Diamonds Forever: Rajesh Khanna’s songs relive his golden moments

Nagpur: The soulful songs, soothing music, serene locales and romantic reel stories picturized on Rajesh Khanna were rekindled by singers of Shri Siddhivinayak Publicity at a musical extravaganza titled ‘Diamonds Forever: Unforgettable Melodies of Rajesh Khanna’, on Sunday. The concert was held at Deshpande Hall, Civil Lines.

Conceived and developed by Samir Pandit, the programme featured singers like Sagar Madhumatke, Arvind Patil, Sarang Joshi, Shreya Kharabe and Sonali Dixit. The host for the evening, Manoj Salpekar, entertained the audience as he shared anecdotes from the actor’s life, who was fondly known as ‘the first superstar of Hindi cinema’.

Kharabe and Joshi set the tone with ‘Jab andhera hota hai’. ‘Zuban pe dard bhari’ was next by Patil. Madhumatke teased the nostalgic vibe with his rendition of popular songs ‘Mere sapno ki rani’ and ‘Chala jaata hu kisi ki dhun mein’. He went on to perform crowd-pleasing songs like ‘Mere dil mein aaj kya hai’, ‘Roop tera mastana’. His medley of songs ‘Woh shaam kuch ajeeb thi’, ‘Kuch toh log kahenge’, ‘Mere naina sawan bhadon’ and ‘Diye jalte hai’ was the highlight of the show.

Joshi’s performance on ‘Pyaar deewana hota hai’ and Patil’s presentation of ‘Kahin door jab din dhal jaye’ were celebrated among the listeners with smiles and rounds of applause. Kharabe and Joshi returned to stage with their second duet on ‘Bheegi bheegi raaton mein’. Dixit’s performance on ‘Na jane kya hua’ was well-received.

Other songs like ‘Jis gali mein tera ghar’, ‘Chandni raat mein’, ‘Hazaar rahen mud ke’, ‘O mere dil ke chain’, ‘Maine tere liye hi’, ‘Gun guna rahe hai bhanwre’, ‘Aate jaate khoobsurat awara’, ‘Hum dono do premi’ and ‘Chhup gaye saare nazare’ relived the magic of that era.

The show concluded on a dynamic note with the songs ‘Jai jai Shiv Shankar’, ‘Zindagi pyaar ka geet hai’ and ‘Mere sang sang aaya’.

The singers were accompanied by Raja Rathod on the keyboard, Gaurav Tanksale on the rhythm guitar, Ritesh Trivedi on the lead guitar, Nandu Gohane on the octopad, Prashant Nagmote on the tabla and Dholak player Nitin Janware. The technicians were Abhishek Lilhore, Mithun Mitra and Rajesh Amin.

Quotes

Siddhivinayak’s programmes are amazing. I have been a regular visitor at their concerts. This was also a nice programme

Sudhakar Pasari | Journalist

I always love going to these programmes. Today’s was a great one with slew of melodious singers giving their best

Siddhi Joshi | Student

A very well organized programme and was a good source of entertainment to the audience

Abhay Balde | Self-employed

(Interviews by Shwetal Kothari)

ends