Chhaayaageet #264 - “Aapko alag alag kamron mein gaana hoga.”
You will have to sing in different rooms.
It is the day of the recording for a grand historical film. Inside the studio, the air is quite tense. The composer sits with his head in his hands, listening to the lines written by the lyricist.
“Yeh labz theek nahi lag rahe hain,” says the composer. These words do not feel right.
The lyricist quickly writes down another version and shows it to him.
“Iske baare mein kya khayaal hai?” asks the lyricist. What about this one?
The composer shakes his head, signaling his disapproval. He is still not satisfied. Nothing is working out here in the studio. The composer tells everyone to pack up for the day. They both decide to leave the studio and head over to the composer’s house. The plan is to work late into the night. They iterate for hours, but the perfect tune is still out of reach.
By late evening of the next day, something sparks in the composer’s mind. For some reason, an old folk song keeps coming back. It is an old folk song from Uttar Pradesh. Born in Lucknow, this one is especially close to his heart. A song about love that screams defiance.
“Ek kaam karo. Iss lok geet ke alfaz aur dhun ko dhyan se suno.” the composer suggests. Do one thing. Listen carefully to the words and tune of this song.
The lyricist listens to the song. The spirit is there, but the words need to be polished. He adapts the simple folk language to match the dignity of a royal Mughal court. Finally, they have it.
“Ab yeh sahi hai,” says the composer after listening to the new lyrics. Now this is the right one.
They invite the female singer to the studio. She practices her lines, and the initial rehearsals sound amazing. The filmmaker enters the room from the back and listens quietly.
The composer and lyricist turn to the filmmaker and tacitly try to get his impression of what they just heard. “Gaana bahut accha hai, lekin…” the filmmaker takes a pause there. The song is very good, but…
The filmmaker has explained the situation, but he still knows something that the music team does not know yet. He goes into the details of the set. This song will be filmed in a magnificent Sheesh Mahal —a palace of mirrors which will be built inside a fort. In fact the set will be so spectacular that he wants this song to be recorded in Technicolor.
“Aap sab samajh hi gaye honge. Mujhe is gaane ek gehri goonj chahiye.” the filmmaker explains. You all must have understood by now. I want a deep echo in this.
The composer realizes that a standard studio recording will sound too flat for a song that needs a massive, open palace. The technology that he has in the recording room is very basic and cannot produce what the filmmaker wants.
He starts looking around. The only option is to break the walls of the studio and expand. Then it strikes him. Of course. He goes to another adjoining room that has these shiny tiles. That should reflect some of the sound. He calls the singer over to that room.
“Zara yahan do linen gaakar sunao.” The singer obliges. There is definitely reverberation. The composer looks pleased. He rushes to a few more rooms as he needs varying degrees of reverberation throughout the song. All rooms produce a different variant of the depth needed.
“Aapko alag alag kamron mein gaana hoga.” the composer tells the singer. You will have to sing in different rooms. “Wahan se awaaz goonj kar aayegi,” the composer says as he adjusts the microphone. The sound will echo back from there.
The singer performs the song from a distance, her voice bouncing off the walls to create the grand echo that defines the character’s love for the prince as well as her rebellion against the emperor.
Naushad composed the song Jab Pyar Kiya To Darna Kya for the film Mughal-E-Azam. The lyrics were written by Shakeel Badayuni and the film was produced/directed by K. Asif. The playback was provided by Lata Mangeshkar and the song was picturized on Madhubala as Anarkali. During the song, Prithviraj Kapoor as Shahenshah Akbar and Dilip Kumar as Shehzaada Salim are in the court as Madhubala performs her dance routine.
K. Asif wanted to recreate the Sheesh Mahal (Palace of Mirrors) at Lahore Fort. At a time when entire films were made for less than ₹10 lakhs, this single set cost an estimated ₹15 lakhs. There was a technical challenge with the set. The set was made of thousands of small mirrors imported from Belgium. When the crew first tried to light it, the mirrors reflected the studio lights so intensely that they blinded the cameras and created hot spots. To capture the shimmering effect without overexposing the shot, the cinematographer, R.D. Mathur, spent days experimenting. He eventually decided to use strips of cloth to bounce and soften the light, and also used thin wax coatings on some mirrors to manage the glare.
Shakeel Badayuni wrote and discarded several drafts before arriving at the final lyrics. Naushad picked a folk song Prem Kiya, Kya Chori Kari Hai which was popular in Uttar Pradesh and decided to use its tune. Shakeel Badayuni transformed the lyrics into a defiant song of rebellion against the Emperor. In order to create the effect of an echoing voice, Naushad used different rooms with reflective tiles to achieve that. Something that is taken for granted in today’s world by the composers using the latest technology during recording.
K. Asif filmed one reel of Mughal-e-Azam, including the song Pyar Kiya To Darna Kya, in Technicolor. Impressed by the result, he filmed three more reels in Technicolor, near the story’s climax. After seeing them, he sought a complete re-shoot in Technicolor, but financiers refused. K. Asif subsequently released Mughal-e-Azam partially coloured, although he still hoped to see the full film in color.
This is Lata Mangeshkar singing the same song in a concert.
Singer: Lata Mangeshkar
Music: Naushad
Lyrics: Shakeel Badayuni
*ing: Madhubala, Dilip Kumar, Prithviraj Kapoor
Producer/Director: K. Asif
Film: Mughal-e-Azam (1960)