MUMBAI: Naushad Ali, who passed away in Mumbai on Friday at age 86, transformed the `soundscape' of Hindi cinema with his memorable musical scores of the 1940s and 1950s. Time can be harsh with the cinematic idols of an era, and very few actors, musicians or directors retain their command over the imagination of their audience. Naushad was one of the few who did.

Instantly recognisable to Indians across generations, his tunes course through the bloodstream of popular music.

A magisterial figure whose authority derived from his classical training, Naushad was also a daring experimenter. The elegant, richly textured classicism of his music was the result of an innovative, beautifully hybrid interweaving of diverse influences. He led the way in cutting across the East-West line.

Not only did he introduce the accordion in Hindi film music, but he pioneered such unorthodox combinations as those between the mandolin and the sitar, the clarinet and the flute. He was one of the earliest Indian music directors to introduce the technique of sound mixing, with the vocal and the orchestral playback tracks recorded separately and then merged. In his quest for excellence, Naushad honed the gifts of vocalists such as Mohammed Rafi and Lata Mangeshkar, shepherding them towards popular acclaim.

Naushad's abiding contribution to Hindi cinema was his translation of classical Hindustani music for a mass audience. He invited the distinguished Hindustani vocalists Ustad Amir Khan and Pandit D.V. Paluskar to sing for Baiju Bawra (1950), a period film that tells the tale of a Mughal musician. He also persuaded the celebrated Bade Ghulam Ali Khan to lend his voice for K Asif's spectacular Mughal-e-Azam (1960).

Naushad's ability to draw on a spectrum of sources may be traced back to his early musical training. Born on December 25, 1919, he grew up in Lucknow. There, as a child, he would be transported into ecstasies by the live orchestras that accompanied the films of the silent era. Later, he was initiated into Hindustani classical music by three teachers: Ustad Ghurbat Ali, Ustad Yusuf Ali and Ustad Babban Saheb. He was also exposed to Western music. While making a living repairing harmoniums, he composed for amateur theatrical companies such as the Windsor Music Entertainers.

The lights of the big city beckoned Naushad in the late 1930s, and he moved to Mumbai in the hope of making his way as a musician in the movies. Success did not favour him at once, and he often found himself homeless and hungry. His fortunes improved when he joined the music director Khemchand Prakash as an assistant. Naushad composed his first independent score for the 1940 film Prem Nagar, but was noticed only two years later, for Sharda, for which the 13-year-old Suraiya sang for the female lead. It was Ratan (1944) that catapulted Naushad into the firmament of Indian cinema, establishing him as the most sought-after and highest-paid music director.

Naushad's finely calibrated music, attentive to the weight of phrase and lilt of cadence, was in consonance with the lyrics of the time. These were often written by Urdu poets such as Kaifi Azmi, Shakeel Badayuni and Majrooh Sultanpuri.

In a career that spanned more than six decades, Naushad provided music for 66 films. He worked with such major directors as Mehboob Khan, A.R. Kardar, Kamal Amrohi and K. Asif. For about 20 years he reigned supreme, recording a series of successes including Anmol Ghadi and Shah Jehan (both 1946); Eilaan and Dard (both 1947); Anokhi Ada (1948); Dillagi, Dulari, Andaaz, Mahal and Barsaat (all 1949, easily Naushad's annus mirabilis); Babul (1950); Udan Khatola (1955); Mother India (1957); Ganga Jamuna (1961); and Mere Mehboob (1963).

The 1960s and 1970s brought other sounds into Indian cinema: syncopations, disruptions and simplifications that offended the refined sensibility of a composer who could meld the classical with the folk, Hindustani with Western, but who would not acquiesce in a vulgarisation of taste. Although Naushad emerged from a long silence to compose the music for Akbar Khan's Taj Mahal: An Eternal Love Story (2005), his last great score was written for Kamal Amrohi and Meena Kumari's Pakeezah (1972). Pakeezah brought together all the themes that distinguished the kind of cinema with which he had been associated: ethereal beauty holding feudal decadence in counterpoint, the survival of refinement in the face of brutality, the redemption of tragedy by grace. It is for these qualities that Naushad's music will be remembered.

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