In the previous Musing, I quoted Salilda as saying,
"our raga classification is so vast that almost any melody from any part of the world can be classified as a raga or a misra-raga."
Today I present a contrary point of view, which is actually closer to my own opinion.
Recently, thanks to Pavan Jha and Falguni Trivedi Shah, I received a wonderful book titled, Hindi Film Sangeet Ka Safar, Meel Ke Patthar (Hindi), by Vijay Verma. I like the book very much and recommend everybody to get a copy. On Page 333, shown here, Vermaji says,
My translation:
In 'Dhunon Kee Yatraa' Pankaj Rag, in his well-written chapter centered on Hemant Kumar, has counted about 30 of his songs in Hindi films as based on Ragas. But here I would beg to differ a bit. The question is, did we ourselves find a Raga in an already completed song, or, the composer himself has composed the song keeping in mind that Raga? If we try to find a Raga, and do not hesitate to stretch things, we can find Ragas everywhere or we can impose Ragas on everything, but this is not meant by a song-based-on-a-Raga.
Now You Know!
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