And the Award for the Best Music Director goes to?

The year 1943 was like 1944 in many respects. Kismet became a cult hit for its novel theme; it also happened to have outstanding music by Anil Biswas. Anil Biswas also gave some excellent music in Hamari Baat. Naushad didn’t have a Rattan (1944) exactly, but he gave music to three films – Namaste, Kanoon and Sanjog – and all the three celebrated silver jubilees. Towering above all these, KL Saigal, Khursheed-starrer Tansen became a musical masterpiece, composed by Khemchand Prakash. Ram Rajya, composed by Shankar Rao Vyas had some songs which have acquired iconic status. New Theatres maintained their quality with Kashinath (Pankaj Mullick) and Wapas (RC Boral). There were several others making a mark, such as Kamal Dasgupta, Shyam Sundar, Pt. Govind Ram, Vasant Desai and Rafiq Ghaznavi. For lovers of music of the vintage era, these are familiar names and they have acquired a place in the Roll of Honour.

In such a wide filed it is impossible to come up with agreed best male solos, female solos, and duets but I have been putting up Wrap Up 1, Wrap Up 2 and Wrap Up 3 respectively for the three categories. Even with a number of ‘Special songs’ in addition to the best ten in each category, I am not entirely satisfied that I have done full justice to throw a broad-sweep flashlight on the music of 1943. These can be seen as the best efforts at harmonising different choices, looking at popularity, quality and shelf-life of the songs. These Wrap Ups are an important outcome of these reviews.

Some readers have enthusiastically participated in the discussions enhancing our knowledge significantly. Arunkumar Deshmukh’s choice for the best music director is Anil Biswas for Kismet. Anup’s choice for the best is Khemchand Prakash for Tansen. So is Gaddeswarupji’s. Mahesh’s choice for the best music director is Anil Biswas for Kismet. Pramod Godble goes for two choices for the best MD, Anil Biswas for Kismet and Khemchand Prakash for Tansen. Neeruahaf, too, votes for Khemchand Prakash for Tansen. Thus, the general choice for the best music director veered between Khemchand Prakash and Anil Biswas.

Let me give a consolidated Table of the ten best songs in each of the three categories: Best Male Solos (Wrap Up 1), Best Female Solos (Wrap Up 2) and Best Duets of the year (Wrap Up 3). This gives a quantitative picture of the songs that made the most impact and are remembered till today, with their respective music directors. Let us see how this picture looks.

Consolidated list of the Best Male Solos, Female Solos and Duets of 1943

Rank	Best male solos	Best female solos	Best duets
1	Din soona suraj bina, chanda bin rain..Diya jalaao, jagmag jagmag diya jalaao (Khemchand Prakash	Ab tere siwa kaun mera Krishna Kanhaiya (Anil Biswas)	1-2. More balapaan ke sathi chhaila bhool jaiyo na  (Khemchand Prakash)
2	Bina pankh ka panchhi hun main (Khemchand Prakash)	Aye bhi wo gaye bhi wo khatm fasana ho gaya (Naushad)	1-2. Dheere dheere aa re baadal (Anil Biswas)
3	Neend hamari khwab tumhare kitne meethe kitne pyare (Shaym Sundar)	Beena madhur madhur kachhu bol (Shankar Rao Vyas)	Hum aisi kismet ko kya kahein haye, jo ek din hansaaye ek din rulaaye (Anil Biswas)
4	Kaahe guman kare ri gori (Khemchand Prakash)	Ghata ghanghor ghor more machave shor more sajan aa ja  (Khemchand Prakash)	Aao ri suhagan naari mangal gaao ri (Shankar Rao Vyas)
5	Baag laga dun sajni (Khemchand Prakash)	Barso re kaare baadarwa piya bin barso (Khemchand Prakash)	Bharat ki ek sannari ki hum katha sunaate hain (Shankar Rao Vyas)
6	Bhai bhaj le Shri Bhagwan (Vasant Desai)	Papiha re mere piya se kahiyo jaay (Anil Biswas)	Jeevan hai bekar bina tumhare (RC Boral)
7	Tumne mujhse prem jatakar duniya se begana kiya (RC Boral)	Shabnam kyun neer bahaye (Khursheed Anwar)	Bhool na jana aaj ki baatein (RC Boral)
8	Sabr-o-qaraar chheen ke ankhen chura gaye  (Pt. Govind Ram)	Ek tum ho ek main hun ek nadi ka kinara ho (Naushad)	Gori baanke nayan se chalave jadua (Pt. Govind Ram)
9	Preet ki jyot jalakar chup hain (Khemchand Prakash)	Manwa kaahe phir tadpaye  (RC Boral)	More raja ki oochi atariya  (C Ramchandra)
10	Dil-e-nadan tujhe hua kya hai (Chhannalal Naik)	Zara nainon se naia milaye jaao re more baanke raseele sanwariya (Kamal Dasgupta)	Saajan ke naina jaadu baan main wari jaaun  (Rafiq Ghaznavi)

We can now present the same table music director-wise as follows:

Music directors of 1943 having most number of the Best Songs

Sl No.	Music Director	Male solos	Female solos	Duets	Total
1	Khemchand Prakash	5	2	1	8
2	Anil Biswas	–	2	2	4
3	RC Boral	1	1	2	4
4	Shankar Rao Vyas	–	1	2	3
5	Naushad	–	2	–	2
6	Govind Ram	1	–	1	2
7	Chhannalal Naik	1	–	–	1
8	C Ramchandra	–	–	1	1
9	Kamal Dasgupta	–	1	–	1
10	Khursheed Anwar	–	1	–	1
11	Rafiq Ghaznavi	–	–	1	1
12	Shyam Sundar	1	–	–	1
13	Vasant Desai	1	–	–	1
	Total	10	10	10	30

The above Table shows the rank of music directors in terms of the number of their songs in the three best lists:

Khemchand Prakash:    8
Anil Biswas:                     4
RC Boral:                          4
Shankar Rao Vyas:         3

This follows the popular choice. The surprising part is the Khemchand Prakash overtakes Anil Biswas by a factor of two. Khursheed was at her very best in Tansen, 

And the SOY Award for the Best Music Director of 1943 goes to:
1. Khemchand Prakash for Tansen

As the year-wise review for 1943 comes to an end, it is time to thank all the readers for their participation, and special thanks again to Arunji for sharing his notes about the year.

The post Best songs of 1943: Wrap Up 4 first appeared on Songs Of Yore.