Now, a song for the Marathi 'manoos'

What could be termed as an ideal gift on the occasion of Marathi Bhasha Din, Labhle Amhas Bhagya Bolto Marathi, song from Marathi album Abhimaan Geet, was launched at a grand ceremony at Dadoji Konddev Stadium in Thane on Saturday.

To support the initiative by young music director Kaushal Indamdar, several reputed names in the Marathi music industry were present.

The song has been written by senior Marathi lyricist, Suresh Bhat. The participation of 112 singers, 350 chorus singers (all from different cultural backgrounds), 65 instrumentalists and 50 technicians remains the true highlight of the song. The song has been recorded at nine different studios in three cities — Thane, Mumbai and Chennai.

This initiative saw the light of the day, thanks to the Rs500 each contributed by close to 2,000 persons, artistes, technicians and Inamdar’s friends. Biswadeep Chatterjee, sound designer of Three Idiots and Rang De Basanti, has designed the song. The programme was supported by two social organisations Prerna Pratishthan and Marathi Asmita.

The most senior singer of the Abhimaan Geet is 80-year-old renowned folk artist Vitthal Umap while the youngest participant in the album is eight-year-old Mugdha Vaishampayan, runner-up of Zee Marathi channel’s Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Little Champs.

Inamdar said, “As a music director, my medium of expression is my music. So, I thought of expressing by means of this song. I hope every Marathi person makes an effort to dedicate something to the language in their own way. Besides, I also wanted to prove that a Marathi manoos from a competitive field like music can also get together to help each other.” Inamdar stated that Marathi language is among the 15 most spoken languages in the world and every Maharashtrian should be proud of it.

Some of the  artistes who have lent their voice to the song are Hariharan, Shankar Mahadevan, Aarti Anklikar Tikekar, Uttara Kelkar, Ashwinin Bhide Deshpande, Suresh Wadkar, Padmaja Fenani, Asha Khadilkar, Pandit Satyasheel Deshpande, Avdhoot Gupte, Shridhar Phadke, Sadhana Sargam, Bela Shende.