'Dilruba' or 'Disco Dilruba' is from Anil Films 1982 'Partner' starring Deepti Naval and Kanwaljeet with Kalpana Iyer. The story is romance and somehow, this wonderful hybrid East-West disco song threads the story along in the movie.
ORCHESTRATION
The song is a pastiche [piece in the style of] on Boney M.s 1981 disco song 'One Way Ticket To The Moon' by Indian Music Director Vijay Singh, but totally 'Indian-ised' in the process to become something completely new and fresh. The singer is Sharon Prabakhar and she gives a new lower pitched 'disco' sound to the 80s song that was uncommon at the time. The voice is quite 'raunchy' and fun. The English, "Ooh My Heart is Burning" and "Baby let your love light shine" are quite cheesy but make the song very memorable at the same time. The lyrics are quite empty about "Dilruba" but make a great dancing tune for the scene.
There is a western song form [Verse-Chorus-Bridges etc.] and a lot of repetition of lines.
The treatment of 'disco' by Indian monody-based [melody] composers is very interesting.
The ensemble includes a typical MIDI keyboard driven by an early MIDI sequencer. This makes only occasional ostinatos [repeated figures played in bass and treble over and over] - but the ostinatos disappear and reappear and are too fast to be played by a human player, thus unnatural. The bass ostinato is quite quite high in pitch and only sprinkled over the piece periodically but not constantly as would be found in a harmonic western song.
The texture is mostly thin and curiously uses real drum kit and accoustic [non-electric] percussion [instruments you hit]. This sound cuts a fresh biting sound through the heavily reverb [electronic echo] of Prabakhar's voice. There use of a treble electric guitar but it is a soloist giving an eccentric spattering of syncopated [off-beat] patterns under the singing.
The most wonderful and memorable part of 'Dilruba' is the antiphonal [interaction between two parts] low electric guitar single note on-beat tune then 'answered' by the repeated figure in doubled tablas. Sheer genius and a great motif [recognisable little bit] of this great song!
The female backing vocals give the listener a break from the soloist's singing and express great fun of the performers and composers working with a foreign music form that they are exploring and not too sure of how to pull off.
VIDEO
This is the most iconic visualisation. Every single shot of this song is identifiable as this 'Dilruba' song. The costume of Kalpna Iyer is fashioned a little on Middle Eastern Belly Dance, but still Indian film 'carbaret' style. The girls in shorts and severe brushed back hair seems inconguous with Kalpana yet this is very memorable.
Kalpana Iyer is very un-selfconscious and the cabaret dance is just superb. Kalpana's make up is heavy 80s style mixed with a little Indian traditional ideas of make up. The eyebrows are so heavy, the lips to red. She is a chocolate box to the eye.
The filming works extremely well. Strangely, like many 80s films, the song shots do not match up or have much 'continuity' of scene but that only thrills more. A lot of experimenting with the camera with close ups, underneath shots [Kalpana belly dance shot from underneath 'sailing backwards' is fabulous on the big screen!]. The eye is awash with lots of varied and unpredictable shots that unfold in an interesting way right up to the end of the song and engage the audience. The monotony of the lyrics is offset by clever filming.
The use of the lovely big bearded customer brings a sort of 'normalising' to the strange 'out of this world' scene we are presented in an imaginary nightclub and the whole fun interaction between Kalpana Iyer and the gentleman are charming and fun.
