[quote=extenok,Jul 21 2005, 04:31 PM]
The Perfect Song: A Myth?Kisko Khabar Thi - DevdasSahir - S. D. BurmanWhat makes a song perfect? How does a song attain that state of perfection? What amount of time is spent in making a song sound perfect? I can't answer those questions nor can I explain the exact nature of perfection for a song. There is one thing I can do, which is to try and explain what makes a song perfect for me.
Four things: melodic music in keeping with the song's mood & feel, appeal of the tune, lyrics that mean something without sounding contrived and lastly, the singer's rendition.
In keeping with this thread's subject matter, I chose Talat Mahmood's song from Devdas, titled 'Kisko Khabar Thi'.
The mood & feel of the song are in line with the storyline, which requires the sound to be tragic, leaning towards mellowness. The flute use here is remarkable in between the lines. The background music is subtle, proving that less
is more!
The lyrics speak of defeat and failure, not in words that you would need a dictionary to understand, but in simple plain urdu, unadulterated by the poetic injustice meted out by some verbose & erudite poets. The language is simple, conveying one thing only - the character's despair.
The onus rests on the vocal chords of the singer, in the end, to bring together the music & the words. A song is alive when the words are written & the music is scored. But it's the singer's rendition that gives it a soul.
Here, Talat shines, delivering a controlled performance where others might have seemed hysteric. Talat instills an unexplainable poise & grace into the song. The pauses are timed to the millisecond, making this seem more like a controlled experiment than a song. But such are the tribulations of achieving perfection in creation!
Talat starts with '
hum jaisay', leaves it hanging in the air, short & suspended. Starts again, afresh, this time stretching '
jaisay' and doing the same at the end of '
barbaad dilon ka'. The thing to note here is that there is variation, but not too much - just enough. The pause between two words in the last line, again, adds effect & weight to the words being said. This is the culmination of the song, '
aaj teri ... mehfil se uthay ... kal, dunya se uthh jayeinge'.
It's magic when a simple musical instrument's use combines with the appropriate words and the singer's voice so effortlessly, gelling together to give you a masterpiece.
Behold,
perfection!
[/quote
You have selected a very apt song for developing the theme, "A perfect song"
Although I must confess that if I would have done a similar exercise, this song may not have been on top of my list. Here I may add that one could perhaps look for a perfect song under various moods and shades. I can think of the following moods / shades to describe the song selected by you. "pathos", "Melancholy" or plain "sadness". The two songs that readily come to my mind (I am certain, there are many more), which have the four qualities described by you, are "Dil Jalta Hai Toh Jalne De" the Mukesh Pathos from Pehli Nazar and the Geeta Dutt melancholy "Waqt Ne Kiya, Kya Haseen Sitam". Perhaps the only additional quality that I could add to Geeta's song is Guru Dutt's superb picturisation, which gives a totally different dimension to this ageless classic.
Pradeep