The singing diva of the 40s  tuned with SD Burman in only three films - (Above : Suraiya)

Manmor……. Manmor hua matwaala.... a clear and melodious voice wafts out of your radio set and slowly entices you into a world beyond. The lilting voice gently holds your finger and leads you to a world full of sunshine and wonderment. With it you bob over crests and troughs that are as timeless as music itself. Tum nas nas ras ki phuhaar mein rom rom madhushaala ....As your soul soaks in this life-giving nectar your mind bobs up in one last effort to ask….. Yeh kisne jaadu daala?

Such was the magic of Suraiya’s voice. It had a star-in-the-eyes brightness that was disarming. Even though her on-screen image occasionally courted glamour, her voice remained rooted in simplicity and heart-warming earnestness.  It is no surprise then that this singing diva of the 40s had her listeners wrapped around her little finger. .When the honey voiced singer met up with our very own spinner of eternal melodies, the effect had to be enduring magic. If we take a dip in the ocean of melody along with Sachinda and Suraiya’s we are rewarded with some eternal sparklers.

Sadly Suraiya only made a special appearance in Burmanda's music room. These two stalwarts have tuned in together only for three films.But this short tuning has left us with some timeless gems whose sheen has not diminished even half a century later.

Suraiya was a huge singing star in the late 40s. She had scaled great heights under almost every important composer of those times, particularly so under her mentor Naushad. Most of this happened while SD was still in Calcutta and then later when he was struggling to make a mark in Bombay. Thus for most of their careers Dada and Suraiya’s paths did not cross. He was busy with Geeta Dutt, Lata, Shamshad, Amirbai Karnataki and other singers who were regulars with Bombay Talkies and Suraiya stuck to Naushad, Husnlal Bhagatram, Khursheed Anwar, etc. with her main contact point with the Bengal school of music being Anil Biswas.

However, Sachin Dev Burman and Suraiya’s paths were destined to cross.And there is no second-guessing why they had to cross. Yes, it is thanks their equally legendary associations with the evergreen Dev Anand. And so it comes as very little surprise that some of Suraiya’s most high profile songs for Burmanda come from the Navketan banner. It is also a lesser surprise that two of the three films that Burman worked on with Suraiya were Dev-Suraiya starrers.

If we go back and trace their association we see that the first time Suraiya and SD came together was two years after his arrival in Bombay. It was for a 1948 Dev Anand-Suraiya starrer called Vidya. Vidya was a fairly significant film in other ways too. It marked the beginning of Dada’s legendary association with Dev Anand. On a side, it was also Suraiya’s first film with Dev Anand. After Vidya, these three artists teamed up again in Afsar. Afsar was the film that launched the Navketan banner in 1949. The film was released in 1950 and it boasts of two of Suraiya’s all-time-great solos. After Afsar Suraiya sang for SD Burman only once more. This was for a 1952 film called Lal Kunwar.

Suraiya-SD Burman Selections 1. Manmor hua matwala Afsar 2. Naina Deewana Afsar 3. Tum jo Mile Lal Kunwar 4. Laayi khushi ki duniya (with Mukesh) Vidya 5. Gun gun gun bole re bhanwar Afsar 6. Jhoom rahi re  Vidya 7. Preet ka naata jodne waale (with Geeta Dutt) Afsar 8. Kise maaloom tha Vidya 9. Preet sataye teri yaad na Lal Kunwar 10. Pardesi Re Afsar

If one glances through the Burman-Suraiya songs together, the one thing that becomes quite apparent upfront is that their association was more representative than definitive. The handful of songs that the two did team up for was far more indicative of what they could have done together rather than being indicative of what they actually did do together.

Sachinda's first film with Suraiya, Vidya, is redolent with the fragrance of the 40s. The most famous song out of this film is the rare Suraiya-Mukesh team-up for the duet Laayi khushi ki duniya. Kise maloom tha might win favours for being the song most representative of the decade in which it happened.

The decade that we mention above relates to that era of film singing when bass heavy voices were the order of the day. Suraiya too had a bass heavy voice. But what set her voice apart from that of her contemporaries, was a pleasant lilt and a fluidity that was rare in those times. When utilised effectively Suraiya's voice had a quaint bell-like tinkle to it. Naushad was the first to discover and exploit that natural lilt in his compositions like Murliwale murli baja. Other composers like Khursheed Anwar (Paapi papiha re), Anil Biswas (Door papiha bola and Rahi Matwale) and later Ghulam Mohammad ( Nukhtacheen hai gham-e-dil ) also played around with this tonal quality in her voice.

SD Burman presented Suraiya's voice in Afsar and  Lal Kunwar in a manner that brought out the natural  lilt in her voice.Above: SD Burman

Burmanda's most effective utilisation of Suraiya too was in the same mode as his above-mentioned contemporaries. As always, Dada did things in his own distinctive style that bears fruit in form of the beautiful songs of Afsar. Dada's compositions for Afsar find their roots in Rabindra Sangeet and Bengali folk music. Here he moulds Suraiya's voice in a manner that brings out a restrained sweetness from these tunes. Under his baton her voice sounds delightfully rich, textured and sprinkled with just the right amount of sweetness… quite like a perfect gourmet dessert! The heart-tuggingly sweet Tagore adaptation Nain diwaane ek nahin maane is offset by the soulful and lilting Manmor hua matwala (arguably the pick of the lot).The chirpy gun gun gun gun bole re bhanwar, exudes the infectious spirit typical to Burmanda’s earlier numbers.Under Sachinda, Suraiya also does a rare team-up with Geeta Dutt for a charming Preet ka naat jodne waale. Then there is the wistful Pardesi Re, which is a rare Hindi film adaptation of the great Bengali poet/composer Kazi Nazrul Islam’s works. The Bengali original Padmar dheu re(Oh! The waves of the Padma) was rendered amazingly by the maestro himself. Afsar was undoubtedly the high point in the SD-Suraiya saga.

Music profile: Suraiya

Tribute to the singer – actor Suraiya

“She retired too early”

This superstar singer/actress passed away on the 31^st of January after a brief stint at Mumbai’s Harkison das Hospital. But before that since the 60’s when she gave up acting she became a recluse for no better reason than “I’m too fat, I want people to remember me as I used to be.”

As one looks back at the career of this reclusive spirit one hears numbers like ‘nain diwane’, ‘man mor huwa matwala’ the outstanding ‘woh paas rahe ya door rahe nazaron mein samaye rehte hain’; frothy numbers like ‘ tarari tarari’, romantic ones like ‘tu mera chand’, sad numbers like ‘kise maloom tha’, ‘aiso se jee na lagaye koi’. She held her own amongst stalwarts like Nurjehan, Zohrabai Ambalewali, Amirbai, and even begum Akhtar. Her career spanned only 20 years but one is astounded at the body of work she has left.

< language=java src="http://media.fastclick.net/w/get.media?sid=22495&m=7&tp=9&d=j&t=n">

Music maestro Naushad who has shared a long association with this star recalls: “She was a lively young girl, always ready to burst into laughter, a quality she retained till today. But this singing star of the 40’s and 50’s neither sang nor acted now. The reason for this again was that she wanted to make up for those years and years of discipline she had to go through, when she was at the top. Ruled by a martinet of a grandmother who took complete charge of her life and accompanied her everywhere and never let her out of her sight, she was completely responsible in making Suraiya what she was” says music maestro Naushad Ali.

Naushad Ali recalls how she entered the film industry at the very tender age of 9; literally accompanied by her grandmother who remained a strict and powerful influence and chaperone throughout her career. “We were” he recalls, “making a film for Prakash pictures and needed a young girl to play the heroine’s younger sister, someone who could also sing. G.M. Durrani a singer suggested Suraiya and one day a young girl wearing a frock and holding her grandmother’s hand walked into the office. I gave her an audition. She had no training in music but she was intelligent. She sang 2 songs for the film Station Master-one was a chorus ‘yeh rail hamar ghar ki chuk chuk chuk and ‘saajan ghar aye ayeri aali’, which was a solo number. This was her debut both as an actress and a singer. Subsequently she gave playback for the heroine Mehtab in the film Sharda. From here she became the voice of Mehtaab so successfully that people thought it was Mehtab herself singing.”

“For me she sang in films like Dillagi, Dastaan, Nadaan, Dard, Deewana, Anmol ghadi. Her unsophisticated voice was her specialty,” he analyses. “Her natural tonal quality was very good. She was gifted with a naturally melodious voice. Hers could be called non-professional singing but her pick up was very good and she learnt things quickly. She retired too early, she could’ve sung a lot more.”

But any reference to Suraiya would be incomplete without a mention of their fabled romance. Dev Anand however prefers to keep those beautiful moments in his personal file. “When I entered the industry,” he reveals, “she was already a big star, she was a lovely person, a good singer, very friendly, her singing was effortless. I’m out of touch with her now but I remember meeting her some time back. She starred in Navketan’s first film Afsar. She was very nice but she was always surrounded by this retinue of people.” this last is said without any rancor.

“I particularly recall her singing the songs of Anil Biswas one of the very fine music composers of that time. And I’d sit and listen. I don’t know what to say-what can one say when anyone dies-one feels sorrow.

“I remember I had cried when our relationship broke up. We had lost touch and gone our separate ways and this was a closed chapter in my life.”