LEXINGTON, MA— Aashiq-e-Sadabahar, the musical show produced by Mohan Subramaniam and five other local singers, brought the Bollywood’s silver screen romance alive at the packed auditorium of Scottish Rite Masonic Museum in Lexington last weekend.
The show also debuted a new local singer: Ashwini Paranjape, who beautifully rendered Jaanewaale se mulaakaat na hone paai, Dil ki dil hi men rahi baat na hone paai from Amar (1954). Other singers were Mr. Subramaniam, Sowmya Shri, Raghu Saranathan, Nidhi Tare Lad and Hemant Patkar.
The theme-based musical program focused on Bollywood’s romantic couples. Mr. Subramaniam and his physician wife, Meera, have carved a special niche in producing sold-out theme-based musical programs in Boston.
Aashiq-e-Sadabahar followed the tradition of several of their previous hits such as Awaaz-e-Jazbaat Shankar Jaikishan ke Saath, A Musical Journey with Hrishikesh Mukherjee, Badshah-e-Romance and Khandan-e-Kapoor, among others.
In Aashiq-e-Sadabahar, however, Subramaniams tried something different.
“Over the last few shows we have consistently heard from our audience that they would prefer listening to more songs from us. This year, we finetuned our program to do just that and had 4-5 songs more than what we usually present,” Mr. Subramaniam told INDIA New England News.”
Subramaniams also managed to get popular radio announcer Ameen Sayani, who had presented super hit Binaca Geetmala for decades in India and across South Asia, to introduce several segments and items through his voice.
“We were also fortunate to have Ameen Sayani, bringing to the program an aura that is unmatched, along with some lovely and unique personal anecdotes of his own interactions with the iconic stars featured in our show,” said Mr. Subramaniam. “We truly focused on music and its nostalgia and brought emotional warmth through music, the singing, and some delectable film clips rather than talking about the songs.”
Some of the iconic couples featured at Aashiq-e-Sadabahar included Raj Kapoor-Nargis, Dilip Kumar-Vaijayanti Mala, Dev Anand –Waheeda, Rajesh Khanna-Mumtaz, Amitabh-Rekha and Sharukh-Kaajol.
The core organizing committee of the program consisted of Dr. Meera Subramaniam, MD, Dr. Manju Sheth, MD, Harish Dang, Eshani Shah, Jharna Madan and Preetesh Shrivastava.
Here is the list of songs performed at the Aashiq-e-Sadabahar:
Dam bhar jo udhar
Piya tose naina
Shokhiyon mein
Uden jab jab zulfein teri
Ameen Sayani on Sharmila and Rajesh
Mere dil mein aaj
Yunhi tum mujhse baat karti ho
Pardesiya
Tujhe dekha to ye jaana
Koi haseena jab rooth jaati hai
Pyar kiya to
Ankhon ki gustakhiyan
Aaja sanam madhur
Chaudwin ka chaand
Dekha ek khwab to
Humsafar mere humsafar
Jaane wale se mulaqat
Din dhal jaaye
Theheriye hosh mein aa loon
O mere sona
Dil jo na keh saka
Ram kare
Aaja panchi akela hai
Ek main ek tu
Gir gaya jhumka
Teri Bindiya
Abhi na Jao chhod kar.
