Lata and her sister Asha have dominated the industry in such a way that they did not allow any new female singers. Lata would boycott any producer who dared to choose a new singer. She also used to threaten her male counterparts like Rafi and Kishore Kumar, if they worked with any other new singers. The domination was such that Lata would sing all the classical compositions and Asha would sing the western numbers.
The only singer who challenged Lata was Anuradha Paudwal, of course not with much success. Anuradha had openly criticized Lata for indulging in monopoly. This created problems for her as music directors started avoiding her, because of you-know-whom. Finally, in the nineties, producers got fed up of her and went for new talent like Alka Yagnik and Kavitha. Thus ended the monopoly.
The only singer who challenged Lata was Anuradha Paudwal, of course not with much success. Anuradha had openly criticized Lata for indulging in monopoly. This created problems for her as music directors started avoiding her, because of you-know-whom. Finally, in the nineties, producers got fed up of her and went for new talent like Alka Yagnik and Kavitha. Thus ended the monopoly.
I want to stress a couple of points here.
- Noted that Lata is a talent, this does not give her the right to spoil the career of other female singers.
- What is the use of such a talent, who will not guide anyone, not let other budding talent to try their luck?
With all the money, and most of it earned through threatening and soft extortion, this lady has built a hospital, to earn more money! I hope through the right way. And now, she threatens to move to Dubai, if the Peddar road flyover goes above her house and spoils her balcony view. All I can say is Bye Bye Lata.
2. The second is our own Kishore Kumar who came to Bollywood to become a renowned singer, but ended as both a great actor and a very renowned singer.
He came to Bollywood to get a break in singing, but was rejected because he did not have any formal training in music. He managed to bag some acting roles with his brother, Ashok Kumar 's help.
Its said that Kishore did not have any interest in acting, so he would just make silly faces in front of the camera, so that he would get rejected! But the audience loved him and the rest is history. Its also rumored that he tried direction at a later point in his life to show loss and avoid income tax. His movie Chalti ka naam gaadi was supposed to be a flop.
An amusing character that he is, his wikipedia page talks in length about his histrionics.
An amusing character that he is, his wikipedia page talks in length about his histrionics.
All said and done, he was one of the best actors and singer that Bollywood ever had.
5 comments:
First of all congratulations on showing the courage to write so strongly against Lataji. There are a few names against whom writing is a taboo; lata-asha,amitabh bachchan to name a few. If were to delve deep (i can, as music is my forte, at least I feel so), Anuradha Paudwal happened a little later. Your take on Lataji's domination to the extent of being unscrupulously monopolistic is true. It stared with supressing a very talented singer, who was actually contemprary to her, Suman Kalyanpur. In stead of all this I feel being generous is a good thing to have and not a must have.
Coming to Kishore Kumar, the kind of versatile persona he had . You were right in saying that he got a few roles courtesy his elder brother. Kishore, the singer, was never encouraged by Ashok Kumar. A look at Kishore Kumar's only interview will reveal more. Coincidentally, the interviewer was none other than...Lata Mangeshkar
@Amit: Wow, I did not know this stuff. Thanks for sharing. You are right that being generous is a good thing to have and not a must. When it comes to Lata, her voice and her persona overshadows all her shortcomings as a person. In the end, all that matters is that she is a legend and will continue to be one and ya I too love to listen to her!
Kishore, as I said before, is one of the best talents that Hindi cinema ever had.
thats really shocking though..thanks for sharing.
wow ! intersting !
Happy to have found your Masakali blog. I will read the posts at leisure. And yes, I am in your followers list.
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