Aarti Mukherji

Aarti Mukherji (also known as Aarti Mukherjee or Arati Mukhopadhyay) is a Bengali playback singer who has also sung in Hindi films such as Geet Gata Chal (1975), Tapasya (1976), Manokamana and Masoom (1983).

Born into a musical family with a rich, cultural and musical heritage, she was initiated into music at a very early age by her mother. Subsequently, her melodious voice and abundant musical talent were honed under the tutelage of Shri Susheel Banerjee, Ustaad Mohammed Sagiruddin Khan, Pandit Chinmoy Lahiri, Pandit Laxman Prasad Jaipurwale and Pandit Ramesh Nadkarni, who helped her develop a wide repertoire of light as well as classical music. She is a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party.^[1]

Early life

Aarti Mukherji was born in c. 1943 in West Bengal, India. She belongs to a Bengali speaking family. In a TV show called "Dadagiri" she recollected memories of her early days. She stated there that she once got an opportunity to sing in the "All India Music Talent Programme" in 1955, when she was merely a 14 or 15 years old teenage girl who had streams of dreams to go to Bombay and match the height of fame as Lataji. Arati Mukhopadhyay was trained in Indian Classical Music from a young age. She sang primarily for Bengali films. She won the music contest, "Metro-Murphy Contest", where the judges were music directors like Anil Biswas, Naushad, Vasant Desai and C. Ramchandra. This paved way for a career as a playback singer.^[2] she got her first break in 1958 Hindi film sahara starring Meena Kumari, but the music of that film was not so successful. After a string of flop films like girl friend(which starred Waheeda Rehman), she decided to examine herself to Bengali films. She played back for the first time in a Bengali film called "kanya" in 1962. Her outstanding versatility and nice-pitched voice infatuated people so much that they started losing attention to erstwhile leading singer Sandhya Mukherjee. Her voice and singing style was not only different from Sandhya, but also was better than her. In the late 1960s, her voice was used to be on-screen voice of leading actress Suchitra Sen, instead of Sandhya Mukherji. In 1966, she sang in the film "Golpo Holeo Sotyi", which earned her BFJA Award for Best Female Playback Singer. In 1976, she restored the award for the film "Chhutir Phande". She lent her voice for the leading actresses of the late sixties till eighties such as Madhabi Mukherji, Sharmila Tagore, Aparna Sen, Debashri Roy, Tanuja etc. She along with Asha Bhosle took leading spot in the 1970s, gradually replacing Sandhya. It is considered to be the cause behind the decline of a flamboyant career of sandhyaji. she sang two songs in the rakhee starrer film tapasya in 1976. The first song being 'bacche ho tum khel khilone' and a duet with kishore kumar entitled 'do panchi do tinke', which was popular. She is rumoured to have sung 15000 songs in Bengali as well as Hindi songs to her credit. She continued success in the seventies that inspired her to try her fate in Bollywood once again. It was R. D. Burman, who was the mentor of Bengali singers who would later give Kumar Sanu, Abhijeet and Andrew Kishore their first breaks in Bollywood. In 1983, He gave her to sing the melodious song "Do naina aur ek kahani" in the film Masoom as the voice of Shabana Azmi. The song was a chartbuster and even lilted today. It earned her Filmfare award for best female playback singer in 1983. Her popular repertoires include 'Radha banshi chara janena','Ek boishakhe dekha holo dujonar','Ei mon jochonay pa dubiye','ja ja behaya pakhi jana','na de de da, tu na tum','tokhon tomar ekush bochor bodhoy'. She also has a number of famous non-film songs to her credit. She lent her voice to a number of Hindi compositions as well.

Career

In the year 1957, while still in school, she bagged the first prize in the All-India Murphy Metro Music contest held in Mumbai having been adjudged the best singer by leading music directors of that time such as Anil Biswas, Naushad Ali, Vasant Desai, C. Ramchandra and Madan Mohan.

Arati commenced her musical journey in films with the Bengali film ‘Subarna Rekha’ and Hindi film ‘Angulimaal’ and has, since then, sung thousands of songs in Bengali, Oriya, Manipuri, Assamese, Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi and other languages. She was first awarded the prestigious Bengal Film Journalists Association Award in 1965 for Best Female Singer and went on to receive it several times over the following years. Among other reputed awards and titles, she received the Miyan Tansen award of Sur Singar Samsad for her songs in the films ‘Geet Gata Chal’ and the Gujarat State Government Awards for three consecutive years for her Gujarati film songs. She has also received a Filmfare award for her song in the film ‘Masoom.’

Apart from films, Arati has bewitched audiences with numerous records, discs, albums and live performances on television and stage of Rabindra Sangeet and Nazrul Geeti. Her versatility as an artist can be seen in diverse genres of music like Thumri, Bhajan, Tappa, Tarana and Ghazal. She has performed widely and extensively in India and throughout the world in renowned places like Royal Albert Hall in 1977 and Madison Square Garden in 2004. She recently received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Orissa Government in 2015 and from Times of India Group in 2016.

Discography

Popular Songs:

• "Do Panchhi Do Tinke"
• "Kabhi Kuchch Pal Jeevan Ke"
• "Do Naina, Ek Kahani"
• "Bolo Na Bolo Na Soi"
• "Prajapati Sethay Ghore"
• "Kon Kule Aaj Bhirlo Tari"
• "Swapna Niye"
• "Sujyi Alo De"
• "Anugatajane Keno Karo Eto"
• "Tokhon Tomar Ekush Bosor"
• "Ei Mom Jochonay Ongo Vijiye"
• "Sara Mora Kajra Churaya Tu Ne" ( with Rafi -Do Dil - 1965)

Awards

She won the National Film Award as well as Filmfare Award as Best Female Playback Singer Award for the song "Do naina" in Shekhar Kapur's Masoom. BFJA Award for Best Female Playback Singer- 1976 for the film "Chhutir Phande" BFJA Award for Best Female Playback Singer- 1967 for the filkm "Golpo Holeo Satyi"

References

External links

• Aarti Mukherji on IMDb
• Aarti Mukherji at Bollywood Hungama
• "Aarti Mukherjee on Calcuttaweb". Archived from the original on 13 February 2009. Retrieved 16 February 2009.