Dwijen Mukherjee

Dwijen Mukherjee

Genres: indian classical, Soundtrack, Indian Classical Music, bangla

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About Dwijen Mukherjee

Dwijen Mukherjee (Dwijen Mukhopadhyay, 12 November 1927 - 24 December 2018) was an Indian singer and composer, with a career spanning more than six decades. He is an accomplished performer of Rabindra sangeet (songs and music composed by Rabindranath Tagore) and Bengali and Hindi film and traditional songs. He has recorded more than 1500 songs, of which about 800 are songs of Rabindranath Tagore. He has also directed music in Bengali feature films and composed music for popular Bengali songs. In the year 1944, Dwijen Mukhopadhyay made his debut as a professional singer. In 1945, he made his first recording of basic Bengali songs from Megaphone Record Company. The year 1946 was very eventful for him, as in that year, he not only started to act as an artist of All India Radio (AIR) but also started recording with HMV-Colombia Recording Company. In the year 1956, he entertained the soldiers of the Indian Army with his songs at Ladakh. Dwijen Mukhopadhyay received his training in music from eminent singers of Bengal including Shri Sushanto Lahiri, Pankaj Mullick, Santidev Ghosh, Santosh Sengupta, Anadi Ghosh Dastidar and Niharbindu Sen. Dwijen Mukhopadhyay was introduced to the folk music of Bengal, and Hindi film music, by the eminent film-music composer Salil Chowdhury. The friendship between Dwijen Mukhopadhyay and Salil Chowdhury started in the late '40s through their common association with IPTA. The duo gave the Bengali audience a number of masterpieces like "Shyamal Barani Ogo Konya", "Klanti Name Go", "Ekdin Phire Jabo Chole", "Pallabini Go Sancharini" and many others. They worked on two poems of Michael Madhusudan Dutt("Rekho Maa Dashere Mone", Ashar Cholone Bhuli") and came up with rare and beautiful tracks. Later, Dwijen Mukhopadhyay went to Mumbai to work with Salil Chowdhury and recorded duet songs with Lata Mangeshkar for Hindi films like 'Honeymoon' (1960), 'Maayaa' (1961), 'Sapan Suhaane' (1961) and solo playback in 'Madhumati'. Dwijen Mukhopadhyay was one of the foremost exponents of Rabindrasangeet. Gifted with a resonant voice, he has applied himself interpreting Tagore's songs with single-minded devotion, drawing listeners to this music within and outside Bengal. He has performed Rabindrasangeet in noted Bengali films like 'Kshudita Pashan' (1960) – a short story by Rabindranath Tagore and 'Sandhya Raag' (1977) under distinguished Music Directors Ustad Ali Akbar Khan and Pandit Ravi Shankar, respectively. His Rabindrasangeet in 'Kancher Swarga' (1963), Bon Palashir Padabali (1973), 'Wheel Chair' (1994) are landmarks. Dwijen Mukhopadhyay has also performed the famous devotional song 'Jaago Durga' as a part of the musical play 'Mahisasura Mardini' (The Annihilation of the Demon), which is a hugely popular radio programme broadcast by All India Radio (AIR), Kolkata, every year on the auspicious day of 'Mahalaya' marking the beginning of the famous autumn festival of 'Durga Puja' and may be labelled as a signature tune of the entire Bengali speaking community in the world, with a phenomenal popularity for the last 60 years. Mr. Mukhopadhyay had the privilege to sing before eminent dignitaries like Marshal Josip Broz Tito (President of Yugoslavia), Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (President of India), Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru (Prime Minister of India), Indira Gandhi (Prime Minister of India) amongst others. As a member of 'Indian Cultural Delegation', he toured Soviet Union and East European countries like Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia. He also got invited and performed in US, UK, France, Switzerland, Australia, Canada, Singapore and Bangladesh. Dwijen Mukhopadhyay was a member of the "Experts Committee" and the "Selections Committee" at Visva-Bharati Music Board in Kolkata, which was responsible to certify the purity and authenticity of Tagore songs, sung by any artiste all over the world. He was a member of the 'Expert Committee' of All India Radio (AIR), New Delhi that took national level audition of senior singers to promote them to 'Top grade Artists (Singers)' of India. He was the 'External Examiner' of the Post Graduate Course in Visva Bharati University, Shantiniketan, West Bengal, India. He has created a cultural organisation named 'Uttarayani', Kolkata, India to impart training on Rabindrasangeet. He is also the President of 'Bani Chakra College of Music', Kolkata, India. Dwijen Mukhopadhyay was one who had the rare privilege of celebrating the Birth Centenary of Rabindranath Tagore in 1961 and took active part in the celebration of the 150th Birth Anniversary of the great poet that held in 2011. Awards Year Award 1974 Bengal Film Journalists' Association – Best Male Playback Award (Bengali Film: Ban Palashir Padabali) 1982 Debabrata Biswas Memorial Award (Lifetime Achievement) 1991 Indira Gandhi Award 1992 Rajiv Gandhi Award 1994 HMV Golden Disc (On 50th year of his musical career) 1997 Indian Independence Day Golden Jubilee Award 2002 Uttam Kumar Award (Lifetime Achievement) 2003 Ananda Sangeet Puroskar (Lifetime Achievement) From – ABP (Anandabazar Patrika) 2006 Mother Teresa Millennium Award 2007 S. D. Burman Award 2007 Pracheen Kala Kendra Award, Chandigarh 2010 Reliance Big FM Award (Lifetime Achievement) 2010 Banga Bandhu Award from Bangladesh 2010 D. Lit (Hony.) by Kalyani University, West Bengal 2010 Sangeet Natak Akademi Puraskar 2010 Padma Bhushan 2011 Banga Bibhushan Dwijen Mukherjee first came into limelight due his very "Hemanta-Like" voice. Of course he was also an excellent singer and quickly established himself as an accomplished "rabindrasangeet" singer. His friendship with Salil started in the late '40s through their common association with IPTA. Hemanta was also in the IPTA at that time. His next big break came when he recorded the path breaking songs "shyamal boroni ogo kanya" and "klaanti naame go" for Salil. As a composition "shyamal boroni" was a masterpiece and "klaanti naame go" was unique. This album helped Dwijen tremendously. Its phenomenal success followed with other very successful Salil compositions such as "akdin phire jaabo chole", "pallabini go sancharini" etc. One of his rare and beautiful records must be Salil's brilliant composition of Michael Madhusudan Datta's two poems - "rekhomaa daasere mone" and "aashaar chhalane bhooli". He became a close friend of Salil and Salil later invited him to Bombay to sing in a few Hindi films notably Madhumati, Maya, Honeymoon, Jawahar,and Sapan Suhaane. For some strange reason Salil re-recorded some of Dwijen's old songs like "shyamal boroni ogo kanya" in the early '80s with disastrous results. Ignoring that quite a few of Dwijen Mukherjee's songs will always remain popular. (Source: http://www.salilda.com/nonfilmsongs/dwijen.asp )

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