This voice is truly special.
It's priceless.
This is my grandfather's voice.
And I'm listening to it for the first time in my life.
Not a singer, he was a music director.
Sangeetkaar Roshan.
His full name was Roshan Lal Nagrath.
It's a very interesting story how
our surname went from
Nagrath to Roshan.
-Hello. -How are you?
-I'm running a little late. -No, that's all right.
You look amazing.
Yes, like this.
Roshan ji got us to sing all kinds of songs.
To take a beat like this and fill it with sweetness…
What a melody Roshan saab has created.
The palate he had of… Now that I have more knowledge, I can say this.
A little more knowledge.
The palate that he had of music, of his songs was extremely varied.
You see, Roshan saab turned such a complicated tune
into a popular song.
"Dil Jo Na Keh Saka."
Just think, "Dil…" where it starts from.
These vocal graphs that he composed, very few people have matched it.
Delicacy, fragile.
Soulful compositions, Hindustani classical music influenced all his songs.
He has created such great qawwalis that cannot be sung by just anyone.
He was very "today." Very, you know, that kind of thing.
People may not even know
which film the song was from, who the actor was, but they know the song.
His music is bigger than time.
That was Roshan saab for me.
Now just see, how some things run in the bloodline.
If you listen to Rajesh Roshan's songs carefully,
the way he creates variation with different kinds of rhythms,
brings in different percussion,
that is his USP and I tell you, he really excels at it.
I mean, for me, some of my happiest childhood memories
are associated with his songs.
And his songs take me to my happy place.
Rajesh ji has given music to a film like Julie.
Today, that melody can play in any film with any of the young actors today.
I think it's in the bloodstream of the Roshans, of being timeless.
Rakesh ji has his unique style.
"Action!" "Cut!" You know, he scares you.
Guddu uncle,
out of affection, I call Rakesh Roshan saab Guddu uncle.
So, Guddu uncle's most amazing quality,
besides being a supreme technical force,
is that he somehow maintains a strong grip on the story.
In every movie, the emotional dose is always in the right proportion.
I think I used to speak too fast. He was the first director to say,
"Slow down, don't speak so fast, don't hurry. Take your time."
That he takes unlikely subjects
and communicates them to a mass Hindi audience.
Like Koi Mil Gaya. That's not an easy film.
I always wonder, like, "How is he going to communicate this?"
And it always seems to work.
We can talk about Hrithik later.
Because that will take, I think, two-three days for me to speak about Hrithik.
Man, Hrithik as a co-actor…
I'm not going to reveal any of his secrets.
My boy, my beautiful boy,
the most handsomest boy in the film industry after me.
That phenomenon, you know,
I don't think I'd ever seen anything like this at the movies.
When you think of a hero, a full-package hero, I think of
Hrithik Roshan from Kaho Naa… Pyaar Hai.
Hrithik Roshan came into our lives,
It was like a storm that came into our lives.
We didn't know that something like this could even exist.
I had complete faith.
Like, I had no doubts he would become this overnight sensation.
To be one of the biggest superstars
in the history of Indian cinema is mind-boggling.
And when that song began to play…
When I saw him I was shocked he could dance like that.
That's something I didn't know.
Hrithik is eccentric.
Hrithik is troublesome. Hrithik is difficult.
But Hrithik is magical.
When I watched Hrithik's very first film,
I was completely mesmerized and I thought to myself,
"What an actor he is."
It doesn't happen very often that so many artists
are born in one family.
It just doesn’t happen.
But in this family it has. In Roshan ji's family, it's happened.
Each one of them is very passionate about what they are doing.
And they love to hone their craft, you know.
Each generation has contributed to not just the fabric of Indian cinema,
but to the success stories of Indian cinema.
This is a legacy that will remain there for posterity.
I remember that Papa was one of three brothers.
And they owned a contracting business.
I don't know how he got set on the idea that he wanted to be a music director,
or where he got his passion for music from.
From Gujranwala, he came to Lucknow.
He went to Allauddin Khan saab to learn the sarod.
And from there he went to Delhi to All India Radio.
And that's where he met my mother.
She used to be a singer on All India Radio.
Then they got married.
And in 1948, maybe, they came to Bombay.
When they came to Bombay, they had no place to stay.
In those days, there was a music directing duo named Husnlal Bhagatram.
They had two garages.
That's where I was born in 1949.
He got his first film, Kidar Sharma's film, Neki Aur Badi.
GHAR KI IZZAT
MERE LAAL
So the funny thing is, the very first song
he asked me to sing for him
was actually an English song.
To this day, I ask myself, "Why?"
"Why did he ask me to sing that song?"
So my father decided that now we will be going back to Delhi.
So my mother started packing
and right then Kidar Sharma ji came to see us again.
He asked, "Roshan, where are you going?"
He said, "I'm going back, I'm not really happy here."
He said, "No wait.
I'm singing you up for another movie, Bawre Nain.
You're staying right here, not going anywhere."
Bawre Nain, if I remember correctly, was a film from the year 1950.
And it made Roshan saab into the Roshan saab we know.
Just look at the graph in that melody.
It's not easy to sing. It sounds like a romantic song.
But it's not that easy.
It requires practice.
The influence the songs from that film had on me at that particular age.
I was around nine years old, I think.
The notes he composed, the magic…
I couldn't analyze it back then, nor can I do it now.
Great work must not be analyzed too much.
That is pure magic and magic should be allowed to remain magic.
Only a few of you may know this
but he gave two songwriters their big breaks.
One of them was Anand Bakshi and the other one was Indeevar.
Both of them got their break with none other than Roshan saab.
The tablas and dholaks in that song
are not very heavy.
They're being played very delicately and this was Roshan saab's touch.
To understand the line and the beat and arrange accordingly,
is the mark of a great composer, which Roshan saab is.
These days, people write lyrics to match the tune.
Back then, Papa would actually compose songs to match the lyrics.
And Shailendra uncle, who was a very famous lyricist,
used to live very close to our house.
So once, while taking a walk, he yelled, "Guddu!"
-Guddu! -"What's your Papa doing?"
I said, "He's inside, uncle. Why?"
He rolled up a piece of paper
and tossed it up to me and said, "Give this to your Papa."
I opened it and saw something was written on it.
I said, "Papa, Shailendra uncle was passing by and he sent this paper for you.
He wants you to take a look."
He told me if Shailendra uncle comes back, tell him Papa has asked you to come up.
I think barely half an hour must have passed.
-I said, "Uncle!" -Uncle!
"Papa has called you up."
Shailendra ji wrote a song and tossed it up.
Papa got so inspired by the lyrics, that he made the tune then and there.
Roshan uncle used to come home very often, informally.
We used to have a one-room house,
and my mother, she was deeply into palmistry.
So there was this one time when she told Roshan saab
that, "Roshan saab you have a great phase coming up for you.
Great fame, fortune, property, cars, you'll have it all."
Just a few days later,
an imported car drove up and stopped outside our house.
Roshan uncle stepped out of it,
and Papa was completely surprised and so was Mom.
He said, "Bhabhi ji, you had recently predicted
that a great phase was coming up for me
and this is the first sign of my success."
I remember,
in the '60s or a little before the '60s,
we came to live in this flat.
It was the phase of Barsaat Ki Raat, Aarti, Bheegi Raat.
First thing in the morning, Roshan saab used to listen to
Voice Of America.
Connie Francis, Skeeter Davis songs playing early in the morning.
I'm going to school.
Often, he used to stand in the balcony, making a tune.
So his calculation of a tune was one, two, three, four.
In these four beats, can he fix up that tune?
His hand would keep flicking this way
and people who stood below at the bus stand would know
that this is Roshan saab.
And I felt very embarrassed. I said,
"Papa, they… Papa!"
-Papa. -"Papa, everyone's staring at you.
-What are you doing?" -He would say, "I'm composing a song."
"Please go inside and compose, Papa. Don’t do all this here."
And he would say "Beta,
there's so much flowing into my mind, leave me to it"
I was very fond of music.
That I told my dad, please buy me a radio
because I want to hear Binaca Geetmala on every Wednesday.
It was only after marriage that I realized
that Papa, as in Roshan ji,
I had heard his songs.
And I realized, "Oh!" You know.
I've come into this family of music."
My mother, because she was a singer,
Papa would always ask for her opinion.
He'd call out, "Ira!"
And Mummy would come from the kitchen and ask, "Yeah, what happened?"
He'd say, "See, I've composed a new song. Listen to it. What do you think of it?"
Guddu's mummy, she used to sing.
And her songs were, you know how Kishore da
sometimes sang those funny…
Some of his songs make you laugh, because they're fun.
So Mummy was like that.
She used to make, you know, crazy kind of lyrics
which she used to write herself.
But they were so lovely.
So, Lata ji and my mumma were very close friends.
They used to travel,
I don't know from where, Ghatkopar, Goregaon, that side,
in a train, to reach to Famous, Tardeo.
And one day, Mr. Anil Biswas made them sing a duet.
When I was called to sing for his film, Coffee House,
I met him for the first time at the rehearsal.
He would always give at least two options for the same line
and together we would decide which was the one to go with.
We were new singers, it was not like we knew everything.
So, if there was a song like…
If we were to sing this, this was how he would explain it to us.
By watching his hand, we would understand where we had to emphasize.
So more than listening, I would watch the hand movement
to see what the hand was saying.
He would teach you the lyrics, how to enunciate each word.
The way he taught me how to enunciate "lo" was just exceptional.
If there was a classical song to sing,
I'd get really scared.
And the way he would teach it,
I'd try my best to sing it that way.
So, I sang it really nervously.
That's all I can say.
So it's Roshan ji's recording.
When we went to his recordings,
we would sit there and we'd go up and meet him.
He had a very kind nature.
If there was a soloist,
and he was unable to play the solo piece,
he wouldn't shout at him.
He'd call him over.
He would say, "This is how it should be, do it this way."
He would never say, "Hey, what are you doing?" Never.
My dadi, she used to tell us these stories
about my grandfather.
And from those stories,
I used to make this visual of my grandfather.
I would have loved to have met him.
Because from what I can gather from his music, he was a very, very…
you know, soulful man.
The fact is that art and artists,
they do not exist in watertight compartments.
Their individual personality, their cultural background
will always come through whether it's poetry, or music,
or acting, or writing, it will find an expression.
In Roshan saab's compositions, there is no cheapness to them.
Not just the words, but even its orchestration will be very decent.
Feels like, this is a suited-booted song.
I mean, even a song has an image.
When you listen to that song. "Bawre Nain".
In this song, there is mischief, yet there is class.
When I was in Delhi, there used to be radiograms.
So, before the television, advent of television,
and my parents…
And we all used to actually sit around the radiogram to listen to music.
Sometimes I would even dance for my father and mother.
And Roshan saab's songs would play very often. Many of them were sad songs.
Like some of them, I hum. And then there were philosophical songs.
I would always complain to Papa,
"Papa, why do you make such slow, sad songs?
Look at these new music directors, listen to the songs they're composing."
So he too composed a modern type of song.
That very evening, S. D. Burman called him up and said.
"Roshan, don't ever change your style, okay?
The style you have, just stick to it."
I must have been about seven-eight years old. Approximately.
And my mother used to collect money in a small pouch.
A few 25 or 50-paise coins.
When my mother wasn't looking, I would steal them.
With that money, I would think of watching a film.
I'd say, "Where to go and watch a film?" I'd go to Dadar, watch a film at Chitra.
Which one? Mamta.
And to this day that song resonates in my soul.
Money that I'd stolen, Mamta, the film, Chitra Cinema, Dadar.
When Papa's song was being recorded so…
You know, he used to keep his hand like this.
And I used to enter the monitor room, a huge monitor room.
And I used to hear Rafi saab's voice.
"Mann Re Tu Kaahe Na Dheer Dhare."
The peace of mind which he had then, was already in the song.
The writer may have written the lyrics,
but the song, through its composition and the enhancement it got,
you'd get the feeling that whatever words the writer had written,
he had taken it ten notches higher.
Some popular English magazine that was around many years ago,
had held a contest asking what is your most popular song of all time?
So, they made a list of 100 songs taken from their readers and their voters.
And no.1 on that list was, "Mann Re Tu Kaahe Na Dheer Dhare."
His casting for each and every song was excellent.
"Only Rafi saab will sing this." "Only Lata ji will sing this song."
His understanding of which voice
will do justice to what he is trying to say.
Who in this industry can actually create "Mann Re Tu Kaahe Na Dheer Dhare?"
Actually, he had composed the entire song in a very economic manner.
He knew this melody is good.
These lyrics are good.
This rendering will hold very well.
There's no reason to drown it with too much music.
But this can only be executed by true masters.
An ordinary music director cannot do it at all.
This is actually a masterstroke.
Roshan ji did not shy away
from studying all the tiny little details.
Which instruments we should blend together
which may produce a good-quality sound?
A sitar played with a sarod, and with that, a mandolin.
And when to play a solo, this was Roshan ji's specialty.
"Jo Wada Kiya Woh Nibhana Padega." has such deep sentiments attached do it.
Roshan ji and Sahir saab have poured such love into it.
After the verse, when the link line comes in…
What Roshan ji did there, was done so excellently.
The way it drops into the hook line, every time after the verse,
that particular kind of, you know, quiver or whatever,
is created in a song that is not really meant to make you dance dance.
But it's the way it drops, it makes you want to move.
It's just incredible.
One day, we were at the Bombay Lab Studio where we used to work,
There, C. Ramchandra ji landed up.
Sharma ji was the recordist.
He said, "Sharma, just get Roshan saab on the phone"
So he straight away called him.
He said to him, "Roshan, you've ruined my sleep at night.
What a song you've made, 'Jo Wada Kiya Woh Nibhana Padega.'"
"You swine…", he abused him and said,
"If I don't ruin your sleep too,
my name is not C. Ramchandra."
And that's how they used to appreciate each other.
He'd feel very happy when his songs,
his music was well recorded.
He'd place his hands on his waist and do a little dance…
not dance, but wiggle his arms,
and all the musicians who were there would stand around him and clap.
And we'd really enjoy that.
Papa was a very jolly person.
And they used to have a group.
C. Ramchandra, Madan Mohan ji,
Kalyanji-Anandji, Shankar-Jaikishan,
and S.D. Burman.
They'd meet once a month to have a party.
I remember once we were in a car, probably going for a movie premiere,
and Papa had worn a traditional Kashmiri hat,
a nice suit, and a tie.
I said, "Papa, you're looking very handsome today."
He smiled but after that I happened to look at his feet,
and he'd worn his socks but not the shoes.
I remember, it was the film, Dil Hi Toh Hai.
The music was completed.
And Raj saab was absolutely crazy about Papa.
One day, Raj saab came home to meet Papa.
Papa was sitting here, he sat down there and he held his legs and said,
"Let's have a drink and celebrate."
Papa was a heart patient.
And medicines weren't available easily those days.
But in spite of that, he wanted 555 cigarettes all the time.
And Mumma used to fight with him a lot.
So, the Akai tape recorder had this folder
that used to open up for the cassettes, he used to hide his cigarettes in there.
So, one day I caught him.
I said, "Papa, what's this? What're you hiding?"
He said, "Shh."
"Dare not speak a word. Close the door."
He opened a window, and went and stood there, smoking his cigarette.
Then in the evening, around 7:30-7:45,
the whisky bottle would open.
And there'd be an Urdu book.
And he'd keep reading verses from the book.
And all that poetry became a part of him.
In those days,
equal to Filmfare Award was Binaca Geetmala's Wednesday program.
Everyone used to get glued to the radiogram they had.
But once what happened was the competition got extremely tough.
"Chaudhvin Ka Chand" versus "Zindagi Bhar Nahin Bhoolegi Woh Barsaat Ki Raat."
And that night,
"Zindagi Bhar Nahin Bhoolegi Woh Barsaat Ki Raat," and it was the first.
We all rejoiced and we had a big party that night.
But my favorite song actually is a qawwali by him.
I think I nearly know the whole qawwali if it is playing.
It's like they say, "Never before this, never after this."
To this day there's no qawwali like "Yeh Ishq, Ishq Hai."
It took us, I don't know how many days to rehearse the song.
The entire chorus is sitting here.
All the singers are sitting.
We're rehearsing and rehearsing.
It's not easy getting everyone to sing live.
I mean, Manna Dey saab's portion is separate, Asha Bai's is separate,
and SD Batish's line comes in separately.
It takes a real genius mind where you have all the ingredients that you need
but how do you use them?
That is this qawwali's biggest hallmark.
And it's probably in the last verse that Rafi saab makes his entry.
Manna Dey saab would say that the moment Rafi saab sang his alaap,
all of us went cold.
Roshan ji created a revolution with qawwali.
He took the beat and made algebra-like divisions in it.
He had mastered the Raga Yaman Kalyan
in which he made many songs, like,
"Nigahen Milane Ko Jee Chahta Hai"
and "Sansar Se Bhage Phirte Ho."
They were east and west.
How could he
think of a tune in the raga
which would make one think,
"What raga is this?
That doesn't happen in Yaman."
There are notations in that song. It's difficult.
It's so difficult getting a grasp on that song.
And in one take that too.
It wasn't like, wear headphones
and sing two or three lines at a time, wasn't like that.
To conceive such a song
and to keep coming up with variations… How must he have developed it?
Sometimes we would ask Indeevar ji about it "What was his process?"
So Indeevar ji said that there's a story to that too.
So, Indeevar ji and Roshan saab
were travelling outside Bombay and it was getting very hot.
They were on their way to a hill station and they came across a river.
There Indeevar ji rolled up his trousers and said,
"Come, let's splash our feet in the water."
They had been discussing the song. They still didn't have the main hook.
Roshan saab sat down with his harmonium and played a music piece.
So, Indeevar ji said to Roshan saab,
"I wonder, this river,
where does it begin, where does this water come from, and where does it go?"
This idea had already struck Indeevar ji's mind.
And when they sat there with the instrument,
he said, "Roshan saab, I've found my hook."
To this day,
when I listen to that particular song,
I get goosebumps.
It's such a phenomenal composition.
We're lucky that we got to hear these songs,
to learn them and sing them.
It certainly must've raised our standards too.
Improved our performance or bring some progress.
Whenever any of his songs play, one has to stop.
And definitely,
melody… in our film industry, if anyone has played the most with melody,
I think it's Roshan saab.
The magic of Roshan saab's music asserts itself without question.
Roshan saab used to bring tears to my eyes.
And he used to bring smiles, he used to bring romance.
He was, like, a versatile man.
There was no fear whether a song would work or not.
They were made from the heart. Even today, "Laga Chunari Mein Daag" plays.
Even today, kids sing it in reality shows.
Even today, there is absolutely no other song like it.
So if a person is to create, this is how they should, how Roshan saab did.
From among so many music directors, to deliver that caliber of music,
and super hit music…
Amazing!
When I was in college, and I used to take tuitions.
My maths professor,
when he realized that
I am Roshan saab's grandson,
he was just absolutely delighted.
It didn't matter so much to him that I was Rakesh Roshan's son
and Rajesh Roshan's nephew.
But it mattered to him that I was Roshan's grandson.
But there is one thing, he never boasted about himself at all.
Nor did any one else.
He just kept doing good work and people praised him for it
but the limelight that Roshan saab actually deserved to get…
He certainly got enough for us to talk about him today,
and we all know what he accomplished,
but as much as he actually deserved, he never achieved it.
The industry,
the people, they did not give him enough support,
never gave him enough love, or enough respect.
I remember I had come over for the holidays and it was the last day.
I used to study in Wadia college. The next day I left for Pune.
At two o'clock that morning,
my friends came to me and said,
"Some exhibitors have come and they want to meet you."
I went and asked, "What is it?" They said, "You've been called back.
Your father had a health emergency."
We were invited to the Jewel Thief's premier night with family.
We were watching the premiere.
During the interval, a card was sent to me.
"Son of music director Roshan,
please, Rajesh, please come to the entrance."
And Raj Khosla ji was standing outside.
With his hands behind his back.
Then he's telling me that, "Your Papa's condition is very critical."
It hit me like a ton of bricks.
I realized that the matter is serious.
When I got home in the morning, around 7-7:30,
it was crowded downstairs.
Mummy way crying a lot.
Mummy gave me a tight hug.
She said, "Your Papa is gone."
"Your Papa is gone. He's left us and gone."
Literally, it was like I had failed in some exam.
How you feel?
"Oh, God, this is my result?"
But even then…
I tried to stay strong.
I went up to Papa.
Papa's dead body was lying there.
I bowed down and quietly sat down there.
Madan Mohan ji came.
And he was banging his head on the floor and crying.
Saying, "Roshan, you have left us,
now who am I supposed to compete with?"
And then, I remember,
we were going to the cemetery.
I forgot to wear my slippers.
Just running behind…
my dad, and thousands of people.
Unfortunately, Roshan saab passed away very early in the age,
and they were left in their teens, both the brothers.
But they were totally
wanting to be something. You know, they desired to be something.
In my heart, there was this rising feeling
that I want to be somebody.
And you won't believe it,
in just one night,
I went from being an 18-year-old boy to an 18-year-old man.