Retro music lovers and the legion of his loyal ardent fans celebrated the 80th birth anniversary of legendary composer-singer R D Burman (Pancham-da) on June 27th). A little-known fact is that revered Bollywood director Mahesh Bhatt has also worked with the maverick genius Pancham-Da when the latter scored music for two of his movies ‘Vishwasghaat’ (1976) and ‘Naya Daur’ (1978).
In his exclusive ‘past-forward’ epilogue written for this memoirs book “R D BurMania“ authored by this senior film-journalist (Chaitanya Padukone) the articulate Bhatt vividly recalls his association with music-wizard Burman.
“At the song-sittings, there was no grappling for tunes or any labored air around RDB—quality-music flow came to him so easily,” emphasizes Bhatt who has his candid analysis.
“In success-centric showbiz, which generally disowns even legends going through that ‘no-longer-saleable’ phase, that same person is ‘glorified’, soon after as he is ‘no more’. Apparently, it’s easier to ‘deify’ legends, who have departed from this world. A ‘winner’ is a loser--who refuses to give up. And with his sterling scores of ‘1942-A Love Story’, composer R D Burman with his enduring brilliance emerged a ‘winner’. Call it a brutal irony of fate, that he was no longer around to witness his own return to supremacy, amidst deafening reverberating applause,” recalls the outspoken Bhatt wistfully.