By Ramnath N Pai Raikar
The mellifluous songs from Hindi movies dating back to the golden era when melody ruled the celluloid kingdom, namely ‘Jab jab bahar aayi’ from ‘Taqdeer’ (1967), ‘Ek pyar ka nagma hai’ from ‘Shor’ (1972) and ‘Dard-e-dil, Dard-e-jigar’ from ‘Karz’ (1980) have one common thread - the brilliantly composed tunes supported by haunting strains of violin.
And all these tunes composed by the ace music director duo, Laxmikant-Pyarelal, which have Pyarelal Ramprasad Sharma playing the violin pieces himself, further find their roots in Goa; to be precise in a Goan maestro from Majorda village - Anthony Gonsalves.
The 83-year-old musical genius, who in spite of being a Catholic possesses complete knowledge of Indian classical music, besides Western music, has the distinction of being teacher and guide to Pyarelal, and teaching him not only how to play violin, but how to be a refined person. But training disciples and creating good musicians as well as better human beings was only one aspect of this great personality.
After being felicitated by Swar Alaap, a Mumbai-based organisation dedicated to music, at an impressive ceremony held in the Metropolitan city, earlier this year, Anthonybab will now be bestowed upon with the prestigious Karmaveer Puraskaar, in the last week of this month, at Campal. Efforts are on to get his dear disciple Laxmikant to honour his Guru on the occasion. The particular award is described as a National People’s Award for Citizen, Social Justice and Action, as instituted by the Confederation of NGOs, a public-private-people partnership, in association with other partners from industry, media, government and students. The award seeks to celebrate and inspire individual citizen, social responsibility, justice and action initiatives, and are held every year on November 26, the day the Indian Constitution Pledge was signed.
The story of Anthony Prabhu Gonsalves born in 1928 begins in the serene and tranquil South Goan village, when the region was still dominated by the Portuguese colonial rule. With not much interest in studies, the mind of little Anthony was inclined towards music, and therefore he learnt the basics of music from his father, himself a choirmaster in the local church. After learning Gregorian music and assisting his father for few years, Anthony became choirmaster of the Guardian Angel Church in Sanvordem and went on to serve several other church choirs before his ambitious nature took him out of Goa to the ‘City of Dreams’ - Mumbai.
The metropolitan environment of Mumbai made Anthony realise the importance of knowing Indian classical music, thus prompting him to learn classical raagas. He soon found himself entering the world of films, playing violin for music director, Shyam Sundar who is still remembered for his Lata Mangueshkar gem, ‘Saajan ki galian chhod chaley, Dil roya aansoo beh na sakey’ from the film ‘Bazaar’ (1949). Shyam Sundar also provided total liberty to Anthony for orchestrating the music of his films and the impressive result was visible in the film ‘Dholak’ (1950).
Soon the talented Goan musician made it as an assistant to Ghulam Haidar, another highly successful music director of his time. And then he became one of the most sought after music arranger in the Hindi film industry, when the industry was in the midst of its golden period. Celebrated music director, Khemchand Prakash had Anthony by his side when he was recording ‘Aayega aanewala’ in the voice of 20-year old Lata Mangueshkar, for ‘Mahal’ (1949). Few years earlier, Anthony was contributing to the music of the film ‘Pehli Nazar’ (1945), in which legendary playback singer, Mukesh made his debut with the song, ‘Dil jalta hai’ as tuned by Anil Bishwas.
This was the time when Goans like Chic Chocolate, born Antonio Xavier Vaz in Aldona, in 1916, was assisting music director, C Ramchandra to revolutionise film music by introducing Western rhythms, while Sebastian D’Souza was assisting ‘Kings of Hindi film music’ Shankar-Jaikishan along with yet another Goan, Dattaram Wadkar. Countless people memorised, whistled and hummed the compositions of these music directors, whose names rolled in large letters on the silver screen before the movies started, but the music was actually created, the musical instruments selected and tunes arranged by our own Goan ‘Designers of Music’. It would not be an exaggeration to say that if Hindi film heroines of the melodious era sang in the voice of Goa, namely Lata Mangueshkar and Asha Bhonsle, the tunes that accompanied the golden oldies were decorated by Goan musicians.
Anthony Gonsalves became one of the busiest music arrangers in the recording studios of Mumbai during the 1950s. Legendary music director Naushad called for the services of Anthony in his musical film, ‘Dillagi’ (1949), while the ‘Rhythm King’ O P Nayyar chose Anthony’s musical skills for the B R Chopra masterpiece, ‘Naya Daur’ (1957). Some other talented music directors like Madan Mohan and Ravi also utilised expertise of Anthony in their films like ‘Haqeeqat’ (1964) and ‘Waqt’ (1965), respectively.
Craving to make additional contribution to Indian music, Anthony Gonsalves, in the year 1958 founded a 110-musician strong Indian Symphony Orchestra featuring Lata Mangueshkar and Manna Dey as soloists. The orchestra was successfully premiered in the quadrangle of St Xavier’s College in erstwhile South Bombay.
This last serious attempt to create an indigenous orchestra in the country, however, met with a failure. The efforts of the acknowledged musical genius to create symphonic music in the tradition of Indian classical music did not receive approval either from public or the government. A number of musical pieces written by Anthony Gonsalves including ‘Sonatina Indiana’ and ‘Concerto in Raag Sarang’ were either way ahead of times, or the audiences remained yet-to-be trained to appreciate the musical works.
Another unfortunate incident saw the then union minister for information and broadcasting, Dr B V Keskar stating, "Christian musicians cannot represent India." This shocking statement was in total contrast to another statement made around the same time by the then union finance minister, Dr C D Deshmukh, who had said that, "Lata Mangueshkar is a tuneful symbol of national integration." It was an irony that the Pt Jawaharlal Nehru government was making ironical statements about two great artists, incidentally both Goans, based on religion.
The nationalism of Anthony Gonsalves had become suspect due to his so called alien name and the Western music played by him, even though he had knowledge of Indian classical music. The particular issue came up when during the late 1950s Walt Disney Productions represented by its creative director Clarence Weeks was assigned the task to make India’s first animation film by the Indian government. Impressed by Anthony Gonsalves’ knowledge in both Indian as well as Western music, Mr Weeks short-listed him to score the music for the film. Unfortunately, the ministerial clearance never came and the talented musician lost the prestigious assignment. All he received was a scathing statement from the information and broadcasting minister.
y mid-1960s, Anthony Gonsalves had worked with the best of music directors in the best of films, creating the best of tunes. He also trained many students, some of whom had become independent music directors like (Laxmikant) Pyarelal and Rahul Dev Burman. Some other countries, however, took note of the Indian Symphony Orchestra, and the Dean of Syracuse University in New York invited Anthony Gonsalves to teach music at Syracuse.
In search of new musical adventure, Anthony Gonsalves accepted the offer and proceeded to Syracuse to teach music. The achievements of this Goan musician were such that he was requested to train the music faculty at the University. He trained his new students in the finer points of Indian music, and also wrote several small pieces of music, double violin concertos and two sextets with the clarinet and piano. He was further requested to send his music books to the Library of Congress in Washington, which eventually he did. The Rockefeller Foundation sponsored Anthony Gonsalves throughout his stay in the USA, thus enabling him to travel across the country and teach at various American Universities. He even did a stint in Hollywood writing music scores for films such as ‘Silk Screen’.
The pinnacle of glory for Anthony Gonsalves came when he attended the Tanglewood Music Festival and met such renowned performers as Adrian Bold and Eric Lansdorf, who saw him as a legend in the music world. Adrian Bold, in fact, approached Anthony Gonsalves and thanked him for teaching the world Indian music.
All these accolades, however, could not keep the maestro away from his motherland and he often returned to India to meet his family back in Goa as well as his friends in the Hindi film industry. Finally, he decided to permanently settle down in his picturesque native village and enjoy the music played by nature; blowing of wind, chirping of birds, sound of waves, and even silence of the moonlit night.
Saddened at the present state of film music, the maestro had once said in his interview, "Earlier, we looked for progress of music, now musicians look for financial returns."
"Today, no one is interested in promoting music for the betterment of culture, as money has become the priority," he had observed.
Unfortunately, no medium other than cinema is so exposed to (and sustained by) personality cult. Yet, fading is an unfortunate phenomenon peculiar only to the film world. The success stories of yesteryears are the forgotten personalities of today, and the celebrities of today become the non-entities of tomorrow. The meteors shine in the firmament awhile and vanish into the eternal vacuum. Fortunately, for generations to come, achievers leave their footprints on the sands of time in the form of creative outputs. Anthony Gonsalves is one such meteor, who shined brightly during the golden age of Hindi film music, and left melodious radiance behind to be enjoyed by generations to come.
