Jao Chodkar (Hum Dono) and the last one was a famous ghazal “Ab Janeki Zid na Karo” sung by Farida Khanum. All these songs governed by Raag “Yaman” and “Yaman Kalyan” were melodiously sung by Anupama to the utter delight of the audience.

Pradeep Joshi of Sangeet Dhwani while thanking the Chief Guest Anupama Chandratrey and all the participating singers, as well as the audience, mentioned that Sangeet Dhwani, during the last 15 years had conducted over 150 concerts – based on Hindustani Classical Raags, with the support of Bay Area professional Vocalists and Musicians as well as the visiting celebrities from India from time to time.

India Post News Service