Nadeem of the Nadeem-Shravan duo remembers S P Balasubrahmanyam

Nadeem-Shravan’s compositions from

Saajan

, a romantic drama from the 1990s, featuring Sanjay Dutt, Madhuri Dixit and Salman Khan, are still hummed by patrons. Songs like Dekha Hai Pehli Baar, Bahut Pyaar Karte Hain Tumko Sanam and Pehli Baar Mile Hain are counted among the romantic hits of all-time. The songs have been somewhat orphaned today with singer SP Balasubhramanyam’s demise in Chennai this afternoon. He had sung these songs which went on to become chartbusters.
Nadeem Saifi, one half of the Nadeem-Shravan duo, spoke to Bombay Times from London. He said, “Baluji... I fondly called him that. It’s very difficult to stomach the shocking news that he is no more. These are artistes that are absolutely irreplaceable. They are once in a lifetime. Talent such as Baluji are rarely made in God’s factory. They are a select few. My interaction with him only made me feel that success never hit him. He was a humble man, soft-spoken, very popular and extremely down-to-earth. If my memory serves me right, we were recording Dekha Hai Pehli Baar on the New Year’s eve that year. Saajan went on to become one of the top albums of all-times but at that time, we were working on New Year’s Eve. The mood all over the city was celebratory. It was a celebratory mood in the studio also -- Baluji was recording an exciting song. That song found its place in cinema history. Baluji was instrumental in so many such hits in his career. To this day, I still hum the songs from Saajan. It flows out of my soul. Each time I hum Pehli Baar Mile Hain, I have an image of Baluji on the mic. That goes with the other songs he recorded for Shravan and me. Baluji was an actor and he used his acting chops well with his singing. He almost enacted the songs while singing them. It just elevated Salman’s performance. We don’t realise the importance of a song in our day to day lives. Songs lend themselves to every emotional turn in our lives. Only great melodies have the power to do that; and great songs need great songs. Baluji, Mohamed Rafi, Kishore Kumar, Manna Dey, Hemant Kumar -- genuises whose legacies need to be preserved by all of us.”