New Kings Of Ghazal, Ashok Khosla, Chandan Dass, Hariharan & Talat Aziz Options

[swarapriya]

New Kings of Ghazal

Shahenshah-E-Ghazal, Mehdi Hassan, the legendary ghazal singer from Pakistan had and continues to have a tremendous influence in South Asia. His style of ghazal singing inspired many budding singers who tried to imitate him.

He also had tremendous impact and influence on the young Indian ghazal singers. Among the prominent ones, who acknowledged influence on them by the Shahenshah, are talented ghazal singers of India like Talat Aziz, Chandan Dass, and Hariharan.

In this thread I would like to share some of the albums from the following four ghazal singers:

Talat Aziz
Ashok Khosla
Chandan Dass
Hariharan

This post has been edited by swarapriya: Sep 27 2009, 04:37 AM

[swarapriya]

Talat Aziz

Talat Aziz was one of those lucky persons who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. As a kid growing up he was fascinated with the sport of cricket and always wanted to play that game.

Talat’s mother was a poet and his parents were always busy organizing musical gatherings in their own house. Many talented and famous artists were guests at their home. Those included great ghazal singers like Jagjit Singh and Mehdi Hassan. Fascinated with the ghazal singing he trained under several well known teachers and was ready to take that proverbial first step.

During one of the music gatherings in Mumbai, Sanjeev Kohli (son of great music director Madan Mohan) of RPG records heard Aziz sing. Impressed by his voice he persuaded Jagjit Singh to help Talat to cut a ghazal disc. The opportunity came when Jagjit Singh decided to help him release his first ghazal album “Jagjit Singh Presents… Talat Aziz”. This album was a phenomenal success. This led him to sign up for several solo albums most of them becoming extremely popular.

Talat Aziz’s ghazal singing is greatly influenced by the late Mehdi Hassan’s voice. He studied Hassan Saab’s singing style meticulously. Later Talat shared stage with Hassan Saab on tour of various countries where he gave concerts. Talat also sings occasionally in films, acts, and composes music. Aziz was the first one to create a ghazal music video in India.

Here is Talat Aziz’s discography. Please note that this list may not be complete.

[swarapriya]

Ashok Khosla

Ashok Khosla was trained in classical music. He got his first break when he sang in Jagjit Singh’s album “Brightest Talent of the 80’s”. His ghazal in that album, “Ajnabee Shehar” became a huge hit and gave him instant recognition.

This led to a contract by Music India for whom Ashok cut several albums. He also composed music to most of the ghazals he sang. While his ghazal singing took off, Ashok ventured into devotional songs. He released two popular albums on Sai Baba.

Khosla gave concerts all over the world. He has the distinction of performing at the Wembley Conference Center in London three times.

He composed music for a Punjabi film and even sang a couple of songs for a Telugu movie. He worked with the great O.P. Nayyar on an album who showered high praises on Ashok’s singing ability.

Here is Ashok Khosla’s discography. Please note that this list may not be complete.

[swarapriya]

Chandan Dass

Fascinated with music and yearning to sing his own style of songs as a career, Chandan Dass left his parents’ home early in search to reach his goals. He worked and sang for All India Radio for a while. He met Talat Aziz in a music gathering where Aziz took instant liking to the voice of Dass. He recommended him to his recording company. His first album became very popular.

One of the main reasons Talat got attracted to Chandan’s voice was that they both had the inspiration of ghazal singing from the incomparable Mehdi Hassan. Since his first album, Dass has released several albums.

Here is Chandan Dass’s discography. Please note that this list may not be complete.

[swarapriya]

Hariharan

Hariharan was born in a musical family. His father was a renowned Carnatic music vocalist, H.A.S. Mani and his mother Alamelu was an equally famous singer in her own right. Hariharan’s first guru was his own mother.

While growing up, Hariharan was inspired by great Mehdi Hassan’s style of ghazal singing and aspired to become one himself. He vigorously trained under various gurus. He didn’t know any Hindi or Urdu (his mother tongue is Tamil) so he started learning Urdu so that he can sing ghazals. After years and years of studying the language he became very proficient. His current Urdu diction in the ghazal singer’s circle is considered to be one of very high standards.

Hariharan won the top prize in the All-India Sur Singaar competition in 1977. Music director Jaidev who heard him sing at this competition offered him to sing a song in the movie “Gaman”. The song “Ajeeb Saane” became a hit and won him several awards.

During this time he started singing for films in Hindi and all South Indian languages. He is one of the favorites of the music maestro A.R. Rahman.

In 1996 he released a first fusion album in collaboration with Leslie Lewis called “Colonial Cousins”. This became a phenomenal success and in the music world Hariharan’s name got instant recognition.

Hariharan won the best singer award in 1998 form the President of India for his song “Mere Dushman Mere Bhai” in “Border”. He was also recently honored by the President with the Padma Shri award.

Here is Hariharan’s discography. Please note that this list may not be complete.

[swarapriya]

Jagjit Singh Presents Talat Aziz

This was the very first album recorded by Talat Aziz. Jagjit Singh, a family friend of Aziz, composed the music for these ghazals. This very first album by Talat was a best seller.

Because of the lengths of the songs I will upload in them in two back-to-back posts. Here is the first set of ghazals from this album...

[Bhavita]

Swarpriya
I would like to give in my contribution by uploading Talat Aziz's first album - Jagjit Singh Presents Talat Aziz . Hope you dont mind?

1. Kaise Sukoon Paaon
Size - 13.2 mb
Length - 5.46
bitrate - 320 kbps
format - mp3

[swarapriya]

Ghazals from "Jagjit Singh Presents Talat Aziz" Album Continued ...

Here are the rest of the ghazals from this fine album ...

[swarapriya]

Swarpriya
I would like to give in my contribution by uploading Talat Aziz's first album - Jagjit Singh Presents Talat Aziz . Hope you dont mind?

1. Kaise Sukoon Paaon
Size - 13.2 mb
Length - 5.46
bitrate - 320 kbps
format - mp3

Bhavita, sorry about that. I didn't realize that you were trying to upload the songs at the same time as I was. In future, please do not hesitate to contribute to this thread. I don't have the complete set of albums listed, but do have quite a few of them. Those are the ones I am hoping to share.

Thanks again.

Cheers for your support and efforts,
Swarapriya

[swarapriya]

Swarpriya
I would like to give in my contribution by uploading Talat Aziz's first album - Jagjit Singh Presents Talat Aziz . Hope you dont mind?

1. Kaise Sukoon Paaon
Size - 13.2 mb
Length - 5.46
bitrate - 320 kbps
format - mp3

Bhavita, sorry about that. I didn't realize that you were trying to upload the songs at the same time as I was. In future, please do not hesitate to contribute to this thread. I don't have the complete set of albums listed, but do have quite a few of them. Those are the ones I am hoping to share.

Thanks again.

Cheers for your support and efforts,
Swarapriya

[Bhavita]

Would it be a good idea to share what I have once you have uploaded your collection? I mainly have a collection of Hariharan and a few of Talat Aziz

[Bhavita]

Here is a ghazal by Hariharan in Tribute to Mehdi Hassan

Kya toota hain andar andar
size - 21.1mb
length - 9.15
bitrate - 320 kbps
format - mp3

[swarapriya]

Would it be a good idea to share what I have once you have uploaded your collection? I mainly have a collection of Hariharan and a few of Talat Aziz

Bhavita, that seems like a workable plan. Why don't I let you know when I have exhausted my resources so that you can contribute the missing ones.

Cheers,
Swarapriya

[swarapriya]

Here is a ghazal by Hariharan in Tribute to Mehdi Hassan

Kya toota hain andar andar
size - 21.1mb
length - 9.15
bitrate - 320 kbps
format - mp3

Thanks for this song. This is in the tribute album to Mehdi Hassan. I happen to have this song. But thanks for sharing it with rest of us.

Cheers,
Swarapriya

[Bhavita]

the next ghazal by Hariharan for the album Dil Ki Batein - A tribute to Mehdi Hassan

Faisla Tumko bhool jaane ka

size - 17.9 mb
length - 7.49
bitrate - 320 kbps
format - mp3