The ghazal maestro passed away today. It was Jagjit’s single-handed contribution that made the ghazal genre a part of every Indian’s life—and this was at a time when music from the Indian Hindi film industry was melodious, meaningful and with lyrics that we still remember      

Devarajan Mahadevan

At 8AM today, one of India’s greatest music icons passed away. Jagjit Singh, with wife Chitra, managed to pull at our heartstrings with hit after hit from the late 70’s to the early 80’s. The ghazal maestro’s accomplishments were made all the more difficult because his was a genre that had to hold its own against some accomplished Bollywood music-composers.

When Jagjit sang “Apni hatoon ki lakiroon me basa de mujhko; kar diya tune agar mere havaale mujhko” (Let me lose myself in the lines of your palm; can you release me to who I am?), the song captivated you—his mellifluous voice could make you forget yourself and think about the times gone by. Almost all his songs were set to tune by Jagjit himself—and he stayed away from the harsh arc-lights of what is now called ‘Bollywood’ film music.

Still, songs like “Tumko dekha to yeh khyaal aaya (When I saw you, that feeling touched me) and “Yeh Tera Ghar Yeh Mera Ghar” (This home is made just for the both of us) which he composed for an eminently forgettable movie (Saath Saath) in 1982—are something special for a generation that was bought up on a diet of music which was not re-mixed, with songs straight from the soul and which sounded rich—even if they were played on an old LP (or worse, a poor cassette tape player).

The death of his young son Vivek Singh in a road crash at Mumbai’s Marine Drive had the Singh couple shattered—hints of which could be discerned in the songs that they came out with after that. But Jagjit and Chitra did not lose to will to live or to sing.

A show like his just cannot go on. The only tribute that we can pay Jagjit Singh today is to listen to at least two of his best albums—‘A Milestone’ and ‘The Unforgettables’. Ghazals don’t get better than this. And none of the tripe being churned out by Bollywood’s Current Perpetual Hit Factory Machine can even come close to the music that Jagjit Singh had produced. Today brings you back to two other fateful days when a number of us came to know about the demise of Mohammed Rafi and Kishore Kumar (over the radio). 10 October 2011 will be another day that we will never forget.

Here’s Jagjit singing: “Yeh daulat bhi le lo (I have no need for money’s filthy lucre): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3Wq4q7Yygg
Here he wants to go back to the days when he listened to his grandmother’s folk-songs about fairies, when he played with boats fashioned out of paper... and where he wants to go back to the days of yore (a recurring theme in so many souls who find that this cruel world does not have any answers for them) and get drenched in the monsoon of his childhood.

Rest in peace, Jagjit Singh. You don’t need a swan song to bow out.