A 51-year old, evergreen song that was a hit in Hindi, and in Bengali.
I am, right now, teaching two friend this Hindi song, that Latha Mangeshkar sang… “O SajnA” in 1960, for the movie “Parakh”:
I don’t need to write down the Hindi words as the words are clear, and the translation, a pretty good one, appears on the video.
But Lata also rendered a Bengali song to the same tune and music on the same soundtrack:
(because the embedding is disabled)..this gives the Bengali version, followed by the Hindi one.
Or listen to the Bengali version and follow the lyrics here:
The Bengali lyrics are:
nA, jEO nA… rojoni ekhonO bAkI ArO kIchU dithE bAkI bolE rAt jAgA pAkhI nA…jEO nA…
Ami jE thumArI shudhU jIbOnE morONE (2) dhoriyA rAkhItE chAhI noyOnE noyOnE.. (nA…jEO nA…)
jE kothA bolithE bAjE jE byethA morOmE kAndE shE kothA bolithE OgO dAO..
jibonO rojonI jAnI emonI pOhAbE(2) chAndErO torONI thUmI shudurE milAbE…(nA…jEO nA…)
says, “The combination of Salil Chowdhury and Lata Mangeshkar changed the course of modern Bengali song for ever. The song ‘na jeo na’ became one of the most important and most beautiful Bengali songs in history. Bengalees were thrilled to get Lata singing Bengali songs with practically flawless accent. She became one of them and the wonderful songs Salil composed for Lata during the next three decades still remain possibly the most melodic and lyrical Bengali modern songs.”
What a wonderful song! The raag is Khamaj…and the music director is Salil Chaudhury