Tag Archives: Asha Bhosle

Ten Singers, Ten Duets: The Timelessness of Asha Bhonsle

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(Apologies for the hiatus, the result of a series of unavoidable circumstances). 

Last month, when I posted a solos list as a tribute to Asha Bhonsle, a couple of blog readers asked me if I would be posting one (or more) follow-up posts. After all when Lata Mangeshkar passed away, I ended up publishing five posts, a total of fifty songs showcasing the solos Lata had sung with fifty different music directors or music director pairs. Surely Asha merited something similar? Yes, indeed she does, but I personally think Asha’s most stunning solos were sung for a handful of composers like OP Nayyar and SD Burman during the 1950s and 60s. She did sing songs for a wide range of music directors, but I find a lot of those songs relatively forgettable.

I decided therefore to focus this post on another aspect of Asha’s career: her duets: Romantic, funny, flirtatious, poignant—and so much more. Songs where her voice merged with that of a co-singer to create magic.

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Ten Composers, Ten Solos: The Magic of Asha Bhonsle

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I know I am late. Asha Bhonsle passed away, at the age of 92, on April 12. Within a couple of hours of the news of her death, there were tributes cropping up all across the net. Song lists, essays, memories, some misplaced attempts to jump on the bandwagon even if one wasn’t too sure what the fuss was about.

I am late, yes. I have to admit I was a little benumbed—Asha has always been one of my very favourite singers (dare I be an iconoclast and admit that I liked her more than Lata?). But more than that, she symbolized for me an older, sweeter time: an era of kinder films, gentler films, of sublime music and innocence. Asha was the last of the stalwarts, the last one standing of those who had created the magic of the 50s and 60s.

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Book Review: Raju Bharatan’s Asha Bhosle: A Musical Biography

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At the risk of being labelled an iconoclast and being trolled by diehard Lata fans, I have mentioned several times on this blog how much I like Asha Bhonsle. It’s not that I don’t like Lata: I do, very much, and there are many, many songs of hers that I cannot imagine anyone else singing, or singing better than she does. But when I think of Asha, of Aage bhi jaane na tu and Saba se yeh keh do and Yehi woh jagah hai… I cannot help but think that Asha is too often unfairly dismissed as being second to her Didi.

So, when I was offered a chance to review Raju Bharatan’s Asha Bhosle: A Musical Biography (Hay House Publishers India Pvt Ltd, ₹599, 332 pages), I jumped at it. (If you want to read a shorter and more tactful review, read the one I wrote for The New Indian Express, here).

Raju Bharatan's 'Asha Bhosle: A Musical Biography'

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