A singer in a class of his own, Mukesh was ranked, along with Mohammad
Rafi and Kishore Kumar, as one of the greatest male playback
singers in Bollywood history. However, his position was unique - while
Rafi was perfection incarnate and Kumar was the astonishing yodeller,
Mukesh was that man in a bar who would pour you a drink and would sing
you a song for friendships' sake. His voice held a haunting,
melancholic quality that could reach into your soul and move you to
tears.
He was born Mukesh Chand Mathur on 22 July 1923, into a small
middle-class family living in Delhi. He was first heard noticed by an
actor and distant relative, Motilal, when he sang a song at his
sister's wedding. Deeply impressed, Motilal brought him to his own
house in Bombay and had him groomed by the noted singer Pandit Jaganath
Prasad. During this time Mukesh tried his hand at acting, but his first
acting film, Nirdosh (1942), was a flop. However, he got his big break as a
singer with Pahali Nazar (1945) - picturised on Motilal, the song became a success.
Initially, his voice did seem to be imitating K.L. Saigal, but he
acquired his own style in Andaz (1949). The film, a passionate love
triangle, became a runaway hit and so did all of its songs, especially
the Mukesh solos. As well as launching Mukesh's career, it created an
association with the renowned Raj Kapoor that would last
throughout their lives. Starting with Aag (1948) all the way through to
Dharam Karam (1975), Mukesh sang for Raj Kapoor and together they produced some of
the greatest film songs in Bollywood history, most notably in Awara - Der Vagabund von Bombay (1951),
Der Prinz von Piplinagar (1955), _Anadi (1959)_, _Sangam (1964)_ and Mera Naam Joker (1970).
Life was not always that good, however. Encouraged by his success as a
singer, he made a few more attempts to make it as an star, and acted in
two films - Mashooka (1953) and Anuraag (1956). They sadly sank at the box-office. To
make matters worse, when he returned to singing he found that offers
had dried up, and his financial affairs became that, unable to afford
their school fees, his two children were thrown out of school!
Fortunately, he came back with a bang in Yahudi (1958), and two other hits
from 1958 - Madhumati (1958) and Parvarish (1958) - put him back on top as a singer to be
reckoned with. Even Sachin Dev Burman, who had not used him for a
decade, composed two classic songs for him from the films _Bambai ka Babu (1960)_ and
Bandini (1963). He flourished throughout the 1960s and early 1970s with
soulful hit songs, most notably from Anand (1971), a classic about a dying
man; Rajnigandha (1974), a middle-class love story; and Kabhie Kabhie (1976), a
cross-generation romance.
In 27 August 1976, while on a concert tour in the USA, Mukesh suffered
a sudden, sharp and fatal heart attack in Detroit. Afterwards, several
recorded songs of his came out in films released after his death, the
last being for Satyam Shivam Sundaram: Love Sublime (1978), a Raj Kapoor film. He left behind a void
that many male singers, including his own son Nitin Mukesh, have
tried to fill, but no one has managed to fill the place of such a great
singer.
Mukesh was, is and will be the only Bollywood singer to possess a
golden voice...
