‘Pancham Unmixed’ (older post updated)
thanks to Bliss..
LINK
After four years of hard work, finally Mumbai-based writer and filmmaker Brahmanand Singh has completed “Pancham Unmixed” – a film on legendary composer R.D. Burman’s life and time – and released it on DVD.
“It was in my mind for a long time. I wanted to do something definitive on him. I have tried to explore his music in the film. It was possible only by talking to people who have been around him, worked with him and also by talking to some new composers who have a fantastic interpretation of his music,” Singh said.
Director Vishal Bharadwaj released the DVD Wednesday. Singer Amit Kumar and composer Shantanu Moitra were among others who were present at the event.
The two-hour long film features Pacnham’s close friends, colleagues and admirers like Asha Bhosle, Gulzar, Javed Akhtar, Manna Dey, Shammi Kapoor and Rishi Kapoor and talk about the music genius.
It took Singh four years to complete the film on Pancham who revolutinised Bollywood music. Some of the memorable songs of Pancham include “O haseena zulfon wali”, “Aaja aaja main hoon pyar tera”, “Chura liya hai”, “Khaali haath sham aayi hai,” “Mera kuch samaan”, “Saagar kinare” and “Ek Ladki ko dekha”.
“All the people who worked with him are big names. Even though they were willing to talk, it wasn’t that easy to get them at one call. I tried to get everything that I could about him. It was a huge task,” said Singh.
Prominent among Singh’s documentaries are “Asghari Bai” – on an octogenarian legendary dhrupad singer and “A Burden of Love” on Alzheimer’s disease.
The Collectors Edition DVD pack also has a coffee table book on the composer.
November 26, 2009 at 10:14 AM
this is a must watch!
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November 26, 2009 at 6:48 PM
I’m surely in the minority but I think Pancham is rather overrated.
No doubt he produced some gems, but how about the huge number of crap songs he also churned out.
From his contempories, I’d pick Khaiyyam over him any day.
And as for people calling him the greatest ever, that’s a joke – Madan Mohan, Salil Chaudhry, Roshan Saab all made greater music than RDB.
That said, obviously I think he was very talented and when he was inspired to come up with his best it was awesome.
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November 26, 2009 at 7:19 PM
I think Pancham had a phenomenal range. Be it the semi-classical(think parveen sultana in KUDRAT) or the wrongly labelled ‘cabaret'(all of the Helen numbers). He certainly created fabulous melodies and had a firm grasp of instrumentation and orchestration. His experimentation was pretty original (Dhanno ki aankhon mein, chaand ka surma from Kitaab being a case in point). The pathos he actually creates in a racy club number – Sapna Mera Toot Gaya (Khel Khel Mein) is quite heartbreaking including how he joins in for just a couple of lines. An entire story unfolds for you in the song! That is something, no?
Yes he did give us crap too, but who has not churned out mediocre & unforgettabe stuff? Even Naushad has!
So while I completely respect Khaiyyam, Salil Chaudhary, Roshan, Madan Mohan, SDB etc., Pancham remains THAT music composer whose music I remember the most with an amazing amount of fondness.
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November 26, 2009 at 7:59 PM
I can’t argue with his range – he was able to come up with something like the magnificent Beeti Na Bitaayi Raina from Parichay.
I just find that a lot of his songs were just plain noisy. And yeah his experimentation was ‘novel’, but the end results I didn’t always find to be too impressive. Yes all composers came up with bad albums, but Pancham I think gave mostly bad music, with some great albums once in a while.
See, I think the 50’s and 60’s were the golden age of hindi film music, and the arrival of Burman seemed to put an end to this chapter. Laxmikant-Pyarelal perhaps were also part of this decline.
The magic that someone like Roshan created in each of his soundtracks like Bahu Begum, Bheegi Raat, Taj Mahal, Aarti, Mamta etc is completley undervalued whereas I feel those albums were magical. But maybe I just like ‘those kind of songs more’. People like Khaiyyam, Madan Mohan and Roshan Saab appreciated poetry and had high demands from their lyricists, and that came through in their songs.
All said, I agree, he was a genious, but certainly not one of my personal favourites 🙂
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November 26, 2009 at 9:03 PM
There have been plenty of great composers but Pancham was special.
Apart from range, his music had a certain classy quality which I never found in any other composer.
Even today’s successful composers are almost all huge Pancham fans.
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November 26, 2009 at 9:18 PM
I think LP or SJ must have given more hits but I think where RDB stands out is different/unconventional sounds.
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November 27, 2009 at 8:04 PM
The fact that today’s MD’s are huge fans of Pancham is perhaps not a good thing! Maybe if instead they idolised Madan Mohan we might get classier songs…
Def SJ and LP gave huge hits, but I don’t think either of them produced the quality of songs that the real masters did.
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March 30, 2013 at 8:33 AM
I have updated this older post from three years ago. I had forgotten about this till Bliss reminded me with this promo. But here’s the website:
http://panchamunmixed.shemaroo.com/
and it’s available even on Amazon:
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March 30, 2013 at 12:23 PM
Thanks Bliss and Satyam, will try and get a copy of this…
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May 15, 2013 at 2:39 PM
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