#playback singer

Legendary film singer Asha Bhosle has died, age 92.

According to Guinness, the holder of the “most studio recordings” distinction, having done more than 12,000 songs in, inter alia, Hindi, Marathi, Bengali, Tamil, and Gujarati for films, Asha ji, as she was respectfully called by fans, was an unmistakable voice over eight decades of work.

Along with her sister and rival “India’s nightingale” Lata Mangeshkar, she defined playback singing, later working with Western acts such as Boy George and Gorillaz.

aav.

“Piya Tu Ab To Aaja”

“Dum Maro Dum”

Everybody's so worried they're gonna mess up oml- 🎸🪈🎹🥁🎤

Just as the fragrance of a flower has no colour, just as flowing water or a breeze have no boundaries, and just as the rays of a rising sun or a smile of an innocent child has no religious divide, so is the voice of Lata Mangeshkar - a true miracle of nature.

- Dilip Kumar

Lata Mangeshkar passed away on 6 February 2022.

Lata Mangeshkar, also known as the 'Nightingale of India', was one of the most versatile singers in the Indian film industry. Lata was born on September 28, 1929, to classical singer and theatre artist Pandit Deenanath Mangeshkar and Shevanti in Indore, Madhya Pradesh. Her father started teaching her music at an early age. By the time she was five, Lata was seen participating as an actress in plays written by her father. Her siblings  - Meena, Asha, Usha, and Hridaynath - are all accomplished singers and musicians. In a career spanning nearly eight decades,

Lata Mangeshkar was the singing voice for a bevy of Bollywood leading ladies. She lent her voice to over 5,000 songs in over a thousand Hindi and 36 regional films. She had an unprecedented impact on Indian film music. Since 1942, Lata pushed back the boundaries of music with her mind-boggling skills. Over the years, Lata had sung for actresses from Madhubala to Priyanka Chopra. Best known for her versatile voice quality, she recorded albums of all kinds (ghazals, pop, etc). When I was growing up in India as a child I listened to her songs a lot. Because she could be heard everywhere - on the buses, on the taxis, and on the streets - she was hard to ignore. All my Indian school friends and I would listen to her latest songs even if we would quickly forget from which Bollywood movie it came from. She was the voice of the whole of the Indian subcontinent. They may fight each other for political reasons but all South Asians were united in their appreciation of her songs which invoked feelings across the emotional spectrum from sadness to joy.

(via SP Balasubrahmanyam, Indian Film Music Legend, Dead at 74 | Pitchfork)