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Shamshad Begum – O.P. Nayyar collaboration

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Back to Legends – Shamshad Begum

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Shamshad Begum with O.P. Nayyar

In one of his rare T.V. interviews, O.P. Nayyar described Shamshad’s voice as that of a “temple bell” for its clarity of tone. No wonder then, that in the 1950′s, O.P Nayyar gave Shamshad perhaps the most popular songs of her career. Shamshad sang 40 songs for Nayyar and many of these songs especially Kabhi aar kabhi paar, and Leke pehla pehla pyaar appear in the popular remixes today. Shamshad sang for Nayyar the first time in Chham Chamma Chham (1952), a duet with Kishore Kumar – Taraste hain tarapte hain. However, her first hit song for Nayyar was Kabhi aar kabhi paar from Aaar Paar (1954).  O.P. Nayyar was responsible for giving Shamshad’s voice a different angle and making her sing Westernized tunes in songs like Mai ki masti aur hai (Mehbooba), Thoda sa dil laga kai dekh (Musafir Khana) and Meri neendoun mein tum (Naya Andaz). The last mentioned song is perhaps the best duet of Shamshad with Kishore Kumar and one of her favorites.

After emotional involvement of Nayyar with Asha Bhosle in the late 50s, Nayyar started to ignore his once favorite singers i.e. Geeta Dutt and Shamshad Begum, and started to work almost exclusively with Asha. In one of his interviews, Nayyar admits that, “I am to blame myself in the position I am today. My only regret in life is that I didn’t stick to Geeta dutt voice, and ignored her for Asha Bhosle. As I was involved very emotionally with Asha Bhosle at that time, and Asha Bhosle didn’t wanted me to compose songs for any other female singer, this almost stopped me to use any other female voice. Asha Bhosle says that my compositions were very intricate and complex to sing, and me(Asha) and Mohd Rafi can only give 80% to O.P.Nayyar songs. I (Nayyar) think she is lying, she and Mohd Rafi could only give 40% to my music. The only singers who can give 100% and did full justice to my songs were Geeta Dutt and Shamshad Begum.” (Source:- rediff.com)

Shamshad’s last song for Nayyar was that smashit Kajra mohabbat wala from Kismat (1968), and after that she was out of O.P. Nayyar’s recording room. Sad indeed!

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