Death of Jaganmoy Mitra brings an end to the golden era of Bengali romantic songs
The recent death of Jaganmoy Mitra brings an end to the golden period of Bengali romantic and love songs that was distinct by its marvellous combination of poetic lyric and melodious tune.
The period I am referring to start around late thirties when there was a mood to write and compose romantic love songs. It was a period that was gifted with a cluster of highly talented poets, music composers and singers We had great music composers such as Himangshu Dutta, Kamal Dasgupta, his brother Subol Dasgupta and Raichand Boral who gave the most romantic tunes to the most romantic lyric written by Pronab Roy, Mohini Chowdhuri and others.
Jaganmoy Mitra commenced his journey as a singer in that period with other legends namely K.L Saigal, Pankaj Mullic, Krishnachandra De, Sudhirlal Chakravatri, Sachin Dev Burman and later joined by Hemanta Mukherjee, Dhanonjoy Bhattacharya, Akhil Bandhu Ghosh, Satinath Mukherjee and Manobendra Mukherjee. All of them have sung different types of songs, but one thing that is common amongst them is their romantic love song. Those songs have been so popular that at present the Bengali modern song market has been revitalised with a product called “Remake”. It is those immortal songs that are now being recorded again by singers of this age.
Jaganmoy, who was born in 1918,produced his first disc in 1939- Shaono Rate Jadi the very famous song of Nazrul, which also became immortal in Jaganmoy's golden voice. In addition to that, he is remembered by his countless admirers for his other evergreen hits such as Chithi (Tumi Aaj Koto Dure ), Ami Duranta Baishkhi Jhar, Premer Tajmahal, Saathti Bachor Age, Saathti Bachor Parey, Tumi ki Ekhon dekchi Swapan, Bhalobasha More Bhikhari Koreche, , Ami Dekhechi Swapan Kal Rate and many more. He sang Rabindrasangeet as well and did record his voice singing Bande Mataram twice in chorus with others.
Towards late fifties he moved to Bombay where he was popularly known as Jagmohan. He was equally famous for his songs in Hindi, Gujrati and Marathi. In a career over spanning over 40 years, he has recorded over 400 discs.
He died at the age of 85 at his residence in Bombay.
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