Bappi Lahiri and Lata Mangeshkar – two iconic legends in their own right from the Indian music scene, who both passed away earlier this month.
This fateful tragedy is not the only thing that was shared by the two. Bappi, who was a distant relative of legendary singer Kishore Kumar, shared a bond with the iconic songstress, starting from his early career in showbiz.
In a past interview, Bappi had once revealed how it was only because of someone like Lata Mangeshkar singing one of his first tunes as a composer, that brought stability in the kickstart of his career in Bollywood and helped him establish himself.
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In a 2012 interview with ETimes, Bappi was quoted telling:
“I was 4 when in the Eden Garden locality of Kolkata where we lived, Lataji came home and blessed me. I still have a picture of me sitting in her lap. She sang many Bangla songs for my father (Aparesh Lahiri) who was a well-known composer in Kolkata. From then on she has supported me. She sang my first composition in a Bengali film Daadu. If she hadn’t sung for me, I’d have been swept away by the competition.”
Lata Mangeshkar and Bappi Lahiri continued to share this mutual admiration as the two worked again on several occasions, as Bappi slowly transformed himself into the ‘King of Disco’ in 80’s Bollywood.
Here is one of the few songs they recorded with each other:
Bappi Lahiri breathed his last on 15 February 2022 at Mumbai’s CritiCare Hospital in Juhu, while Lata Mangeshkar passed away on 6 February 2022.