"A ghazal," says Jalota, "is much more than the technicality of couplets with a common radeef." Unlike a film song, which lacks variation, a ghazal tries to "capture the mood of the moment each time." Adds Aziz: "One has to maintain standards. The new class of ghazal listeners belongs to the nouveau riche and has no background and literary standard," he says. "When art becomes fashion, there is inevitable deterioration. Only how it is being said." He feels the literary standards of contemporary ghazals are abysmal. Says Hasan: "It is no longer important as to what is being said. Other ghazal writers of yore such as Daag, Momin and Jigar Moradabadi are also ignored.Įven recent poets of outstanding literary merit, including such all-time greats as Firaq Gorakhpuri, are seldom used. Ghalib's treasury of immortal ghazals is seldom tapped today, though one of his couplets, "Dil-e-nadan tujhe hua kya hai, akhri is dard ki dawa kya hai" became a super hit. Ghazals are an intensely personal expression of the poet and his master and it was only with Ghalib, during the reign of Bahadur Shah Zafar II, that ghazals came to be identified with particular poets. The ghazal was judged entirely on the poetry of the words and the depth of the emotion. This is sacrilegious to old timers who point out that when the ghazal was first imported from Persia by the poet Amir Khusro, there was no music at all. In fact, tunes are often selected first and words perfunctorily fitted in. Yet, many are upset that the tinkering has gone too far anyway. The cassette flopped miserably - an indication, claim other record companies, that the public will accept so much and no more of tinkering with the traditional pattern. The ultimate insult to the ghazal came from a private recording company which in a bid to cash in on the boom, brought out Disco Ghazal Cosmic Melody. The result is that a lot of amateurs who have no business being there have become professionals and are doing very well."
It is the done thing to sing ghazals and attend ghazal nites.
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Says she candidly: "Anything and everything is being palmed off as a ghazal and unfortunately the country seems full of fools who accept it. It's simple but lilting music" - now agrees that the popularisation has gone too far. It is difficult to differentiate between a ghazal and a qawwali any more.Ĭhitra, who along with Jagjit was one of the pioneers in popularising the ghazal - "It doesn't pay to be pedantic.
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Hasan Kamaal, a well-known poet who wrote the ghazals for the movie Nikaah says that today the ghazal has been brought to the level of the film song. Says Kohli: "Our aim was to popularise ghazals so that the vacuum created by the departure of melody from film music could be filled." As he sees it, the ghazal boom has raised the popular taste from the musically inferior film music.Ī number of purists, though, question the authenticity of much of what is being passed off today as ghazals. The legendary Begum Akhtar may have been accompanied by just a sarangi and a tabla, but now some ghazal singers are accompanied by a ten-piece orchestra at a concert and as many as 20 musicians for recordings.Įven instruments like the Spanish guitar and the saxophone have been adopted.
For more difficult Urdu, the meanings are helpfully provided on the record jacket. Lyrics have been simplified, tunes made more catchy. To woo the market, no effort has been spared. Chitra says: "It has become a status symbol for big businessmen to have a ghazal night for a wedding." Meanwhile, singers like Udhas and Jalota are often asked to record ghazals for films. Chitra and Jagjit Singh are among the few who refuse to entertain at such functions for any price. Not to be left behind, top industrialists vie with each other to get the best ghazal singers to perform at weddings and mundans. The big names can earn over Rs 5 lakh a month.
The rates for concerts range roughly from Rs 15,000 to Rs 45,000 for established artistes. And since the rewards can be enormous, a number of talented amateurs are keen to try out their luck.