British Forum for Ethnomusicology

An Understanding between Bollywood and Hollywood? The Meaning of Hollywood-Style Music

in Hindi Films
Author(s): Anna Morcom
Source: British Journal of Ethnomusicology, Vol. 10, No. 1, Music and Meaning (2001), pp. 63-
84
Published by: British Forum for Ethnomusicology
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3060772
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ANNAMORCOM
An understanding between Bollywood
and Hollywood? The meaning of
Hollywood-style music in Hindifilms

The symphonic style of Hollywood film music has become a standard part of
the background music, and some of the instrumental sections of songs, in Hindi
films since around 1950. Music is used in both songs and backing scores to
express aspects of drama and narrative, and Hollywood-style symphonic music
and some of its distinctive techniques have become an important part of that
expression. This paper examines some examples of the use of Hollywood-style
music in Hindi films and considers what this phenomenon can tell us about the
creation of meaning and affect and the interplay of universal and culture-
specific elements.

Introduction
Since the coming of sound, virtually all commercial Hindi films have contained
songs. These "film songs" are a ubiquitous presence in urban south Asia, where
their popularity transcends most distinctions of age, class, caste and religion,
and their consumption stretches far beyond the context of their parent films.
Background music has also been used extensively in most Hindi films since the
late 1940s. Although songs are composed prior to shooting, they are arguably
as much based around the film and the scene as is the background music,
which is composed after shooting. Film directors give music directors a great
deal of information about the music that the film and the song situation require,
including details of the story, the characters and dramatic situation, the visuals
(locations, cinematography), action and timing.1
Stylistically, there is considerable overlap between song and background
score. Some sections of songs sound more like background music, breaking

I See chapter2 of my forthcomingthesis "Hindifilm songs and the cinema"for an account

of the productionprocess of Hindi film songs and chapter 3 for a discussion of the situ-
ational natureof film song style. This article is adaptedfrom partof chapter4 of that thesis,
"Music,narrativeand meaningin Hindi films".

BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGYVOL. 10/i 2001 pp. 63-84

64 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGY VOL.10/i 2001

markedly from the idiom of the song. Such sections, which serve the visuals
rather than the song as such, may be omitted from the audio version of the
songs that is released on cassette and CD. Similarly, the background score
often uses and adapts material from the songs, and some of the background
music is sometimes included on the published audio recording. Songs and
background scores of Hindi films are further linked by the fact that all song
composers also compose background scores, although as they become more
famous and hence expensive, many compose the (less high-profile) background
scores only for bigger releases.
The appearance of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films is easily traceable
to a direct influence from Hollywood2 and also to technological advances
around 1950 that made the recording of large ensembles more feasible.3 From
the point of view of meaning this usage raises two questions. First, is this
music used in the same way (i.e. are the same techniques used in the same
dramatic situations to create the same effects) as it is in Hollywood films?
Second, if it is, how is this possible if music is understood to be a culture-
specific semiological system rather than a universal language? In addressing
these questions, this article returns to an old debate concerning musical
meaning, which has revolved around the poles of musical meaning being
inherent in the sounds or arbitrary and culturally learned (see Shepherd and
Wicke 1997, chapter 1). It also leads to a consideration of the coding of foreign
and native music in Hindi films.
The assessment of musical meaning in Hindi films will be carried out
through an interpretationof the narrativecontext. This is not without problems.
Music itself is active in the creation of narrative meaning rather than just
supporting it (Cook 1998; Gorbmann 1987:14-18; Kalinak 1992:20-39);
therefore, interpreting musical meaning from narrative context is prone to
circularity, particularly when carried out by a foreign student. I have tried to
minimise this risk by focusing on scenes exemplifying emotional extremes or
"monopathic emotion" (Brooks 1991:58), which are very much a feature of the
melodrama of Hindi films (Vasudevan 1989, Thomas 1995). Furthermore,
I have tried to focus on interview material from composers and directors and
observations of music-making in the Hindi film industry carried out during
nine months of fieldwork in Bombay between 1998 and 2000. Unfortunately, it
has not been possible to carry out any formal audience research, which would
contribute greatly to this topic. Owing to space considerations, only a small
number of examples are discussed in detail here. However, this research draws
on the viewing and hearing of hundreds of Hindi films and film songs.

2 Many composers have been and are interested in Hollywood film music and Western
orchestras.KeshavraoBhole (1964), Naushad (interviews, 15 November 1998 and 20 April
1999) and JatinPandit,of the music directorduo Jatin-Lalit (interview,4 November 1998),
are just a few. See Dwyer (2000:106) and Vasudevan (1993) on various aspects of the
influence of Hollywood on Hindi films.
3 Interviews: Mr Damle (4 April 2000) and Narayan Mulani and Suresh Chandravankar
(6 March2000).
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 65

Hollywood-style music in Hindi films: some examples

Mother India (1957) is possibly the most successful film in the history of
Indian cinema.4 The story takes place in a pre-partition,pre-modem village and
follows the life of Radha (Nargis), who arrives there as a young bride. Her
mother-in-law has taken a loan from the evil and cunning Sukhilal, which
plunges the family into a desperate struggle for survival, made even worse
when Radha's husband dies. Her younger son Birju grows up rebellious, full of
anger at Sukhilal and thirsting for revenge, and Radha struggles to keep him
out of trouble. Eventually, Birju goes too far and assaults Sukhilal. In so doing
he is wounded and hides from the furious villagers. Radha tries to save Birju
but gets into trouble herself, at which point Birju saves her. When he is out of
danger, he leaves her and runs off. She runs after him, and starts to sing the
refrain, "O mere lal dajd..." ("O come to me my darling, I'll embrace you, I'll
hide you in my heart"). Both the lyrics and the visuals of the song express the
intense love of the mother for the son and her desire to protect him from harm.
This song is not based on any particular rdga, but is rdga-like and Indian in
style, possibly a mixture of several ragas.
After the last refrain, the song moves into a coda where there is a drastic
change of mood. Although Birju was running away from his mother during the
song, he kept looking back, apparently responding to her words, and appeared
vulnerable, clutching his wounded shoulder. In the coda however, he stops
looking back. As the coda begins there is a shot of Birju running along a road
towards the camera, having shaken off his mother. As he reaches close up, he
looks up slowly, glowering. We then see him grab a gun, mount a horse and
ride off with a group of young men. We see the wedding procession of Rupa,
Sukhilal's daughter whom Birju loathes and plans to abduct as revenge. Birju
rides down to where the procession is passing and draws up to the palanquin
where she is seated. The coda ends here. Whilst the song is an expression of the
mother's love for her son, the coda shows an outright rejection of this love and
a giving way to rage and is profoundly disturbing. In turning away from his
mother, the archetype of goodness in the moral universe of the Hindi film
(Thomas 1995:165-8), Birju is seen to be rejecting the most fundamental kind
of love and moral goodness and heading for certain disaster.
The coda is very much in Hollywood style. It uses a large symphonic-type
orchestra with strings, woodwind and trumpets. It is played in a loud and
heavily accented style. There is liberal use of violin tremolos in bars 11-12,
20-3 and 27-8. Extensive chromatic movement is found in the musical lines
and sequences in bars 14-18 and 26, and heavy use of the diminished 7th in
bars 13 and 20-4. There is also metrical ambiguity, with the section wavering
between a 6/8, 3/8 and in bar 26, an 8/8 feel. The musical line is mostly

4 As ticket prices increase, recent hits keep "breaking all box office records", but in real
terms, few films can rival the commercial success of Mother India or its status of all-time
classic in Hindi cinema. The only possible contenders are Kismet (Gyan Mukherjee 1943),
Mughal-e-Azam(K. Asif 1960), Sholay (Ramesh Sippy 1975), Hum Aapke Hain Koun...!
(SoorajBarjatya1994), and Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (Aditya Chopra1995).
66 BRIT ISH JO URNAL OF ETH NO MU SICOLOG Y VOL. 10/i 2001

REFRAIN
Voice my iJJi~
0ne- rel -I a gjid tu iha ko-ga le la gg It di la
6 CODA
Voice la

nmk tujhbe..chu pd I~
u O- me-re id aI ji
Strings II
10

Tptj II;~~J
Strings VWI )
14

Strings lfyg# IF I1 'i

18

Tpt ~I ~ f
Strings

23

Tpt~ 7JII ~ I
Strings ~ 7

26

Strings ~l
29

Strings' PIi 1

Figure 1 Final refrainand coda of "0 mere I/I 5 ji" (Only the violin and trumpet lines
have been transcribed, since it was not possible to hear all the parts clearly enough to
transcribethem.)
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 67

Clarinet

Bass Clarinet
tl'S:t I i
- 1X
t^ - - I It
Trumpets

i J ^. I #j 1#- J J_A: 14
Strings

Cl.
[$2-J-.#II I. J.
B. Cl.
l" r J I f #ri'
Tpts
Vt)
i: fJr I
l: tt
'
II
Figure 2 The statue scene

chromatic, full of large leaps, and unmelodic, in the sense of melody as "an
extended series of notes played in an order which is memorable and
recognizable as a discrete unit (hummable, if you will)" (Kalinak 1992:5).
A further example of Hollywood-style music in a Hindi film is a scene from
another all-time classic of Hindi cinema, Mughal-e-Azam (1960), a historical
romance telling the tragic story of the love of Emperor Akbar's son Salim
(Dilip Kumar) for the maid Anarkali (Madhubhala). In this scene where
Anarkali first meets Salim, a gift of a statue is presented to Akbar. Because the
statue was not finished in time, Anarkali had to take its place. Salim unveils
what he believes to be a statue by shooting an arrow at the clasp that fastens its
covering. This moment is filled with fear, alarm and suspense as we see an
arrow heading towards the flesh and blood heroine. During this moment, the
classical sitar music, which has been playing softly in the background
throughout the scene, suddenly changes into a loud, heavily accented phrase
built around the whole-tone scale, played in brass, clarinet, bass clarinet and
tremolo strings. There is also a prominent tritone leap between bars 4 and 5 in
the clarinet and bass clarinet, and metrical ambiguity with the move into 5/4
time in bar 3.
An example of such music in a modem Hindi film is from Raja Hindustani
(1996) in the scenes where the villains, having engineered a bitter fight
between Raja the hero (Aamir Khan) and Aarti, the heroine (Karisma Kapoor),
then present each of them in turn with forged divorce papers to try to split them
up permanently. This is a terrible moment in the film. Having seen Aarti, the
rich Bombay girl, and Raja, the small-town taxi driver, fall in love and get
married against all the odds, their separation and, worse still (particularlyin the
Indian context), the possibility of divorce seems to be going against what is
destined and what is morally right. As Aarti reads the papers a look of shock
and horror comes over her face. This is accompanied by a highly unmelodic
68 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGY VOL.10/i 2001

'LF I I----I-
4 g,JI ,1I oo
Strings
i \ t ' f Ir I

Strings
@#r #r
<T #
r^ 1
fJ 11

Figure 3 Aarti'sreaction to the divorce papers

line played loudly in the violins, with semitone intervals and leaps of major and
minor 7ths covering three octaves in two bars. It then turns into diminished 7th
and dominant 7th arpeggios.
These techniques of heavy chromaticism, diminished 7ths, augmented
scales, tritones, unmelodic lines with large, awkward leaps, tremolo strings,
and loud, accented playing in brass have been typical of scoring for strongly
disturbing scenes in commercial Hindi films since around 1950.5 Ostinatos, or
repeated motifs, are often used alongside these other techniques. What in
Hollywood are termed "stingers" - sudden loud, accented chords - are also
used to express sudden shock, such as when a character hears some appalling
news (Gorbmann 1987:88-9). Many unmusical sound effects such as screeches
and crashes are also used in scenes of terror and horror in Hindi films,
particularly since the 1970s. Combinations of these techniques have come
almost exclusively to constitute the musical vocabulary of scenes such as these
in all kinds of commercial Hindi films.
Another typical Hollywood cliche that is found in more recent Hindi films
is the use of bluesy saxophone music to accompany "unvirtuous" women
(Kalinak 1992:120-1). Such music is used in Raja Hindustani when Aarti buys
herself a skin-tight red sequined mini-dress and appears at the shop door
pouting at Raja. Of course, Aarti is not a vamp: she is the heroine, but she
looks like a vamp in this dress, which is expressed by the music. That this
outfit is unsuitable for a girl like Aarti is very clearly expressed to us by Raja's
disapproval of the dress and then a group of unsavoury characters who take
Aarti for a vamp and harass her, and whom Raja then "has to" fight. The use of
this musical cliche is very similar to that in Hollywood films. Another
particularly distinctive Western musical sound that is found in Hindi films is
that of the large symphony orchestra and "Western" (as opposed to Indian)
choruses.6 Just as in Hollywood films, they are used to create a feeling of
5 There are some earlier films which use aspects of this
style, but only in a limited way.
Before 1950 backing music was very sparse.An early example of extended chromaticismis
in a scene from Devdas (1935, Bimal Roy; music: Rai Chand Boral and Pankaj Mullick,
New Theatres,Calcutta).Devdas is in mental torment,torn between his love for his sweet-
heart,who is socially below him, and the desire to please his family, who want him to leave
her and go to Calcutta.A slow ascending chromaticscale accompaniesDevdas as he holds
his head in agony, tryingto decide what to do.
6 Both of what are termedIndianand Westernchoruses are used in Hindi film music. Indian
choruses are used mostly in songs that traditionallyuse group singing, such as wedding
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 69

largeness, an epic feeling (Gorbmann 1987:81-2). This is the case with the
scores of Mother India and Mughal-e-Azam, both epic films, which use the
symphony orchestra and Western chorus extensively.
The sound of massed strings playing melodic lines, another Hollywood
favourite, is also found ubiquitously in Hindi films. As in Hollywood, it is
commonly used as a way of signifying romance. However, this is only part of
the vocabulary of romance in both Hollywood and Hindi films. For romantic
scenes in Hindi films, melody, often in the form of a song, is accompanied by
many other instruments such as sitar, sarod, Indian flute and guitar, and in a
variety of more or less hybridised styles ranging from Indian classical, light
classical and folk to Western pop or symphonic. Furthermore,the associations
of these melodic styles is likely to be different in Hindi and Hollywood films.

Musical universals?
As these few examples illustrate, there is a degree of crossover in the use of
Hollywood-style music in Hindi and Hollywood films, which is particularly
evident in scenes of disturbance, discomfort, trauma, fear and evil. The use of
chromaticism, diminished 7ths, accents, unmelodic motifs, tritones, ostinatos,
"stingers" and so on in these scenes is so similar to their use in Hollywood
films that it would be possible for Hollywood and Bombay composers to score
for these scenes in either location.7 This is certainly not the case for other types
of scene, such as romantic scenes (whether happy, sad or erotic), celebratory
scenes such as festivals or weddings, or devotional scenes. The use of the
symphony orchestra and choruses for big-canvas, epic sound is also common to
both traditions, as is the use of the bluesy saxophone music for "bad"women.
Such a convergence of meaning is intriguing in these two contexts. How is
this apparently foreign music able to be used successfully in Hindi films?
Before jumping to any conclusions about universality, it is necessary to
investigate how these Hollywood cliches may be creating their effects in both
contexts. The Hollywood/Western context is taken here to be tonal music. For
the Indian context, I have been guided by interview material, work by other
scholars and also material from classical rdga theory, to which many film
composers - even contemporary ones - referred in discussions. Although
classical rdga music is only one part of Indian music, it is the only part that has
provided a body of theory, which makes it useful in the discussion of even
contemporary film music. Those aspects of raga theory drawn on in the dis-
cussion below relate to some of the broader melodic properties of rdga, which
are applicable to much folk music melody and, more importantly, to the

songs, devotional songs, and seasonal songs. Westernchoruses are used extensively in songs
and backgroundscore, often singing to "ah"and singing in harmony.The Westernchoruses
in the film industrymostly comprise local Christiansingers.
7 Comic scenes also share
many conventions in Hindi and Hollywood films, such as
staccato and pizzicato, but an investigationof these conventionsis beyond the scope of this
article.
70 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETH NO M US I CO LOGY VOL.10/i 2001

"Indian"modal melodies (Arnold 1991:139-41, 166-8, 173-5, 188-9) or even

the hybrid and Western melodies used in film music.
The use of bluesy saxophone music in both Hindi and Hollywood films to
mark a woman as unvirtuous is almost certainly a convention learned from
Hollywood. In Hollywood films, it may be seen as originating in the context of
American society in the early decades of sound film, where this type of music
carried for many "implications of indecency and promiscuity through its
association with so-called decadent forms such as jazz, the blues, and ragtime"
(Kalinak 1992:120). There is no reason why these musical forms would carry
such connotations in the Indian context. In Hindi films, the bluesy saxophone
may partly evoke loose sexual morals through being clearly Western in origin.
However, a lot of other classical or popular Western music is used in Hindi
films without this association.
The use of a large ensemble like the symphony orchestra and choruses for
epic feeling, grandeur and augmentation of effect may be based on an iconic
association between a large ensemble and economic power and hence grandeur.
Arnold notes how "orchestral size not only indicated musical choice or
financial well-being but became a status symbol for the music director"
(1991:175). Naushad explained to me how doubling or tripling a melodic line
in different octaves would bring grandeur to it: "this is a single melody in one
octave, and if you divide it into three octaves then a feeling of greater grandeur
will certainly come." He went on to explain the reasoning behind the use of
bigger ensembles in film music in terms of their effect of grandeur:

Previously everything used to be in one octave. Then, in order to bring a

feeling of greatergrandeur[to the music], the films startedgraduallyusing
more instruments.They took piano - piano isn't an Indianinstrument.They
took sitar togetherwith the piano; the mandolintoo. And not just that, they
took the Spanishguitartoo...
(Interview,20 April 1999).8

Anil Sharma, a contemporary producer, and director of Gadar - Ek Prem

Katha (2001), commented similarly on the use of symphony orchestras: "these
kinds of films [that] I am making, because they are big canvas films, you have
to have symphonies and those kinds of things to enhance the effects in
background and song" (interview, 15 April 1999).9 With the association of
large ensembles with economic power, it is possible that big ensembles and
choruses may be able to evoke grandeurand breadth in many cultural contexts.

8 "Single melody hai, ek octave par, aur usko tin octave me ap agar divide karenge to
grandeurzyada a jaega", and "Pahlesingle melody hoti thi. Film6 ne phir usme, usko zyada
grandeurlane ke lie, zyada instrumentka dhire dhire istemal suri kiya. Piano bhi laya, piano
to IndianinstrumentnahThai, sitarke sath piano bhl laya, mandolinbhi laya. Phir yahl nahi,
uske sath phir spanishguitarbhi laya..."
9 He also said that the ear of the Indianpublic was so tuned to Westernmusic now that they
would not accept a commercialfilm or film songs withoutany Westernmusic.
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 71

It is important to note that although the symphony orchestra is Western in

origin, its use is not necessarily perceived as Western. Naushad emphasized
that, for example, "O janewalo" from Mother India played in full orchestra is
not "Western" since the melody is Indian, based on rag Megh. Its effect,
however, is augmented and made grander by this orchestration (interview, 15
April 1999).
What of the techniques that are used in disturbing scenes in Hindi and
Hollywood films? In the context of Western tonal music, sounds that upset
tonality or cause tonal ambiguity can cause discomfort and have unpleasant
associations, such as fear, suspense, evil and so on. Rhythmic ambiguity can
also have a parallel disturbing effect (Brown 1994:8). Herrmann's music for
Hitchcock films, for example, helps to create the feelings of discomfort,
irrationality and suspense that is characteristic of these films by playing with
the normal expectations of tonality (Brown 1994:150). Extensive chromatic
movement, whole-tone scales, diminished 7ths and the tritone all upset tonal
music's means of providing stability by creating and fulfilling expectations.10
However, all these techniques can be and are used within tonal music to
provide desirable (and resolvable) tension.
Extensive chromatic movement, whole-tone scales and diminished 7ths all
upset tonality in the context of Western tonal music, but what effect do they
have in the context of Indian music? The first important point to note is that
these features do not exist in any Indian musical system. The music director
Naushad Ali explained and demonstrated how the whole-tone scale is
completely outside of the raga system: "No rag can be made in [the whole-
tone scale]", and it is only when you add a half-note interval to the whole-tone
scale that a rdga can be formed.11 He also described the whole-tone scale as
being dpka ("yours"), originating in Western and not Indian music. When I
inquired how this whole-tone scale felt to listen to, he replied that it was always
used for "effect", "where there is some distortion ... mental destruction ... you
play these notes in places like that"12(interview, 20 April 1999). It is used for
exactly this purpose in the example of the statue scene of Mughal-e-Azam
described above. Because the whole-tone scale is alien to the rdga system and
also to common genres such as film song, devotional song and wedding songs,
it can evoke discomfort or disturbance. This is a different, though parallel,
reason to why it can evoke discomfort in Western tonal music by providing
tonal ambiguity. This quality of disturbance or distortion is not universal, as
proved by the fact that the whole-tone scale appears extensively in the context
of music by Debussy and other early twentieth-century French composers that
is not normally considered to be disturbing.
Extended chromatic movement is also "foreign" to the north Indian rdga
system (Jairazbhoy 1975:48). The Hindustani gamut is theorized as comprising
10 See also Tagg (1998) for a discussion of the use of the tritone in detective music in TV
and film.
J "Ismekol rag nahl ban saktajab tak half-note nahl milaefige
ap."
12 "yeh aksar effect ke lie istemal karte haim... jaha distortion hai kuch ... mental
destruction..."
72 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGY VOL.10/i 2001

seven scale degrees, which occur as the "natural"(suddh) notes (swaras), four
"flattened" (komal) notes, and one "sharp" (tlvra) note: Sa, komal Re, suddh
Re, komal Ga, suddh Ga, Ma, tlvra Ma, Pa, komal Dha, suddh Dha, komal Ni,
suddh Ni. These can be represented in Western terms as:13 C, Dl', D, EL,E, F,
F#, G, AL,A, BL,B.
Altogether this produces twelve swarasthdns, or "note positions", which are
theoretically a semitone apart, although in practice intonation varies and is
significant to the character of rdgas.14 However, although the twelve swaras-
thans are theoretically equivalent to the chromatic scale of Western music,
notes are not conceived in this way in Indian music. They are not laid out in
theoretical works as a chromatic scale, but as the seven notes and their
flattened and sharpened variants. The chromatic scale appears in no raga and in
no common technical exercise either. Direct chromatic movement is very
limited in Indian music. Whilst rdgas do use both flat and natural, or natural
and sharp, versions of swaras, they normally do so with crooked (vakra)
motion ratherthan direct motion. For example, whereas it would be possible to
have A, BL,A, B, C in a phrase of a rdga, it would not normally be possible to
have A, BL,B, C. The normal maximum direct chromatic movement possible
would be of two semitone intervals in a row, such as B, C, DL',for example. (An
exception to this is MTyakTMalhdr, which can be performed with both komal
Ni and shuddh Ni (BL,B) in succession. MTydkrMalhdr is considered to be one
of the most "difficult" and heavy rdgas of Hindustani music, partly because of
this chromaticism.)
Extending Naushad's example of the whole-tone scale, it can also be under-
stood why direct chromatic movement can evoke disturbance and discomfort in
the Indian context, because it violates the normal logic of the rdga system and
also is not a part of the melody of film songs, wedding songs, devotional songs,
seasonal songs or other regional repertoires. Again, there is no evidence to
prove that chromaticism has some universal ability to cause discomfort, but
this capacity does appear to be common to both Western and Indian contexts.
Diminished 7ths are a well-worn way of evoking fear or dread in Western
tonal music. Again, like the whole-tone scale and extended chromatic
movement, they are alien to the rdga system. Like the whole-tone scale, the
diminished 7th arpeggio (C, EL,F#, A), contains neither the natural fourth nor
natural fifth degree of the scale. Its four notes also form two tritones, C-F# and
EL'-A,making it highly dissonant (see below). Although there are rdgas that
contain the notes of the diminished 7th arpeggio, these notes in isolation do not
form any rdga or any other kind of Indian melody.

13 Sa is the base or tonic note, and its absolute pitch is fixed accordingto the instrumentor
the singer's comfort.Where absolute pitch is not relevant,to representSa as C is convenient
because the guddh,komaland tivra swaras translateneatly into natural,flat and sharpnotes.
14 This system of twelve theoreticallyequal semitones to the octave goes back at least at
least as far as the fifteenthcenturyin Indianmusic and possibly as far back as the eighth (or
even the sixth) century(Widdess 1995, chapter8).
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 73

There is much evidence that the tritone is a dissonant interval in Indian

music. In The ragas of north Indian music, Jairazhboy refers to the interval of
the tritone as dissonant, "The half-way point of the twelve semitones of the
octave is Ma# (F#), but the dissonance of this note to the ground-note should
preclude its use as the end and beginning of a register" (1975:76). The tritone
interval found in every diatonic scale also disrupts tetrachordalequivalence, the
ability to repeat a phrase in either tetrachord, which is an important symmetry
in Indian music caused by the accompanying drones. Jairazbhoy argues that the
negotiation and balancing of this dissonance is a central dynamic in the evolu-
tion and characteristic movement of ragas (1975:76). Very few rdgas use
prominent tritone steps. One such rdga is Sri, in which the interval of komal Re
to Pa, (D; to G) is very prominent.This is considered a difficult, heavy raga.
A musical line that is not melodic, is "unhummable"and has many large,
especially dissonant intervals can be a source of discomfort in the context of
Western tonal music and is used in this way in Western film music (Kalinak
1992:5-6). Melody is an even greater focal point in Indian music than it is in
Western. In classical music, raga itself embodies melody. Folk music, such as
wedding songs, seasonal songs and devotional songs, is also melody-based, as
is film song, however Western or hybrid the tune. The use of only a few notes,
very large leaps, and the emphasis of dissonant intervals, or extended chroma-
ticism, as shown in the examples from Mother India and Raja Hindustani, will
take a musical line out of the scope of raga and also out of the scope of folk
melodies or film melodies. In this way, we can see why unmelodic lines can
evoke disturbance in the Indian context.
The tremolo is a classic means of evoking fear and suspense in Western
music. Fear, anger and upset cause the speaking and singing voice to tremble,
and so a trembling note can iconically refer to a trembling voice and evoke
these feelings. Interestingly, just as the English word "tremolo" means
"trembling", the Hindi equivalent kampan also means shaking or trembling
(from fear or cold). Ravi Shankar notes that "fury or excited anger" (raudra
rasa) as in the fury of nature "can be shown in music through many fast,
'trembling' ornaments, producing a scary, vibrating effect in the low notes"
(1964:26). However, whilst kampan and other unsteady notes evidently can be
used for negative effect in the Indian context, this is not by any means their
only possible effect. Tremolos are used extensively in the jhala section of
instrumental classical music, for example, which is not normally found to be
disturbing.
Kalinak sees ostinatos as evoking discomfort "through sheer accumulation,
a kind of musical Chinese water torture" (1992:93). Although Chinese water
torture presumably has the same effect on any human being, it is not possible,
without extensive research, to comment on the effects of its purportedmusical
version. Ostinatos are a part of much Western, African and African-American
music, where they are not necessarily considered disturbing, although a single
motif would rarely be repeated indefinitely in isolation in any of these styles,
but would more usually form a part of an overall musical texture. At this stage,
it is not possible to assess whether the use of ostinatos in Hindi films is simply
74 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGY VOL. 10/i 2001

learned from Hollywood or whether it may have a deeper, physiological reason

behind it, and indeed, if its use in Hollywood is anything more than an arbitrary
cultural code.
The use of the "stinger"or sudden, accented loud chord/sound for shock or
alarm in Hollywood and Hindi films apparently works through an identifiable
physiological mechanism. Whatever the chord or note played, it is the sudden-
ness and the loudness that provides a shock, in the same way that any sudden
unexpected, especially loud, noise can make someone jump. This seems to
parallel the startle response, which is "an invariant response in humans to a
sudden, intense stimulus, such as a loud noise like a revolver shot." This
response is found "in humans from infancy to old age, and in primates as well
as many other mammals" (Robinson 1995:55).
Although there are musical techniques common to Hollywood and Hindi
films that appear to have a physiological aspect to them, this does not
necessarily mean that they will have universal applicability. Middleton has
argued that there are gestures in music and musical expression that are linked
to the body and somatic states15and sees these gestures as "underlaidwith still
deeper generating 'gestures': kinetic patterns, cognitive maps, affective
movements" (1993:177-8). However, rather than seeing these gestures as
cross-cultural phenomena, he sees them as "deep structuresor principles which
give unity to a music culture", and even the more deeply generating "gestures"
are "probably specific to a culture too: people seem to learn to emote, to order
experience, even to move their bodies, through locally acquired conventions".
He continues by noting that according to "modern genetic theory ... it is
impossible to find, or to conceive of finding, even the smallest, the most
embryonic bit of human nature which is not already nurtured.Human nature is
always already encultured" (1993:178). However, although there can be no
assumption that a given musical element or gesture can communicate
universally even if it has a physiological basis, it does seem probable that a
musical effect is more likely to be applicable to a wider range of cultures or
contexts if its expression is rooted in a physiological response, and the more
basic the physiological response is, the more universal its potential is likely to
be. For example, it would surely be easier for any human being to learn a
sudden, loud chord/note as a code for shock rather than rdga Bahdr as
"expressing the natural beauty and joy of the spring season" (Bor 1999:28).
Tagg cites categories of "extremely general bio-acoustic types of connotation"
as musical universals, such as relationships between volume and timbre and
certain types of physical activity: "nobody yells jerky lullabies at breakneck
speed" (1993:20-2). However, without extensive cross-cultural research, it is
not possible to do anything more than speculate on these issues.
It must be emphasized that the above discussion of musical features is
meant to indicate how and why these techniques can produce these effects and
their potential to produce these effects, not that they must necessarily do so.

15 Peter Kivy introduces a similar concept of "contour" in The Corded Shell (1980;
discussed in Robinson 1994:13-22).
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 75

There are no hard and fast rules about what effects certain aspects of music
produce. Even a technique with a probable physiological basis like the "stinger"
does not have an automatic effect of shock, since there are always other factors
in the musical, cultural and performance contexts that govern a listener's
reaction and which may well be more significant than its physiological effect.
However, it is also to be noted that sounds are often used in a particularly stark
and exaggerated way in film music in order to produce relatively unambiguous
effects, which are further multiplied by using several techniques at once. This
is even more so in the music of melodramatic films, where emotions tend to be
portrayed in an extreme and "monopathic" form musically as well as through
narrative.In the example from Mother India above, there are not just a hint of
chromaticism, the diminished 7th, tremolo and unmelodic motifs but the
extended and unrelenting use of all of these techniques, which hones in on,
exploits and multiplies their individual potentials to produce an effect of
disturbance, distortion or disaster within the Indian context.
Hollywood techniques can be seen to be working in Hindi films through a
range of mechanisms. Some, like the bluesy saxophone music, appear to be
arbitrary, learned conventions. Others, such as the use of the symphony
orchestra and large choruses for grandeur may have a potential for application
in a range of cultures, due to the common association of size and scale with
wealth and grandeur. There are a number of techniques such as the stinger,
tremolo and ostinatos and various ways of manipulating pitch, tempo and
volume that may well rely at least in part on physiological gestures for their
communication. However, cultural codes and the effects of the musical and
performance contexts will still be at work, and it is impossible at this stage to
do more than speculate on their use in both Hindi and Hollywood films. Many
musical techniques, such as extended chromaticism, the whole-tone scale,
diminished 7ths, tritones and unmelodic lines are able to work similarly in both
the Indian and Western contexts owing to coincidental reference points or
compatibilities in the logic of both musical systems. Their meanings are neither
universal nor arbitrary.In the Indian context, either these techniques are recog-
nized as dissonances within the raga system or they generate discomfort by
being outside the rdga system or other forms of Indian melody altogether,
thereby constituting an antithesis of Indian music.

The coding of Indian music and raga

The compatibility in meaning of these Hollywood techniques for evoking
disturbance within Indian music explains their successful accommodation into
Hindi films. But why is raga or other types of Indian music or song not used in
scenes of disturbance or discomfort in Hindi films? And why is moving out of
the field of rdga, folk or film melody necessarily disturbing? As soon as the
focus of "O mere ladla j'd moved from the mother's love for her son to the
son's breaking away from her love and his turning to a path of wrongdoing, the
song ended, and the modal and raga-like Indian melody and Indian musical
logic in general were rapidly abandoned.
76 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUS ICOLOGY VOL. 10/i 2001

Introduction

Strings
) IJI 1II
r^JSIj^J'
- r
-
Trumpets I [-' I I r
ff
Figure 4 Introductionto MuhabbatkTjhu.thTkahani pe roye

In the statue scene from Mughal-e-Azam, when the arrow is shot, the
classical sitar music that is playing is superseded by the motif built around the
whole-tone scale. When the tension and fear of the unveiling are over and
the festive atmosphere is restored, sitar music again begins to play in the
background.
The example from Raja Hindustani is similar. When Raja is presented with
the divorce papers, after he has vented his fury his dialogue turns to one of the
strongest positive ideologies of Hindi cinema as he announces that he will
never give Aarti a divorce because for him, marriage is for life. Aarti, after the
initial shock, also ultimately announces that she will never divorce Raja, even
if he wants her to, because for her, marriage is for ever. By the time Aarti as
well as Raja has been shown to hold such an unwavering belief in love and
marriage, there is an overwhelming sense that love and goodness will triumph
and villainy will be thwarted. All traces of diminished 7ths, semitones and
unmelodic motifs vanish, and the utterly catchy song and theme tune of the
film comes in, PardesTpardesT.
Any music director will tell you that the music of songs or background
scores is made according to the film and the scene. The use of a Western idiom
in Raja Hindustani is justifiable, as it is set in the modem era, but we may well
ask why films like Mughal-e-Azam or Mother India use any sounds of non-
Indian origin at all. This is particularly so in the case of a composer who is an
avowed traditionalist. Although Naushad insists that Indian melody or raga
should be the base of film music, he admitted that there were places where it
was necessary to break a raga or move out of the scale (thdth) entirely. In a
famous song scene from Mughal-e-Azam, Anarkali is depicted in the dungeon
in chains, singing of the false nature of love in a song in rag Darbdrt,
"Muhabbat ki jhuithi kahani pe roye". The introduction to the song shows
Akbar being given an ultimatum issued by Salim to free Anarkali. Akbar,
already furious at the fact that his son is in love with a maid, is furtherincensed
by this and tosses it aside, apparently determined to thwart his son's love. The
introduction to this song, transcribed in Figure 4, uses the notes of rag
Darbari, but in a way which mostly violates the character of the raga itself
such as in the emphasis of the tritone interval Ab (strings) to D (trumpets) (bars
14-19). When I inquired why the introduction was not also in rag Darbari
proper, Naushad explained how, in a situation where background-style music16

16The introductionto Muhabbatkt jhu-thikahani is part of the song, but also similar to
backgroundmusic in termsof style and may have been composed priorto shooting.
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 77

is used for an effect alongside a song in a raga, "we put the rag aside for a
while, and we forget the scale of the rag and its emphasized notes for a short
while because we want an effect there."17The idea that pure rdga and Indian
classical music are not suitable for scenes of disturbance was also implicit in
Naushad's views on modem Hindi movies: "The move to violence-based films
has affected music, because if you make such a [violent] subject ... then where
can radgDarbdrl or radgBhupali come?"18 (interview, 20 April 1999).
The music director Vishal Bharadwaj also expressed the opinion that pure
rdga and Indian music were not usually appropriate for deeply disturbing or
unpleasant scenes. He said that the playing of solo instruments like the sitar
and sarod was "so sweet" and could not give a really bad effect. He later said
that a disturbing effect through Indian music could be possible, especially with
the use of percussion instruments or some of the "odd scales" (for instance
those that are non-diatonic, using augmented 2nds), but it was easier through
Western symphonic-style music: "nasty things and the fear and this, it's very
easy to do through Western music" (interview, 16 March 2000). The mention of
the "odd scales" of classical music to evoke disturbance is interesting.
Although these scales are a part of classical music, film songs are now never
written in them. As film music has moved further from classical music, these
scales have become increasingly marginal, and hence potentially able to evoke
disturbance in the context of Hindi films. An older music director may have
seen this differently.
Ravi Shankar, who has scored music for several Indian films, though not
commercial Hindi films, also touches on this point in a discussion of the nine
sentiments or rasas. Bhaydnak rasa (the fearful), he writes, "is difficult to
express in music through one instrument (though a symphony orchestra could
do it easily), unless there is a song text to bring out its exact meaning".
Bibhatsa rasa (the disgusting), he continues, "is also difficult to show through
music". Bibhatsa and bhaydnak rasas "are used more for drama than music"
(1964:26). It is the rasas of s'a-nta,karuna and sringdr (the peaceful, pathetic
and romantic), however, which with their "gentle and subtle qualities are
especially well suited to our music, because of their spirituality". Ravi
Shankar's score for Pather Panchali (1955) shows these beliefs put into
practice. All the music of this film is Indian, and music does not accompany
any scenes of revulsion, fear, ruin or disaster. There is no music accompanying
the long scene where little girl Durga falls ill and dies. Music returns as karuna
rasa takes over and the family grieves the loss.
Shiv Kumar Sharma is another renowned classical musician who has com-
posed music for films - in his case, commercial Hindi films. He also said that
in the rdga system, the unpleasant, disturbing emotions are not usually
expressed: "we take soft rasa in rdga system, and most of the rdgas are

17 "Vahrag ke un sur6 thori der samne rakhtehue, rag ka thath, vadi samvadT jo hoti, vah
usko thorl der ke lie bhula dete haim islie ki vaha effect cahie."
18 "Lekin vahl kuch asar music me bhi a gayi hai islie ki jab subject ap vaisa banaenige
[violent] ... to usme phirrag Darbarfya rag BhopalTkaha aega?"
78 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGY VOL.10/i 2001

expressing soft moods like romance, spiritual meditative mood, happy mood,
sad mood, not anger and repulsive mood" and that when performing music
"normally we go there to give happiness and good feeling". However, in drama
it is necessary to evoke all the moods. He explained that this could be done
with Indian music by taking several notes out of a raga or mixing several ragas
and creating discord. He gave the example of a South Indian raga, Machispalli,
that has the notes Sa, tivra-Ma, Ni (C, F#, B1) in it. In the rdga,
the notes are used in such a way they don't sound discord ... Now if you
just takejust these three notes ... this is discord. ... [A] rag must have five
notes. So if you just pick up [a] few notes from a rdg and play [them] on
differentinstruments,you will createrepulsiveness.
26 March2000)
(Interview,
This is a similar technique to Naushad's of "forgetting"the raga's structurein
order to create an effect.
The music director Uttam Singh also said it was possible to create a feel of,
say, villainy with a typically sweet, romantic rdga like Bihdg, by using clusters
of notes from the raga rather than the raga in its proper form (interview, 6
April 2000). He also said that lots of percussion could be used to produce a
disturbing effect.
Although ragas can be adapted to express disturbance, disaster etc., it is
outside their usual treatment and they would not normally be performed in this
way. However, this has not always been the case. In the Natyas'adstraBharata
lists a range of situations, emotions and moods where songs known as dhruvas
could be sung during the performance of ancient Indian drama. Lath comments
how
there seems to be hardly any shade of human feeling or nuance of a
sentiment where a dhruva could not be used ... They could be sung in
situations pregnant with turbulent emotions, whether of the pleasant or
unpleasantsort ...
(c.1975:95)

Bharata also links jdtis, early modal forms of Indian music, to different rasas
according to their predominant note, thus linking some jatis with bTbhatsa
(disgusting), bhayanak (terrifying) and raudra (angry) rasas (Widdess
1995:39). This indicates that melodic forms were believed to express all the
rasas.
Until around the end of the first millennium jdtis and ragas were primarily
associated with dramatic performance, where they presumably were used for
portraying all shades of emotion present in the drama. In Matafiga's Brhad-
desg, dating from late first millennium CE (Widdess 1995:x) ragas are linked
with "specific dramatic moods, charactersand situations". However, rdgas later
began to be given "more esoteric or religious associations, for example, with a
specific time of day, astronomical constellation, or presiding deity" (Widdess
1995:44). Modem classical Indian music is most strongly associated with
bhakti devotion, and the link with drama has become quite obscure. Classical
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 79

song texts deal overwhelmingly with romantic themes, devotional themes, such
as the praise of certain gods (dev stuti) in the case of dhrupad texts, or most
commonly a combination of the two with the parallel of romantic love for love
of God according to the bhakti devotional tradition.
However, classical or light-classical music has remained associated with a
number of dramatic forms. Nineteenth-century Marathi drama, for example,
based its music mostly on classical ragas, but also drew from various light
classical, devotional and folk styles (Ranade 1986). Whilst Ranade does not
discuss the issue of music and dramatic mood in detail, he mentions with
reference to Balgandharva, one of the greatest Marathi stage singers, that "it is
known that his contemporaries set high value in intense emotionalism in music
and realised their aim chiefly through displaying two primary colours of
musical pathos and aggression" (Ranade 1986:69). This seems to indicate that
disturbing scenes could be expressed in song (there was no backing music
in Marathi drama until the 1930s through the influence of films; Ranade
1986:85-7). Perhaps ragas not normally used to express disturbing feelings in
non-dramatic music could be used to do so in drama with the help of "a song
text to bring out [the] exact meaning", as Ravi Shankar mentioned with
reference to bhaydnak rasa in music (1964:26).
NautahkTis a traditional musical dramatic form that is sung throughout
rather than spoken and uses light classical, popular and folk genres (Hansen
1992:213-20). All types of situation must be expressed through music, acting
and lyrics. However, again, there is not enough detail on this aspect of music in
published works on NautahkTto comment on the role of music, and if, for
example, light-classical, folk or popular genres are adapted from non-dramatic
uses in order to express disturbing scenes. The memoirs of Keshavrao Bhole,
the Marathi theatre and film music composer, also indicate the use and
adaptation of Indian ragas for disturbing scenes in early Indian films. He
describes the use of rag Hin.dol in the chant from the opening scene of
Amritmanthan(1934): the film
begins in an atmosphereof fear. There is a hideous statue of the goddess,
the Priest (a "villain")and his men gatherin the dark:the Priest standingin
the middle swathed in shadow. 'Killer of demons, the victorious Goddess
Chandika',goes the prayerin slow, ominous chant
(MazheSangeet 1964, translatedexcerptsin Ranade(ed.) 1991:53).
It is perhaps the distancing of classical music from drama and its close
association with bhakti devotionalism that has caused classical music and rdga
to be mostly dissociated from emotions or moods such as fear, fury, horror or
discomfort in a modem cultural form like the Hindi film. In Hindi films, it is
music that falls outside the field of rdga that usually evokes these kinds of
emotional and dramatic states. If rdga evokes the sacred and love, then moving
out of the field of rdga can evoke disturbance, distortion, disruption or damage
to that sacred, the proper moral universe and love. It is not possible to say more
specifically what any particular piece of music that violates the field of rdga
expresses without some kind of context. We can understand that it expresses
80 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETHNOMUSICOLOGY VOL.1 0/i 2001

"some distortion ... mental destruction", but whether this is the "distortion"of
a son breaking away from his mother and goodness, a threat to the life of the
heroine, or a threat to the union of hero and heroine is specified in the context
of the scene and the film only. It is possible to tell whether we are in or out of
the field of rdga, but nothing more specific in emotional terms.
Although this discussion has referred to classical rdga, since 1970 classical
music has been used very little in Hindi films. In later films in particular,the
distinction between rdga and the antithesis of rdga can more meaningfully be
seen as one between the melodic and the unmelodic. The techniques such as
extended chromaticism, tritones, whole-tone scales and diminished 7ths, to-
gether with a lot of large leaps, such as in the example from Raja Hindustani,
disrupt not just rdga and classical melody but folk melody and film song
melody too whether they are Indian in character, hybrid or highly Western. In
the context of folk music, melody and song are not usually associated with
impending disaster, evil, destruction of good, and so on, but with devotion,
festivals, weddings and life-cycle rituals. In the context of Hindi films, songs
and melodies (in the background score or song sequences) tend to accompany
romantic scenes, or victorious scenes, where good is winning or fighting back,
as well as the same devotional, life-cycle ritual and festival contexts as folk
music. I have never seen a character singing a song that solely expresses an
emotion such as fury, revenge, terror, horror or any other disturbance of the
moral universe. If these emotions form part of a song sequence then they will
be expressed during the instrumental sections of the song rather than as a part
of the vocal melody. Furthermore,most of the singing in Hindi films is done by
the hero and heroine, the characters most associated with goodness and
upholding the moral universe. The characters most associated with the destruc-
tion of goodness, the villains, do not sing at all.19 When I inquired why a
villain such as Gabbar Singh from Sholay (1975), one of the most evil and
sadistic characters of Hindi cinema, did not sing, most people found the idea
ludicrous. Milind (of music director duo Anand-Milind) commented that "The
terror of Gabbar will go off if he sings" (interview, 3 March 2000). Music
director Uttam Singh similarly said, "he's a bad guy, he can't sing" and that if
he did, he would not seem so bad (interview, 6 April).
With this coding of melody and song in folk music and in Hindi films, it is
possible to see why something that is unsingable and antithetical to melody can
evoke disturbance, distortion and destruction of all the positive associations of
melody and song.
This coding of rdga and melody also perhaps explains how Indian per-
cussion music can be used for disturbing scenes, something many music
directors mentioned, because of the absence of rdga and melody. Indian

19 Anti-heroessing, but they are not evil like villains. They are often fighting against estab-
lished society but helping the underdog. Their behaviour is always mitigated by tragic
circumstances that have led them astray and, most importantly,by the fact that they are
never completely alienated from their mother,the embodimentof moral goodness in Hindi
films (Thomas 1995:172).
MORCOM The meaning of Hollywood-style music in Hindi films 81

percussion (tabla) is used in Pardes (1997) in the climax scene where the hero
fights with the villain. This, however, is still very unusual for a commercial
film, the only example I have come across. It is more common in art films,
which are realist in style, and not concerned with the ethos of "big screen
entertainment".

Conclusions
This paper's initial examination of the use of Hollywood techniques in Hindi
films found a considerable amount of mutual compatibility between the usage
of certain musical techniques in both Indian and Western film music. This
might be considered surprising, considering that Indian and Western musics are
usually thought of as very different or even contrasting. Although there was no
conclusive evidence that any of the other crossovers are examples of musical
universals, Nettl's words on this topic spring to mind:
There are musical systems, there are musics, but they are more readily
connected, more readily understoodat least in some respects by the novice,
than are true languages. Despite enormous variety of musics, the ways in
which people everywhere have chosen to make music are more restricted
than the boundariesof the imaginable.
(Nettl,1983:43)
Many of the "Hollywood" techniques most commonly found in Hindi films
conveniently constitute an antithesis of raga and classical melody and also film
and folk song melody, which are associated to a greater or lesser degree with
the sacred, love, romance and celebration. They can therefore be used as a
powerful means to express distortion, destruction and disturbance of these
qualities in a range of dramatic situations. It is not the fact that this music is
mostly Western in origin and probably came from Hollywood that makes it
negative in this way, but rather that it is profoundly at odds with the strongly
positively coded phenomenon of raga or melody. Although the West as
opposed to India tends to imply a threat to the moral universe in Hindi films,
there are many Western techniques such as large ensembles, harmony and
popular styles that are used without such associations in Hindi films. The use
of Western music is not consistent in any straightforwardway with the moral
coding of the West in its meaning, and it involves many more factors than there
has been space to explore here.
Although dramatic forms before sound film must have used or adapted raga
and other forms of Indian music to express these kinds of disturbances of
distortions, in Hindi films, apparently Hollywood-inspired techniques have
mostly taken over. Why modem composers usually switch into a Western
sounding idiom, borrowing from Hollywood, rather than adapting traditional
resources is not entirely clear. It is perhaps a combination of several factors.
These Hollywood cliches are highly effective in the Indian context, they cover
an area that contemporary Indian music deals little with, and they have the
added advantage of evoking grandeurwhen used in a big ensemble. Moreover,
82 BRITISH JOURNAL OF ETH NO M US I CO LOG Y VOL.1 0/i 2001

these techniques were available in scenes from Hollywood films and were
easily copied, especially given that a considerable number of musicians avail-
able in Mumbai (including Parsis and Goan Christians) were capable of
playing such music.
Aside from raising issues relating to music and meaning, this investigation
into Hollywood-style music in Hindi films also reveals that the use of Western
music in Hindi films is not just a factor of global fashions and Western or
Hollywood cultural hegemony. Although Hindi film songs are commonly
discussed as an independent tradition of popular music that has little to do with
films, the musical style of Hindi film songs and background scores, including
the level and style of Western music used, is profoundly shaped by the
cinematic and dramatic context.

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Films cited
Amrithmanthan (1934) Prabhat Films. Director, V. Shantaram; music,21
Keshavrao Bhole.
Devdas (1935) New Theatres. Director, P. C. Barua; music, Rai Chand Boral;
Pankaj Mullick.
Pather Panchali (1955) West Bengal Government. Director, Satyajit Ray;
music, Ravi Shankar.
Mother India (1957) Mehboob Production. Director, Mehboob Khan; music,
Naushad; lyrics, Shakeel Badayuni.
Mughal-e-Azam (1960) Sterling Investment Corp. Director, K. Asif; music,
Naushad; lyrics, Shakeel Badayuni.
Sholay (1975) Sippy Films. Director, Ramesh Sippy; music, R. D. Burman;
lyrics, Anand Bakshi.
Raja Hindustani (1996) TIPS Films. Director, Dharmesh Darshan; songs,
Nadeem-Shravan;background music, SurendraSodhi; lyrics, Sameer.
Pardes (1997) Mukta Arts. Director, Subhash Ghai; songs, Nadeem-Shravan;
lyrics, Anand Bakshi; background music, VanrajBhatia.

Note on the author

Anna Morcom obtained a B.A. degree in ethnomusicology and Hindi from the
School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), London University. She is
currently completing her Ph.D. on the cinematic dimension of Hindi
film songs. Aside from Indian film music, Indian music, films, and popular
culture, her interests include Hindi and Urdu language, Tibetan music,
and singing. Address: 24 Lawn Crescent, Kew, Richmond, Surrey TW9 3NS;
e-mail: annamorcom@hotmail.com

21 Unless otherwise stated, songs and background music are by the given music director.