Editorial
Manna Dey in our midst
His songs have always touched the soul
THERE is always a certain joy in music, in partaking of it as well as participating in it. And when the maker of such music is Manna Dey, it is a whole world of melody that opens up before those who believe that music and poetry and song are all. Nothing else is. That is a lesson we have learnt once again with the legendary artiste's latest visit to Bangladesh. Coming as it does at a time when we in this country recall once more the young men who sacrificed their lives in defence of the Bangla language, Dey's trip is a fitting tribute to that our glorious saga. Manna Dey, it may be recalled, has made music in a number of South Asian languages, notably Bangla, Urdu and Hindi.
Coffee House-er shei adda ta is now part of our musical folklore. And so are o amar mon Jamuna tumi onek jotno kore amaye dukkho dite cheyechho. One could go on and on about the repertory that is peculiarly Dey's. Travel back, if you will, to some of the more illustrious numbers he crooned back in the 1960s in Urdu. For a generation that is today in its mid-fifties, tu pyar ka sagar hai remains as devotional a song as it is an evocation of love. Speaking of love, though, how can one not remember that Pushto-touched song, picturised on Balraj Sahni — ae meri Zohra jabeen tujhe maloom nehi tu abhi tak hai haseen aur main jawan? For Manna Dey comes of a generation that firmed itself on sheer musicality, in the being of Mohammad Rafi, Talat Mehmood, Mukesh, Hemonto Mukhopadhyaya and so many others. There lies cause for our happiness. And yet there is sadness once you recall that among all that club of the great and the good in the poetry of music, Manna Dey remains the last survivor. He is ninety and may not have very many more seasons in store for himself.
Which is why it is altogether fitting and proper that the people of Bangladesh pay him the tribute he has so richly deserved. He has made us happy through the years. His songs have touched the depths of our souls and the spaces among the stars.
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