Manna Dey, a profile Options

[Pradeep]

Manna Dey was born Prabodh Chandra Dey, the name 'Manna' conferred on him by his uncle K C Dey, a well-regarded actor/singer and star of New theatres. The family wanted the young Dey to take up law, but K C Dey saw the talent that lay inside, and took the young man to Bombay in 1940.

There, Manna Dey worked as an assistant to music director H P Das. Along with his distinguished uncle, the two senior musicians trained Manna in the subtleties of tumri, bhajan, tappa and qawwali. His first break came when Vijay Bhatt of Prakash Pictures asked the elder Dey to record a song for the movie Ram Rajya.

K C refused, and suggested his nephew instead. The music director, Shankarrao Vyas was understandably sceptical, but after just a few tests at the studio, 22-year-old Manna was given the job. But he was singing for the aged character Valmiki, and this would prove to be one of the problems he would face in his career.

Typecast, if playback singers can be typecast, as a singer in mythological films, Manna Dey continued to get similar job offers, and he was soon disgusted with the work he was getting. With not enough time or experience in the industry to make a break by himself, he even contemplated returning to Calcutta.

However, after the film Mashaal, where the song Upar Gagan Vishaal became a huge hit, Manna Dey reconsidered his plans and stayed in Bombay. After that first breakthrough, the hits followed at a rapid pace, and he was soon an established, popular and well-regarded figure in the Hindi film industry.

His deep voice usually kept him out of the hero's playback post, but he was never overly concerned of his relatively second-fiddle status. With his semi-classical training, he was a much better interpreter than even Mohammed Rafi in some cases.

Awards and recognition of a similar nature were not soon in coming, but Manna Dey never let that affect his work. Working with composers from Anil Biswas to R D Burman, critics could not find a single flaw in his work, but it was only last year that he was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Zee Sangeet Awards
ceremony.

Over the last few years, he has stayed out of the limelight, and has recorded very little. He continues to be a 'doyen' in the Hindi playback field, and his fans continue to stay fiercely loyal.

[Chitralekha]