Any account of Indian playback music must start and end with Lata Mangeshkar.
Born September 28, 1929 in Indore, Lata Mangeshkar has been active in all walks of Indian popular and light classical music having sung film songs, ghazals, bhajans and
pop. She is the supreme voice of popular Indian music, an Indian Institution. The Guinness Book of Records listed her as the most recorded artist in the world with not less than 30,000 solo, duet and chorus-backed songs recorded in 20 Indian languages between 1948 and 1987. Today the number might have reached above 40,000!
Dinanath Mangeshkar, her father, owned a theatrical company and was a reputed classical singer. He gave her singing lessons from around the age of five. Her God-given musical gifts meant that she could master the vocal exercises effortlessly on first pass and from early on she was recognized as being highly gifted musically.
However when her father died in 1942, the onus of being the breadwinner of the family fell on Lata. Between 1942 and 1948 she acted in as many as 8 films in Hindi and Marathi to take care of the family’s economic problems.
The first Hindi film in which she gave playback was Aap ki Sewa Main (1947) but her singing went unnoticed. When Lata entered the Film Industry, heavier voices like Noorjehan, Shamshad Begum and Zohrabai Ambalewali ruled the Industry. Ironically Lata was even rejected for Shaheed (1948) by producer S. Mukherjee who complained that her voice was too thin! However Ghulam Haider unable to use her in Shaheed gave Lata her breakthrough song with Dil Mera Toda from Majboor (1948).
1949 saw the release of four films. Barsaat, Andaaz (1949) , Dulari and Mahal. The songs of all four films were runaway hits particularly ‘Aaega Aanewaalaa’ from Mahal. By 1950 the Lata wave had changed the Industry. Her high-pitched singing rendered obsolete the heavy basy nasal voices of the day.
Asha Bhosle too came up in the late 1950s and the two sisters were the queens of Indian playback singing upto the end of 20th century.
The phenomenal success made Lata the most powerful woman in the Film Industry.
Lata sang under the baton of all the top composers barring O.P. Nayyar and with all the top playback artistes of the day. The 1960s and 70s saw Lata go from strength to strength.
Lata Mangeshkar is in fact that rare artist who has realized her search for excellence.
A Phalke Award winner for her contribution to Indian Cinema, the another jewel in Lata’s crown is having India’s highest civilian award, the Bharat Ratna conferred on her in 2001.
