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NEW DELHI: Age has not withered his voice or affected his
sense of humour. And though the grey lines are beginning to
show, legendary playback singer Manna Dey still shows the
same enthusiasm while performing that he had been popular
for two decades ago.
Expectedly, he left the audience entranced as he sang some
his most popular numbers here last night at a concert organised
by Doordarshan. The entire performance was recorded by Doordarshan
for telecast and for being converted with CDs and VCDs as
part of the archival collection of Prasar Bharati.
Apart from the singer, the evening also saw the recitation
of poetry by well-known lyricist Gopal Das Neeraj who in fact
has also written some of the songs that the 86-year old Manna
Dey sang.
The singer obliged by singing some of Neeraj's lyrics, including
'aye bhai, zaraa Dekh ke chalo' from the film 'Mera Naam Joker'
made by probably the best showman of Indian cinema, Raj Kapoor,
and 'Aie mere pyaare watan, aie mere bichchde chaman' from 'Kabuliwala'
based on the story by Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore and 'Poochho
na kaise maine ran bitaayi'. Both Manna Dey and Neeraj received
the National Awards for this song from 'Mera Naam Joker'.
The maestro chose to pick his own songs, and though he had
a book in front of him with the lyrics written in them, he
seldom had need to look down as he got carried away and the
words came on their own from the corners of memory.
Other songs rendered by Manna Dey included 'Umarya Katti
Jaye', 'Phul Gendwa Na maaro', 'Jeevan se lambe hain jeevan
ke raste', 'Ai meri Zohra Zabeen tujhe maloom nahin', and
so many others including a Bengali song inspired by a famous
coffee house in Kolkata which used to be frequented by artistes
and filmmakers like Satyajit Ray.
He also sang a composition of his favourite music director
S D Burman-- 'Piya Maine Kya kiya, hame chhodh ke jayyo na'
and a few verses from 'Madhushala' composed by Harivansh Rai
Bachchan.
He was accompanied on the tabla by Indranath Mukherji, Richard
Mitra on electric guitar and Mahendra Gokhale on keyboard.
Manna Dey 's soulmate and ''inspiration'' of his art Sulochana
was also among the audience.Earlier, CEO Prasar Bharati BS
Lalli welcomed Manna Dey with a bouquet of flowers and presented
him a shawl. Senior officials of Doordarshan and All India
Radio were also present.
Born in 1920 in Kolkata, Manna day learnt the basic nuances
of singing from his uncle Krishna Chandra Day and Ustad Dabir
Khan. Later, when he came to Mumbai in 1942, he perfected
his art under the tutelage of Sachin Dev Burman and under
two stalwarts, Ustad Aman Ali Khan and Ustad Abdul Rahman
Khan.
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