Indian music ranks amongst the oldest and is considered as sacred, coming from the testaments (Vedas and Upanishads) of the Gods. Births, deaths, weddings, and all occasions are marked by music. Since time ago music has played an integral role in the Indian being. He sang while sowing, harvesting, ploughing, etc and she sang while grinding grain, putting the little one to sleep, bathing the cattle, etc. The numerous festivals, turn of seasons and special dates and anniversaries being the other days of song and dance. The Indian gods play Flute, Veena, percussive instruments etc. There is a folk song for every conceivable occasion and situation of Indian life. Likewise the highly scientific system of classical music has thousands of scales (raag), categorized into the time slot and season they should be performed and heard. Some scales are believed to be associated with death, some light lamps, some cure ailments and so on.

The musical and lyrical richness of these genres have manifested themselves into a most unique genre known simply as cinema music. With the advent of the Indian 'talkie' film came the film song in 1931. It is a culmination of folk, classical, popular and theatrical influences. Although India has made a thousand commercial films every decade since then, real respectability towards the film song is a recent phenomenon. Despite the immense popularity that is. The media guided by the so called care takers of Indian classical music is mainly responsible for it's two facedness. While generations of the sub continent and other nations have soaked in the pleasures of Indian film music, it had constantly been looked down upon. The living generations, however, now openly enjoy and swear by the music that moves them.

Till recently, none of the films credited the musicians who played their background scores and songs. The music of the film may have catapulted the film's success, but other than the names of the music director, singers and lyricists, no music maker's name was declared. Their contribution as an artiste has remained invisible. This system ensured that the musicians who comprised the orchestra for the song recording were not only deprived of any conceivable royalty, immediate or accruable, but also of a name in public. The cine musicians took their payments for playing their parts and left the recording studios of old time Bombay where a bulk of the Indian films have been made. This they did day after day, playing their instruments for one hit song after another. Success and recognition came only to the music director, singer(s) and sometimes the lyricist, hoodwinking these artistes into obscurity.

Now, this system conveniently worked for the Indian film musician as there was enough work for the hordes of talented rhythm and melody players pouring into Bombay from all parts of the country. But, the late eighties saw a new dependence on electronics and computers. Keyboards and Octapads were soon replacing whole sections of the orchestra. The new digital recording technology ensured that neither were all the 100 plus musicians required together at one time, nor did one musician have to play only one instrument in a recording as before, he could play several. The largest blow to the musicians was that in time to come, most of the players of acoustic instruments like Sitar, Sarangi, Sarod, percussions, etc were forced to sit at home, not being required for recordings anymore.

Film music recordings demanded that the instrumentalist be extremely talented. As good as a classically trained artiste. He would be capable of reproducing the music pieces exactly as per the grace, amplitude and timing required otherwise the whole song would go for another 'take'. But this dexterity did not bail out the ousted cine musicians as they had no 'name' at all outside the world of cine music. There were no concert platforms available to them. Many left the expensive city, many their profession. Some took to the challenge and turned to electronic instruments, some to programming rhythms and creating tracks. The not so lucky ones drive auto rickshaws and the like.

The children of these great artistes do not play music professionally. If they do at all, then the well educated lot plays non acoustic instruments.

With exception, yester year cine artistes like Saxophonist late Manohari Singh have been recognized as legends now and have been applauded on TV and live music shows. This almost octogenarian was content performing on stage in his new 'avtaar'. But the majority of cine musicians leads a dingy, confused existence often deriding itself for not having made smart investments in it's hey days. In sharp contrast are the lives of globally acclaimed 'classical' musicians Shivkumar Sharma, Hariprasad Chourasia and Sultan Khan who led double professional careers as solo classical stage performers and as cine musicians.

With the film industry doing well now, one can hope that lessons learnt from time and technology will spur the current generation of music makers to lead better lives and output meaningful music.

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