‘Her voice was very rich in timbre and at the same time very soothing.’
Key Points
- ‘Whenever composers couldn’t get Lataji, and they needed a voice in the same timbre, they went to Suman Kalyanpur.’
- ‘She was being compared with what was the benchmark of excellence in playback singing. That could only be a good thing, never bad.’
- ‘Mahendra Kapoor, a very fine singer, suffered as he was compared with Mohammed Rafi. Likewise the comparisons to Lata Mangeshkar must have affected Suman Kalyanpur’s career.’
M M Keeravani, whose melodies in Jism still reverberate in our ears, recalls Suman Kalyanpur’s dulcet voice with pleasure.
“She was the quiet achiever. Her voice was very rich in timbre and at the same time very soothing. I specially recall her song. I think it was from the Dev Anand and Waheeda Rehman film Baat Ek Raat Ki.”
Keeravani feels Suman Kalyanpur was a sound alternative to Lata Mangeshkar. “Whenever composers couldn’t get Lataji, and they needed a voice in the same timbre, they went to Suman Kalyanpur. And she was a fine alternative. She was also a very accomplished singer in her own right.”
The Oscar winning composer feels the comparisons with Lata Mangeshkar did more good than damage to Suman Kalyanpur. “She was being compared with what was the benchmark of excellence in playback singing. That could only be a good thing, never bad.”
However, Keeravani denounces the tendency to compare voices. “Mahendra Kapoor, a very fine singer, suffered as he was compared with Mohammed Rafi. Likewise the comparisons to Lata Mangeshkar must have affected Suman Kalyanpur’s career.”
Photographs curated by Satish Bodas/Rediff
