Who Wins Between Old and New Bollywood Songs?

by Richa Jha Asistent Manager

Songs have always been an integral part of Indian cinema. From the days when ''talkies'' or movies with sound began in the Bombay film industry, songs began to be incorporated in them.

Liking or disliking any song basically, depends on personal taste. People of every generation usually think that the culture prevalent during ''their'' time was the best and that it has been eroded in the modern era. But still one often finds themselves entangled on social networking sites in India in the argument between people over which songs were better; old or new?

To counter this question following three points are necessary to be understood -

The Drawing of Line

It is very important to draw a distinction between what people consider as ''old Bollywood'' and ''new Bollywood''. For this purpose, the example of famous film historian and author, David Bordwell can be taken. David Bordwell has classified the ''Classical Hollywood'' era as the period between 1917 to 1960. He has based this on the narrative principles used in the storytelling of this cinema.

Similarly, Bombay film industry too can be classified as ''old'' from 1931 when the movie 'Alam Ara' was released and it had a song in it; to 1980. This classification is important so that people do not include their own likes and dislikes of songs from 10 or 20 years ago

School of Music

When comparing a Mohammad Rafi or a Naushad to a Mika Singh or Honey Singh, most people simply observe the pace of songs and its meaning and then make a judgment whether old Bollywood songs were good or the new ones. However, the key is to understand that both these generations and their musicians are followers and practitioners of different 'school of music.'

Classical Bollywood songs were an extension of Classical Indian Music which lays emphasis on correct pronunciation of words along with taking care of all the music 'Ragas' or notes properly. That explains their slow pace of singing compared to modern day popular songs which often do not have any meaning in them.

Mind the Language

Upon close listening, you will notice that many of today's songs have a heavy leaning towards the Punjabi language. This was not the case with the old mp3 songs. Many of the old-school lyricists were poets as well and they were very well-versed in the Urdu language. That is why many of classical songs are in Urdu and have a different pace about them.

Hopefully, the next time when you are surrounded by the debate between the fans of old and new songs, you will consider the above three reasons to counter the argument.

Source : http://www.artipot.com/articles/2078294/who-wins-between-old-and-new-bollywood-songs.htm