Raichand Boral

Rai Chand Boral (19 October 1903 – 25 November 1981) was an Indian composer whom music experts have called the Bhishma Pitamah, or father of film music in India. He is widely recognized as a pioneer in Indian film music, especially for his work at New Theatres, where he helped shape early Hindi and Bengali film scores.

Early life and training

Born in Calcutta, Boral was the youngest of three sons of Lal Chand Boral, a classical musician specializing in Dhrupad. His grandfather, Nobin Chand Boral, was among the first attorneys at the Calcutta High Court and had married the youngest daughter of the wealthy Hooghly-Calcutta philanthropist Sagarlal Dutta. Boral’s training came from visiting musicians from Rampur and Gwalior, including Ustad Mushtaq Hussain Khan of the Rampur-Sahaswan gharana, tabla player Masit Khan, and sarod player Ustad Hafiz Ali Khan. He learned "Sath Sangat" on the tabla and attended music conferences in Lucknow, Allahabad, and Benares.

Career

Boral joined the Indian Broadcasting Company at its founding in 1927. In 1931, during the silent era, he moved to New Theatres to provide live music for stage performances. Alongside Pankaj Mullick, he ran the New Theatres music department, which set high standards for film music that were rarely matched afterward. Their format dominated Hindi film music for its first two to three decades.

Boral also helped shape the early career of singer K. L. Saigal. Composer Anil Biswas called Boral the "Bhishma Pitamah of film music." Boral blended the Ghazal style of North India with 19th-century Bengali tunes using string instruments. In 1935, he used playback singing in the Hindi feature film Dhoop Chhaon with the song "Main Khush Hona Chahun," featuring an all-women chorus led by Parul Ghosh, along with Suprabha Sarkar and Harimati, in a dance sequence—though playback singing had already been introduced earlier in Indian cinema, such as in Alam Ara (1931).

After moving to Bombay in 1953, he composed music for Dard-e-Dil (1953), which included songs sung by Lata Mangeshkar. He also composed music for some basic records. His last major film with New Theatres was Anjangarh (1948). Over his career, he directed music for an estimated 70 to 75 films (excluding live scores for silent movies), in both Hindi and Bengali.

In 1978, at age 75, Boral received the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in the Creative and Experimental Music category.