Vintage Favourites - Part 1

Vintage Favourites - Part 2

Vintage Favourites - Part 3

Vintage Favourites - Part 4

1. Ashok Kumar

2. Juthika Roy?

3. Saraswati Devi

4. Surendra

5. Pankaj Mullick

6. Ashok Kumar

7. Pankaj Mullick

8. Probably Kanan Devi?

9. Probably Khursheed Begum?

10. Shamshad Begum

11. Noor Jehan

12. K.L. Saigal

13. Suraiya

14. ?

Also help me identify two more unknown singers from black and white era.

Who is she?

Who is she and the guy next to her?

Kanan Devi

Actress and singer; started with the name Kananbala. Debut as child actress in Joydev (1926). Later contracted to Radha Films where she acted in Jyotish Bannerjee films (e.g. Manmoyee Girls’ School). P.C. Barua was unable to obtain her for the role of Paro in Devdas (1935) but she played the lead in his next film, Mukti (1937), which made her a star and launched her long association with New Theatres. The success of Vidyapati, esp. her duets with K.C. Dey, made her the top star of this studio from 1937-40. An untrained singer when she entered films, she later studied briefly with Ustad Allah Rakha at Lucknow. Employed as singer at Megaphone Gramophone receiving further training from Bhishmadev Chatterjee, possibly responsible for her distinctive Bengali style. Later learnt Rabindra Sangeet with Anadi Dastidar. She considered Rai Chand Boral to be her real teacher. One of the few New Theatres lead players not to have a stage background, her impact on Bengali film paralleled Shanta Apte’s on Marathi cinema, departing from proscenium frontality and privileging synchronous speech. Her singing style, usually in rapid tempo, is still identified with some of the biggest studio era hits (esp. Vidyapati, Street Singer, ,Sapurey). Resigned from New Theatres (1941) and freelanced in Bengali and Hindi films. Turned producer with Shrimati Pics (1949); later launched the Sabhyasachi collective with the film Ananya (cf. Ajoy Kar). Wrote an autobiography, Sabare Ami Nomi (1973). The Marxist economist and noted columnist Ashok Mitra took her as an example to comment on the elitism of pre-Independence Calcutta society in his ‘Calcutta Diary’ (Economic and Political Weekly, 1-8 August 1992), describing her ‘Eliza Doolittle’ transformation from the illegitimate Kananbala into the glamorous Kanan Devi, stardom and her first marriage to the brother- in-law of the economist Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis making her a member of Calcutta’s cultural elite.

Listen!

Ae chand chup na jana , Singer – Kanan Devi, Music – Kamal Das Gupta, Film – Jawab, Year –1942