With Muzaffar Ali at the helm, music in Jaanisaar had to be special. Each song of the film is well-crafted but two compositions sung by folk singer Malini Awasthi stand out. While “Teri qatili nigahon ne maara” is a thumri, “Tumko aane main, tumko bulane main” is a dadra and both are 100-year-old. What’s more is that they have not been recorded digitally but live in a studio with musicians on tabla, harmonium and saarangi. “To record free spirit genre of songs like thumri is tough digitally. This thumri required live recording and Muzaffar sahab immediately agreed to it. We had musicians playing instruments live in the studio which is not the trend because usually the songs are recorded on tracks,” says Malini, who rose to fame with reality music show Junoon on NDTV Imagine . She remembers having received a standing ovation for the same thumri there.
A disciple of Girija Devi, Malini sings in Awadhi, Bundelkhandi and Bhojpuri dialects. “It is one thing to incorporate an old composition and another to stay true to its originality. The composition is sung in just the traditional way. The composition starts in a different rhythm but with antara it takes a complete turn,” says the singer. She also sang a part of the song “Dil mera muft ka”, in Saif Ali Khan starrer Agent Vinod . In Chaar Footiya Chhokre featuring Seema Biswas and Soha Ali Khan, Malini sang one of her most popular folk numbers “Saiyaan mile larkaiyan”.
Jaanisaar is a period drama set in the time of freedom struggle. Malini says the writers of those times who penned such songs were incredible but didn’t even bother to take credit for it. “So we don’t know who wrote this thumri and dadra. ‘Teri qatili nigahon ne maara’ just fit into the situation because here Noor is learning the art of mujra and she is trying to do all the gestures. It is not that we haven’t had old thumris earlier in films. We had Begum Akhtar’s ‘Hamari atariya pe’ in Dedh Ishqiya but it had just so many instruments in it which diluted its real flavours. It needed very few instruments and that’s how we have treated these compositions in Jaanisaar ,” says the singer, who has been part of Muzaffar Ali’s Jahan-e-Khusrau festivals in the past.
How she came across these two compositions is an interesting story. She learnt the dadra “Tumko aane main tumko bulane main” from her guru, a doyenne of Banaras gharana who is lovingly addressed as ‘Appaji’ by her students. “It was my initial years when we were low on confidence and still figuring out things. So while going on concerts I would often ask her what to sing. It so happened, she was in Delhi with me when I received the invitation to sing in Karachi. Then she taught me this dadra because of the predominant Lucknowi flavours in it. She said as it has so many Urdu words, it will appeal to the audience there,” recalls the artiste adding that Girija Devi herself never sang it on stage because she wasn’t really sure of how these Urdu words would sound in her voice. She had also not learnt it properly but heard it from another singer and really liked it.
The thumri, Malini says, is a classic rendered by Kashi Bai. She found it in her old recordings gifted to her by a friend. “I am really happy that in this film we have been able to present two rare compositions in their real styles and only Muzaffar Ali sahab could have done it as he really understands the Awadh region, its music and its culture,” says Malini who has been trying to push the genre of folk songs through her concerts and albums. “Saiyan mile larkaiyaan”, a Bhojpuri folk song without which no concert of Malini’s is complete, has got one million hits on Youtube. “That too without any publicity. I think it is a wonderful sign.”
