Asha Bhosle meets Glen Miller at the Grass Roots of Bollywood
-
Artist:
-
Album:Aasha Soundtrack
-
Track:Ina Mina Dika
How CAN you resist clicking that tiny triangular button?
This was written by C Ramachandra and Rajinder Krishnan for the soundtrack of "Aasha" in 1957, and features a fairly young an inexperienced Asha Bhosle as "playback" singer over an "In The Mood" pastiche
Comments (7)
It's like 1957's version of a mash up..infectious!
Charming! I am brimfull of Asha. She is channeling the big band singers of the 30's and 40's and succeeds in spite of language and culture and time.
She really is an amazing singer. Still is at her ripe age. This jarring little diddy reminds me of some of the Bollywood juztapositions in, for example, the "spy movie" sound.
By an amazing coinciedence, I happened to be browsing through ivylander's old posts and hit on this gem from his "Why Bollywood is more than just camp, over two years ago. Composed in the '60s by the great R D Burman and performed in the 1971 movie "Caravan". The "playback singer" is Asha Bhosle "(at one time Burman's wife) and the male voice is Burman himself. Yeah, you'll snort at the charmingly cornball choreography and the sweetly naive boozing. But the song is 100 percent kickass" sez ivylander.
"Ina Mina Dika" is the first South Asian blues recording I've ever heard, and it's wondrous.
Spike 1, you're not saying Najma is the same person as Asha Bhosle, are you? Her song, and the video you fortunately retrieved are both tasty smörgȧbords.
I think I can clear up the inter-Spike confusion. Najma is a South Asian who - while classically trained and usually involved in more experimental stuff - decided to record an cover album featuring her favorite filmi tunes, so her "Piya Tu Ab To Aaja" is a loving homage. The whole "Forbidden Kisses" CD is pretty much a nonstop pleasure...
Najma Akhtar was born and raised in London, although ethnically she says "I am of Asian origin." Her Shanachie album QAREEB has been one of my all-time favorites since its release in 1988. It's quite different. More traditional. She composed ravishingly beautiful songs on Ghazal poems in the Urdu langugage, accompanied by violin, sax, tabla, bass and kybrds. I'll do a post on that album soon. After that more classical-oriented music and her next album, ATISH, FORBIDDEN KISS was a big left turn for me. All new to me at that time. It languished on my shelf until I had heard more Bollywood music and seen a movie or two. I agree, tasty and nonstop pleasure.
Experimental stuff indeed. She has performed with the likes of Jimmy Page & Robert Plant, Jethro Tull and La Cucina.