एस.डी. बर्मन

Sachin Dev Burman (1 October 1906 – 31 October 1975) belongs to that rare handful of composers who united the soil of folk music with the heights of classicism. Born in Comilla (now in Bangladesh) into a family connected to the royal house of Tripura, Sachin received his first training from his father Nabadwipchandra Dev Burman, a sitarist. Years of rigorous study followed in Calcutta — under K.C. Dey (Manna Dey's uncle), Bhishmadev Chattopadhyay and the sarangi master Badal Khan. But Sachin Karta's true school was the rivers of East Bengal: bhatiyali, the songs of the boatmen of the Padma, whose calling cry sounded through his melodies all his life.

By the 1930s he was one of Bengal's most popular singers and composers; in 1944 he moved to Bombay. His first major Hindi success came with 'Mera Sundar Sapna Beet Gaya' (Geeta Dutt) in Do Bhai (1947). Then began the historic association with Dev Anand's Navketan: Baazi (1951) — which jazzed up the Hindi film song overnight — Taxi Driver (1954, his first Filmfare Award), Nau Do Gyarah, Kala Pani, Kala Bazar. For Guru Dutt's Pyaasa (1957) and Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959) he composed Hindi cinema's profoundest musical poetry — 'Jaane Woh Kaise Log The', 'Waqt Ne Kiya Kya Haseen Sitam'. The stream never ran dry: Sujata, Bandini ('O Re Maajhi'), Guide (1965) — every song of which is now a textbook — Jewel Thief, Aradhana (1969), Sharmilee, Abhimaan (1973, his second Filmfare) and Mili.

As a singer, his cracked, keening voice — 'Sun Mere Bandhu Re', 'Wahan Kaun Hai Tera', 'Safal Hogi Teri Aradhana' (National Film Award for Best Male Playback Singer, 1970) — entered films like a sutradhar, a narrator from beyond the frame. Honoured with the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award (1958) and the Padma Shri (1969), the famously frugal, football-loving, paan-chewing Sachin-da died on 31 October 1975, having slipped into a coma while working on the songs of Mili. His tradition flowed into the next generation through his son, Rahul Dev Burman.

S.D. Burman was born on 1 October 1906 in Comilla, in eastern Bengal, into the family of Nabadwipchandra Dev Burman — a sitarist and Dhrupad practitioner connected to the royal lineage of Tripura. The boy grew up between palace refinement and riverine countryside, and chose the river: the bhatiyali of boatmen, the songs of fishermen and farmhands of East Bengal became his deepest musical memory. After graduating from Comilla Victoria College, he moved to Calcutta in the mid-1920s for higher studies and serious musical training — under K.C. Dey from 1925, then Bhishmadev Chattopadhyay, and the sarangi master Badal Khan; he also absorbed from Ustad Allauddin Khan's circle. By 1932 he was recording Bengali songs, and within a few years his semi-classical and folk-styled records had made 'Sachin Dev Burman' a beloved name across Bengal.

After a decade as Bengal's star singer-composer (and film work in Calcutta from the late 1930s), S.D. Burman moved to Bombay in 1944. Following Shikari and Aath Din (1946), Do Bhai (1947) gave him his first Hindi hit. Baazi (1951) for Navketan changed the game — 'Tadbeer Se Bigdi Hui Taqdeer' turned a ghazal into a smoky jazz seduction. Through the 1950s he built three great houses: the urbane Navketan thrillers (Taxi Driver, Nau Do Gyarah, Kala Bazar), Bimal Roy's lyrical realism (Devdas, Sujata, Bandini) and Guru Dutt's tragic poetry (Pyaasa, Kaagaz Ke Phool). After a heart attack in the early 1960s and a brief lull, Guide (1965) became his Everest, followed by Jewel Thief and the era-turning Aradhana (1969), which minted the Kishore Kumar age. With Hrishikesh Mukherjee came the autumn masterpieces Abhimaan and Mili. He won Filmfare Awards for Taxi Driver (1955) and Abhimaan (1974), the National Award as a singer for Aradhana (1970), and worked till his final coma in 1975.

S.D. Burman's legacy is the proof that simplicity is the hardest art. His melodies — rarely more than a folk phrase polished to perfection — outlive orchestral fashions because they are built on breath, river and memory. He launched or remade the careers of singers: Geeta Dutt found her soul in his songs, Kishore Kumar credited him as the guru who freed him from Saigal's shadow, and Aradhana's 'Roop Tera Mastana' crowned the Kishore era under his baton. His own voice created a genre of one — the bhatiyali narrator — that composers still invoke whenever a film needs the sound of fate. Through R.D. Burman his bloodline shaped Hindi film music into the 1990s. Tripura's airport bears cultural tributes to him, Comilla preserves his ancestral home, and musicians across Bengal and Bombay still settle arguments with one sentence: 'But Sachin-da would have done it simpler.'

S.D. Burman composed the way rivers flow — the line of melody always supreme, ornament only where the current turns. His foundations were East Bengali folk (bhatiyali, sari, jhumur) fused with Hindustani classical discipline; he could lift a boatman's call into a raag and lower a raag into a lullaby. He was a master of economy: intros of a single flute or sitar phrase, rhythm sections that breathe, silences placed like punctuation. He matched voice to situation with a casting director's instinct — Geeta Dutt's ache, Rafi's grandeur, Lata's stillness ('Mora Gora Ang Lai Le'), Kishore's intimacy — and guarded his tunes fiercely, famously refusing to dilute a melody for fashion. His own singing voice, nasal, cracked and ancient-sounding, he reserved for moments of fate.

• A cracked, keening, ancient-sounding voice — fate's narrator in a film
• The open calling cry of the bhatiyali boatman
• Distinct nasal timbre with an unerring folk inflection
• Few songs, every one unforgettable