Mudassar Qadeer
Muhammad Rafi was born on 24 December 1924 in the village of Kotla Sultan Singh in the Punjab province of British India. He was the fifth among the six sons of Haji Ali Muhammad and Allah Rakhi Bai. Rafi showed musical inclination from a very young age and his talent was recognized by his elder brother’s friend Abdul Hameed and convinced his family to nurture his musical talent. Muhammad Rafi began learning Indian classical music from Pandit Jeevan Lal Mattu who taught him the intricacies of Raag Shastra and Punjabi folk rags Pahari, Bhairavi, Basant and Malhar. He was also trained by Ustad Badi Ghulam Ali Khan and musician Feroze Nizami. Muhammad Rafi was a fan of Kundanlal Sehgal and initially sang under him, he did his first stage show at the age of 13 in Lahore. And started singing for All India Radio Lahore in Lahore from 1941. In the same year, he recorded his first duet Sonye Ni, Hariyaye with singer Zeenat Begum for the Punjabi film Gul Baloch, which was released in 1944. Musician Shyam Sunder was closely related to Muhammad Rafi‘s artistic life. He first gave Muhammad Rafi an opportunity to sing in Lahore and when Muhammad Rafi reached Bombay, Shyam Sunder came to his aid here too and he took Muhammad Rafi to Bombay. introduced to the film world and sang a solo song in the film Gaon Ki Gori with his own music. Noor Jahan played the main role of this film and this film was released in 1945, while the film was made in 1944 with musicians Naushad and Muhammad Rafi. Earlier, Aap Se Hua was directed by AR Kardar, but in 1946, director Mehboob Khan’s film Anmul Ghari Ka Geet Tera Khluna Tota Balak is considered the first solo song of this duo. Noor Jahan played the lead role in the film while The song was written by Tanveer Naqvi. The song that gave Muhammad Rafi the fame of Muhammad Rafi was found in director Shaukat Hussain Rizvi’s film Jaganu Ke Dogana Hid Badla Wafa Ka Bewafai Ke Sawa Kya Hai, which he recorded with Noor Jahan and this film. Released in 1947۔After the partition of India, Muhammad Rafi decided to stay in Bombay and then came the year 1948, after which Muhammad Rafi became the name of Indian film music. The 1950s and 1960s were the era of the rise of film music. Naushad, Shankar Jay Kishan, SD Burman, C Ramachandra, Anil Biswas, Salil Choudhary, Madan Mohan, Roshan, Ravi, Kalyanji Anandji, RD Burman, Lakshmi Kant Pearalal and Saru Ke Javadgar OP, Nair were there. On the other hand there was only one voice Muhammad Rafi. Muhammad Rafi was the first film singer who realized that singing for a concert and record is one thing but singing for a film is another. Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand, Rajand Kumar, and Rajkumar are singing, that is, the rendering and composition of their voice should be in such a way that it blends with the style of the hero, and this quality comes first in the art of Muhammad Rafi. Wala Geet is for a particular character. The film has its own special situation. Each actor has his own look and feel, lisp and voice, and a sense of voice that sets him apart from the rest. Rafi Sahib not only fulfilled all these details while singing the film song, but also made the difference in the voice, movements and style of each hero on screen clear. Examples of this are Radhika’s Nache Re Aur Hoy Hum Jin Li Babard in Dilip Kumar’s Geet Madhu Bin, Dev Anand’s Geet Mein Zindagi Ka Saath Nabata Chal Gaya, Khoya Khoya Chand, Raj Kapoor’s own film Barsaat. Ka Geet Mein Zindane Mein Damm Rota Hai Raha Hoon, the song filmed on Rajendra Kumar is like the days gone by, in which you will know that Rafi Sahib used to blend his voice with every hero while singing and the viewer felt that way. It used to be that the hero was singing the song and sometimes it also happened that the other actor of the film i.e. the side hero and the comedian also had to film the song, even then Muhammad Rafi used to sing the song like the song Sir Jo Tera Chakraye was filmed on Johnnie Walker. Mahmood filmed song Hum Kale Hain To Kya Ho Adal Wale Hain, song sung in movie CID Le Ke Pehla Pahla Pyaar, Bun Ke Aayni Mein Khamar, Movie Zanjire Ka Dewane Hai Dewanon Ko Nazar Bhagai Yaan then Movie Apna Pin Ka Watch Geet Aadmi Musafar Hai, then you will feel that the actor who is actually being filmed is singing it. The magic of art is that as soon as the actor changes, the pitch and rendering of his voice changes۔Rafi has sung numerous songs for famous Bollywood actors. He sang a total of 75 songs for Dilip Kumar which gained immense popularity. Mohammad Rafi has sung 97 songs for actor Dev Anand, who is his example. For the Kapoor family, Mohammad Rafi has sung for Raj Kapoor, Shami Kapoor, Shashi Kapoor, Randhir Kapoor and Rishi Kapoor. He sang 32 songs for Raj Kapoor, which is a great document of the film history of the subcontinent. Muhammad Rafi sang about 180 songs keeping in mind Shammi Kapoor’s body language, dance and acting style which is a fine example of harmony between playback music and acting. He sang 121 songs for Shashi Kapoor. Muhammad Rafi He sang 124 songs for the hero Rajendra Kumar called Jubilee Kumar. He sang 104 songs for the dancing hero Jitendra. Character actor and renowned comedian Mehmood played twenty unique roles in his career for which Muhammad Rafi sang more than 85 songs. Guru Dutt’s cinema was somewhat different from the Indian mainstream and Muhammad Rafi sang 25 songs for him. In which his style and voice are heard separately. He sang 104 songs for Dharmendra. Apart from this, Mohammad Rafi sang 38 songs for Rajkumar and the pairing of the two was also unparalleled. Muhammad Rafi lent his voice to every notable hero, character actor, comedian and other characters of his era.I will not stop writing on the art of Mohammad Rafi, but here I would like to say one thing. Rafi was involved in controversies twice and both times his opponent was of the same importance as Lata Mangeshkar. It happened during Teri Dil Mein, which became so intense that both the legends did not make any double records together for 6 years. During that time, their songs used to be in the films released, but they were not duplicates, and the fact is that this dispute Both of them were not harmed. Meera and Aap Ka Ho were deprived of listening to Jawan’s songs, but later this problem was resolved and Kalyanji Anandji’s song in Bebhodi got to be heard by Sanam music fans. The second controversy is the most It happened regarding the singing of the song for which Guinness added the objections of both of them, but later they removed the name of both in this regard and made Asha Bhonsle’s name a part of his record for singing the most number of songs, which is still standing.One of the greatest playback singers born in India, Muhammad Rafi is considered to be nothing less than a genius when it comes to different styles of music. This great singer had the perfect blend of melody, emotion and energy, resulting in thousands of soulful songs. Be it the classically inclined songs of Biju Bwara or the foot tapping songs of Kashmir Ki Kali۔Muhammad Rafi gave every song the treatment it deserved. His contribution to the Hindi film industry has been outstanding and perhaps no singer till date has managed to capture the hearts of fans the way Muhammad Rafi has. Rafi was known for his versatility as he lent his voice to classical numbers to patriotic songs, sad songs to romantic numbers, qawwalis to ghazals and bhajans. Received the Fair Award and was awarded the National Film Award once. Apart from Hindi, he sang in several Indian languages including Konkani, Bhojpuri, Bengali, Odia, Punjabi, Marathi, Sindhi, Telugu, Kannada, Maithili, Gujarati, Magahi, and Urdu. Apart from Indian languages, he lent his melodious voice to songs in English, Arabic, Persian Sinhalese, Creole and Dutch languages.
The writer is senior analyst and columnist and accessible at [email protected]
