Lata Mangeshkar

The late Lata Mangeshkar is one of Indian popular music and Bollywood's most prized and prolific voices, famed for her four-octave vocal range and known variously as "Queen of Melody," "Nightingale of India," and "Voice of the Millennium." Born on 28 September 1929 in Indore (in the present-day central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh), she caught the music bug early, first receving music lessons aged five under the tutelage of her father Deenanath Mangeshkar, a singer and classical theater actor. She began contributing to her father's muscial plays until he passed away prematurely of heart disease when she was just 13. Carving her own path, she broke onto India's playback scene in the late 1940s, scoring one of her first notable hits in 1949 with "Aayega Aanewaala" for the movie Mahal, and went on to become one of the country's biggest stars, amassing an immeasurable catalogue of music and singing for a glittering array of famous actresses including Geeta Bali, Nanda, Nargis, Nimmi, Nutan, Padmini, Sadhana, and Meena Shorey. According to the Guinness Book of Records and the BBC, Lata Mangeshkar made more than 25,000 recordings during a career that spanned more than seven decades. "Dekha Ek Khwab," originally sung in 1981 on the soundtrack of the film Silsila, and 1987's "Wada Na Tod," (originally featured in the Bollywood film Dil Tujhko Diya), later chosen for the 2004 American film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and its soundtrack, were among these. She continued to work throughout the 2000s and in 2001 was honoured with the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian award. Lata Mangeshkar died on 6 February, 2022 in Mumbia, India from the consequences of COVID-19. She was 92.