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ALL TIME GREATS

A legacy of unparalleled work

Lata Mangeshkar turns 80
Lata Mangeshkar, the greatest Indian songstress of all time, turns 80 today (September 28). Like a flash of lightening, she illuminated a musical world on the verge of change in 1949 and it has never been the same since.
Every singer for the past six decades has been singing in the space charted by Lata's voice. Great singing, unlike good singing, is an experience of beauty laced with pity, a haunted happening in the shadow of our transience. And rarely has a singer symbolised this experience as Lata has over the last several decades.
Today, when the wider soundscape of India is as chaotically rich as that of any western nation with experimental music, indie-rock shows soaked in hipster attitude, pop idols cavorting on HD monitors, innumerable winners emerging from the ceaseless reality singing competitions, a demure woman in a white sari still manages to capture the attention of the subcontinent every time she sings or even speaks.
Her achievements are so gargantuan that even if she had stopped singing after the first 15 years of her career. Indian music would still be in her everlasting debt. Yet Lata continued to work at an extraordinary high level of artistic achievement.
Lata's artistic genius lies in her making singing seem so effortless The most difficult of the ragas and the highest of the scales - Lata reaches with a serenity that would be bewildering even for a classical master She is often criticised for not being versatile enough, like her sister Asha Bhosle.
Us the critics, however, who seem out of touch with her reper-
toire -- Aa Ja Jaane Ja, one of the finest cabaret numbers; Woh Ik Nigah Kya Mill where she sings like a soprano; Ehsan Tera Hoga Mujh Par and Mere Naina Sawan Bhadon where she sings at a scale used only for male voices; Aye Dilruba wherelhe sings an Arabic tune flawlessly in high octave; innumerable songs that she sang for C Ramachandran and Salil
Chaudhury In the western idiom. If this is not versatility, then the term has lost its meaning.
The songs sung by Lata become "Lata songs" -- her genius is overpowering enough to take the credit away from the music composers though her humility may prevent her from sayingso.
It's often said that Lata monopolised the Hindi film music
and did not allow others to grow under her shadow. But it's the music composers who monopolised her, and reserved their best compositions for her.
A biography of hers in early 1990s confidently predicted the end of the Lata era. Little did the biographer realise that Lata was just on the verge of giving the Indian film music some of its greatest hits ever.
At a time when mediocrity is running amok in the Indian film music industry and where anyone who can open his or her mouth is declared to be the next big singing sensation, Lata's presence alone provides a measure of sanity by making listeners realise what true artistry actually means.
Lata has enjoyed the love and respect of her countrymen and women like no other artiste in the last six decades. But what she hasn't been duly recognised for is her contribution as a crusader for the rights of playback singers.
She single-handedly took on the male-dominated Hindi film music establishment on a range of issues --from insisting that records should cany the name of the singers to forcing the Filmfare Awards to recognise the contribution of playback singers to fighting for the royalties with the Indian music companies.
She has championed the cause of women in film and music industry by standing so tall above all others where even giants like Rafi and Kishore Kumar had to contend with Lata's primacy. Nowhere else has a woman so dominated an industry as Lata has with the share power ofherartistic achievement
Compiled by Cultural Correspondent