A Tribute To Kaviraj Shailendra
A song or more specifically a Hindi film song is created by three principal departments - the song writing, the music composition and the singing. Among them it is the former that is arguably the least celebrated. The person in charge of this department is usually referred to as the lyricist. Today the times are different. A music director or a lyricist can easily reach out to his fans on social media and they can benefit from getting to interact with them. It wasn't always like that. With the advent of television certain lyricists such as Javed Akhtar and to a lesser extent Gulzar did become household names. However what about the lyricists who were pivotal in building what is fondly recalled as the golden era of Hindi film music? How many of them are really well known? People may recall the name of the movie and the actress/actress a song was picturised on. They would mostly know who has sung it. Great singers like Mohammed Rafi, Kishore Kumar, Mukesh, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosl...