Book Review: “Soulfully Yours – Ravi”

Soulfully Yours: Ravi
Author: Manek Premchand
Published by: Blue Pencil, Delhi 2025
ISBN: 978-81-943921-4-9
Price: ₹675 (Paperback on Amazon); Pages: 455

The regulars of this blog are well-informed about old film music. How do we view Ravi? I have been quite open about my assessment of him. I don’t put him in the top 5 surely, which comprises: Naushad, C Ramchandra, Shankar-Jaikishan, SD Burman and OP Nayyar. My next 5 would start with Roshan, Madan Mohan and Chitragupta. Thereafter, it becomes very crowded: Khayyam, Hemant Kumar, Salil Chowdhury, Jaidev, Kalyanji-Anandji. So Ravi would fit in my ranking at # 11-15. I believe that was the general view, until Hans Jakhar rehabilitated him on SOY through his series of guest articles.

Manek Premchand starts his biography of Ravi, titled “Soulfully Yours: Ravi” with precisely this Ravi paradox in his article, Overview: Composer Ravi – The Man, and His Music. Giving a long list of his superhit parade, including some timeless songs, he poses a question, “Why this paradox, where Ravi’s music shines, but his name fades?” Then he proceeds to answer it in a unique psychoanalytical way: it is the gap between his Average Joe life and his vibrant compositions. He was self-effacing to a fault, he shunned limelight; away from publicity or marketing himself. He let his music speak for his talent. His simple name of two letters was an extension of his personality. There is nothing flashy or star-like in his name, and there was nothing flashy or signature style about his music. Contrast this with the year-end article on OP Nayyar – the man was flashy as was his music.

An amusing aside which corroborates this point. Manekji recently sent me a message “I have asked my publisher to send you a copy of my newest book, Soulfully Yours Ravi”. The publisher did mention the author, but she forgot to give the book’s name. Therefore, I took it as Manekji signing off with a salutation. So, I innocently replied, “Ravi? I thought you are known as Manek Premchand.” I am sure Manekji didn’t realise that my fleeting reading caused this grave faux pas. It is only the Average Joe name like Ravi which could have caused this misunderstanding that someone could use it as his nom de plume.

In the next chapter Ravi: Composer, Lyricist, Singer, the author examines the Ravi question deeper, and mentions how Ravi’s superlative music was behind the success of many films, in which many others got the Filmfare Award, such as the Best Singer, Best Leading Man or Lady, Best Movie, but he didn’t for the Best Music Director. In several years he got nominated, but finally another person got it. When he did get his first Filmfare Award for Gharana (1961) for the Best Music, some of us dismissed it as a “Sleeper Award” or were surprised, Ravi?.  The world does not remember a runner-up. In recent Messi mania in India, along with him were also Luis Suarez and Rodrigo D Paul, being pushed around by the crowd.

His next chapter, Taking a Close Look at Ravi’s Top 100 Hindi Film Songs, is in many ways the meat of the book. I was curious to find if two of my top favourite Rafi songs figure in the list. Both Na jhatko zulf se paani ye moti phoot jayenge/ Tumhara kuchh na bigadega magar dil toot jayenge (Shehnai, 1964) and Ye jhuke jhuke naina, ye lat balkhati to dil kyun na mera deewana ho tera (Bharosa, 1963) were missing from the top 100 list. This can mean only two things: There cannot ever be an agreed list of top 100 songs, or Ravi’s work is so huge that even top 100 songs cannot accommodate someone’s top two Rafi favourites.  Manek ji next proceeds to analyse each song in detail, its lyrics, music arrangement, significance of the raag Ravi has chosen etc. This section also lets him coin some interesting phrases. The readers of this blog are aware from my reviews of his earlier books that Manek ji is quite a wordsmith; and in this chapter his poetic instincts are in full flow. While discussing Aage bhi jaane na tu, peechhe bhi jaane na tu – and he includes several songs from Waqt (1963) – he coins a phrase The Tyranny of Time. There are other metaphors which I like, for example Wounds That Time Could Not Heal; A Poetic Mermaid in a Murder Mystery; The Architecture of Letting Go; Shadows of the Past; Smiling Through Sorrow and so on. In this chapter Manek ji also briefly dwells on the difference between a ghazal and other forms of Urdu poetry, such as a nazm. It needs to be said again and again that not every song that uses Urdu words predominantly is a ghazal.

We all have our own list of BHNW (Better Heard, Not Watched) songs. My own favourite Ye jhuke jhuke naina, ye lat balkhati, is a prime example of a BHNW song. A comprehensive analysis of 100 songs also lets the author mention several trivia and information. For example, how many are aware that Tally Ho (in Baar baar dekho, hazar baar dekho; China Town) has its origin in the British fox-hunting tradition? Manekji also briefly refers to the episode of misattribution of the lyricist of Darshan do Ghanshyam meri ankhiyan pyasi re in the multiple Oscars awarded film, Slumdog Millionaire. The lyricist is not Surdas, but the Hindi poet Gopal Singh ‘Nepali’ (Film Narsi Bhagat, 1957, music director Ravi). Manek ji also offers a possible reason for confusion – The Bhakti poet Surdas (16^th century) had written a bhajan, Ankhiyan Hari darshan ki pyasi, with similar thoughts. But Nepali’s lyrics and Manna Dey’s rendering of Darshan do Ghanshyam are too good to be mauled by sloppy research.

Ravi was a master of ghazals. Manek ji has listed over 60 film ghazals, some sung in qawwali style (with rhythmic clapping added, such as Sharma ke ye sab pardanasheen aanchal ko sanwara karte hain). But the most interesting information in Ghazals Composed by Ravi is that he has set about two dozen non-film ghazals too of Mirza Ghalib for Doordarshan (1989-90). The piano has been visually featured by many music directors beautifully on the screen. Ravi is an important composer of piano songs. The author gives a list of over twenty such songs. There are some more chapters dissecting songs on different parameters: Title songs, Lori songs, Ravi’s Parodies, Mujra songs, Qawwali songs etc.

The last 160 pages would be a delight for statisticians and data lovers. These give Ravi’s Filmography with songs – films in a year are listed alphabetically, and songs in a film too appear alphabetically. This seems to me a more convenient approach. Also given are Ravi Stats with Lyricists and Poets; Ravi as a Singer; Ravi as a Lyricist; Alphabetical Song List; Ravi’s Non-film Compositions. Such huge data set is bound to throw up some interesting information. One knew that Ravi also wrote lyrics, but lyricist for 69 songs is a startling figure. Ravi gave Lata Mangeshkar less than one-fourth of the songs he composed for Asha Bhosle. Our Data Man, Hans Jakhar had hinted about Ravi’s preference for the younger sister over the mighty empress. Now I would be on the lookout for such evidence in case of N Datta, who according to him showed even more pronounced preference for Asha Bhosle.

Thus, overall this book does full justice to Ravi, which I believe was Manek ji’s primary objective. Are there any flaws in the book? I have to be really quibbling over small things. I believe Manek ji has been lazy in explaining the ‘ghazal’ as a popular form of Urdu poetry. This is what he says:

The lines of the first couplet end in AA
The lines of the second couplet end in BA
The lines of the third couplet end in CA
The lines of the fourth couplet end in DA
And so on

His illustration and explanation make it further clear that in the first couplet both the lines end with the same group of words (Humradeef). Second couplet onwards the first line has to be completely odd, such as B, C, D, but the second line of each couplet ends with the same group of words, i.e Humradeef. So far so good, but another important feature of a ghazal which lends it a charm is that the immediately preceding word (or group of words) before the Humradeef (A) has to be rhyming, i.e. Humqafia. For instance in the example given by Manek ji, Bhari duniya mein aakhir dil ko samjhane kahan jaayen, the humqafia words in the ghazal are before ‘A’ – samjhane, deewane, parwane, afsane, sukoon paane etc. Take another example of a ghazal by Shakeel Badayuni himself, but now composed by Naushad (Amar, 1954) – Na milta gham to barbaadi ke afsane kahan jaate/ Agar duniya chaman hoti to veerane kahan jaate. Look at the rhyming words (Humqafia) before the repeating words (Humradeef) Kahan jaate: Agar hoote sabhi apne to bagane kahan jaate/ Na jalti shamma mehfil mein to parwane kahan jaate/ Zamane bhar ke aage haath failane kahan jaate). I would rewrite Manek ji’s explanation as follows:

The lines of the first couplet end in Q1A-Q2A
The lines of the second couplet end in B-Q3A
The lines of the third couplet end in C-Q4A
The lines of the fourth couplet end in D-Q5A
And so on
(Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4, Q5 are the rhyming words preceding the ‘A’.)