An Unsung Heroine - Chitra (Jagjit) Singh!

.

Jagjit Singh and Chitra Singh, the famous ghazal singers!

 I did a post on Jagjit Singh's ghazals long back.  Our whole family is a great fan of Jagjit and Chitra Singh.  The post is here.  His wife Chitra Singh also is a great ghazal singer.  We have heard her solo songs and songs she sang with her husband too. But mostly people talk about Jagjit Singh and I haven't heard anyone mentioning Chitra Singh's name! I and my son love her voice.

She is born a Bengali and married Jagjit Singh and both of them started giving concerts.  Normally, ghazal singing was conducted in elite homes in those days (Mehfil). Slowly some singers like Mehdi Hassan and Ghulam Ali started giving concerts in public places.  And Jagjit modernised the ghazal singing by using unique instruments like guitar, santoor etc. So, he and his wife, became very popular.  Their songs were easy to follow and we could sing along too! He was particular about the lyrics being clear and simple, but with sincere emotions. He was interacting with the audience who were thrilled to get involved in the concerts.

Now, let me come back to Chitra Singh.  She is not a trained singer.  She developed singing just by hearing good music.  She met Jagjit and married him in 1969.  I am not going to write about her personal life.  I am an admirer of her and her husband's singing.  We will stick to it.

In the beginning, they were singing in jingles.  Later on, both of them started singing ghazals and their audio CD's became a hit.  They reached the homes of ordinary people who were used to hearing just film songs.  Our family includes in that category.  I have told you in Jagjit Singh's post itself how we started listening to ghazals.  His simple ghazals hooked us to hearing mostly his CD's plus some more, like Hariharan's.  We were fans of Latha and Asha and other singers' voices until then.  After we got used to hearing Chitra's voice, we started liking her's too.  My son used to say that we have to keep on hearing  and 'develop' liking to good music!  Their ghazal concerts became famous gradually.  I have never heard of them performing here, in Chennai.  Jagjit gave concerts alone later in his life but his voice was a bit shaky by then and my son wanted to keep his good voice in memory always.  So, we didn't attend his concert here.  It would have been nice if we had the opportunity to hear them live.  But we developed the liking for ghazals  very late!

She has got some good film songs to her credit and many ghazals which are memorable.  Let me give them here. Her voice is unique.

1. Tum aao to sahi...we can keep on hearing this:



2. Tuu nahin toh...tranquility:



3. Har soo dikhai dete...just admire her voice!



4. Aisa lagta hai...zindagi tum ho....lovely song!



5. Woh nahin miltaa mujhe...



6. Ishq mein...Chitra is singing...Jagjit Singh starts the concert with some humour.  This nature of his, has made the pair very famous.  They interact with the audience and so the concert is always lively! I have got this CD at home! This is one of my favourites!



7. A Punjabi song...typical concert atmosphere.  Jagjit is a Punjabi and Chitra is a Bengali, but she sings this Punjabi song, beautifully! This song is in the CD I have with me.  If you had asked me to hear a Punjabi song, just like that, I wouldn't have listened to it.  But when I am made to hear with other ghazals, I just let it play and slowly I started liking it! I have noticed in music reality shows also, when we hear Punjabi songs, we notice that have a kind of 'josh' in them which makes people dance! This is one of that type of song. I sing along this also without knowing the meaning and mostly the words might be wrongly pronounced too, I know! But this is good!




When other people sing Ghulaam Ali's or Hariharan's ghazals, we immediately recognise and say that this is Ghulam Ali's ghazal or Hariharan's ghazal.  The aalaap or sargam varies from each other's singing. Same thing happens with AR Rahmaan's songs or RD Burman's songs or SD Burman's song.  We recognise them with some musical notes or instruments or something.  Like that way, we recognise Jagjit Singh, Chitra Singh's songs also.  In some way, they sound similar to their previous songs...some thread is there in every song! Maybe, this is called 'Gharana'!

Whenever I played Jagjit and Chitra's CD, I used to think that Chitra is not recognised properly.  I like many of her songs.  I have compiled the songs I got in 'You tube'.  Some of my favourites were not available.  Now, watch the concert! Both of them look very young here and their voice at their best.  I am not very familiar with this song, though! Should keep on hearing it and then we will like it...like it happens with AR Rahmaan's song!


 

I love Chitra Singh's 'Safar mein dhoop toh hogi' a lot.  You can hear that in my earlier post on Jagjit Singh here.

Which song do you like of Chitra Singh?


Picture Courtesy: Thank you!


EDITED TO ADD ON 28TH MARCH '13:  Rahul Aggarwal said in the comment section that Jagjit and Chitra Singh's Punjabi Thappe songs are very famous.  I don't have it in my CD collection, so I am not very familiar with it.   But I heard it now and it is interesting, though I don't know Punjabi! Have a look at the song.  Both the singers are very young and it is a live concert in London: