Zee Marathi – One week of little champs wasted

We all knew that Radhika Nande was definitely not the candidate to be selected in the final 4-5. Last time I wrote about the mockery of call back episode on Zee Marathi Saregamapa Little Champs. It is really proved beyond doubt that earlier decision to move Radhika out of competition was right. In this whole process now we have lost one more week and the telecom companies have gained additional revenue.

What has surprised me even more is the % of SMS messages Avanti Patel has got in last few weeks. She is getting almost 2.5 to 3 times of Mugdha who was supposedly SMS champ. This is mind boggling. This is once again proving that SMS is a fraudulent mechanism to prove merit.

One of the quickest suggestion I can give is to enforce one vote per telephone number. Now someone can say that we want one vote per family member but in today’s time almost every senior family member has a cell phone and 1-1 ratio can be moved up to let’s say 2-1. But there has to be some limit. This will ensure that there is no rigging and the wealthy or unnecessarily passionate people wont be able to chose less talented contestant.

I am also surprised that Arya & Prathamesh, despite singing extremely well and consistently all along are not getting enough share of SMS messages. I am their fan but I wont go overboard and pay the telecom companies. I will generally vote only 2-3 times once in two weeks and I am sure there will be many like me who will talk, write and support these children but will not rig the competition. Hopefully my above suggestion will bring some fairness to the entire system. If that happens I will feel positive about voting every week.

Reality TV hates creamy layer

If you are fan of reality TV or not, you can not escape it these days. Almost all television channels depend completely on reality TV. Despite all of these shows people are taken far away from reality but that is another point. May be some other day.

I have been keenly following some of the music competitions for quite some time now. Earlier it was Hindi Saregama which then turned into Saregamapa. I lost interest the day my dear Sonu Nigam left that show. Shaan did a decent job after couple of other hosts but it really did not get my eye balls like earlier. I followed Indian Idol for few episodes and I am sure you all must be following some such show or other. My top favorite these days is Zee Marathi Saregamapa Little Champs and it is but obvious from all my previous posts. What I have observed in the last so many seasons of this program and like wise other programs is that now the times have changed so much that if you are from a well to do family, have got good upbringing, you are well natured, well cultured in short you have the best one can ask for in life, you should not participate in reality television. They will not only hate you, they will hide that hate, they will praise you to begin with because they cannot ignore you but finally they will dump you like trash. Also remember, if you are not one of these and you win, you become part of the creamy layer and then they will dump you.

Now to support my arguments just have a look at these examples: 1. Zee Marathi Saregamapa season 1 – Anagha Dhomse had a personal tragedy. She show courage to stand up to that and I really appreciate it. But was she really the best of the lot? I still feel that Anandi Joshi was really good. But she was consistently hammered by the judges. Same may be case with Mangesh Borgaonkar 2. Saregamapa’s last season – Sayali Panse and Sayali Oak both got lower numbers to some extent due to their good background. 3. In current Little champs, Shalmali, Arya, Prathamesh are getting hit because of their background. Prathamesh is not really hit that hard but Arya is definitely. Kartiki is getting promoted to some extent because of her background. Same is case with Rohit Raut.

I definitely *do not* want to say that the fault lies with the contestants. They are really great talent and they are putting their best foot forward. I have not seen any of the contestants in Zee Marathi taking advantage of their background yet. May be there are some persons spending on the SMSes to promote the non deserving but then that is what is the point. The situation in Hindi is far worse. I have recently started following Hindi Saregamapa once again primarily because of Vaishali and Shankar Mahadevan. To my surprise, I found the story of Vaishali, her husbands illness and her tearful eyes all being used to promote the serial. In earlier days these were part of the media news and gossip but today it has become part of the mainstream event. I am not sure if all this was done purposefully or is it real. But how come every show has such story? It is no longer just the music competition. You have to compete on your background, your family, your emotions. In short it has to be a complete competition. What is the reason for Asma Mohd. Rafi to be in Hindi Saregamapa? She is a complete package of entertainment. Who cares about how well she sings? She is from a gulf country, she is from minority community in India, she makes you laugh, she has fought with her mother to participate in this competition, she can also sing without being ashamed of her bad sur and still has will to be in the competition. What more masala you want for a reality TV?

I don’t have to really write about how SMS and the commerce around it has changed the television industry. Ample has been written and will be written and nothing will change till people get sick of sending SMS and stop sending them. What hurts me more is that there is no place for a person with smooth life who has equal will power, has taken equal effort and has equal talent to survive in this situation. I am not able to forget the expression on Arya Ambekar’s face when one after the other, Suresh Wadkar, Vaishali and Avadhoot started dissection of her beautifully sung “Jahalya kahi chuka”

May be she was half note high, may be she was little fast but she did not lose control of that song even a bit. I never felt what Suresh Wadkar felt while I was listening. For her age she is just too good. I have been to my daughter’s annual social and I just could not stop appreciating these little champs (All of them and not just Arya) after I heard the school’s best talent singing. Not that the school children were bad but these little champs are ALL OF THEM are well ahead of the crowd. When you have gone miles ahead and only one of you gets beating for not doing that last one centimeter of the 100 meter race, I feel that it is unjust to do it in public. They could have done it after the show. I also feel same was the case with Prathamesh as well but not as serious as Arya.

Now the question is should I vote for Arya or not? If I will, I am paying the telcom company and not sure if the channel really cares about it. If I don’t I am not supporting my favorite little princess sent by God. What are you doing? Do we have enough evidence to trust Zee Marathi? I don’t have it for any other Hindi channel at all but being from my Marathi culture, I would like all Marathi channels to build that trust that they are driven by principles and not by money. If they care about our votes, they should care about our emotions too isn’t it. They are not like politicians… or are they??? I am confused…

Zee Marathi Saregamapa – Mockery of callback

Did you see yesterday’s callback episode? I was completely frustrated since the beginning. We all were waiting to see the finalists like Ketaki mategaonkar, Shalmali Sukhtankar, Shamika Bhide, Kartiki Gaikwad and not so keen on Sagar Phadake, Radhika Nande and Neha Karmakar. Yesterday itself when Shamika was out of the competition, one more down due to good voting to Rohit Raut who is in parallel improving his singing skills, she was not crying because she was going to appear on the callback next day. But then suddenly we saw only three of the seven and announcement that two of them will go ahead!!! What!!!! I said.

Though Pallavi cleared that the rest 4 did not come due to personal reasons, it was not convincing enough. After all a day before Shamika says she will be there tomorrow and the next day she is not there! Who in the world will lose such an opportunity! Things look suspicious here. However the episode went well with a great contribution from Honorable Yashwant Deo. His comments were really guiding at the same time had perfect balance to tell you who is where. Kartiki’s first song looked like it is copied from some Hindi song but then it was sung by Dnyaneshwar Meshram – another Saregamapa champ. She sang with lot of energy which I felt was unnecessary but for her age she was good. Radhika Nande was a complete surprise. Although she still needs lot of work on pronunciation, her singing has really improved and she was showing that she is not going to go without a tough fight. Shalmali as usual was great but the comments given by Yashwantji were really apt asking her to reduce some of the over expression. I personally feel that with lot of emphasis from Avadhoot & Vaishali on expression, these children are trying to bring that in without really understanding it. Same is happening with Arya Ambekar as well, I feel. With this guidance, they should be able to come back to normal.

But in the finals, the entire result was a great disappointment. It was difficult to send one person back so the start itself was on wrong footing. With great singing from Radhika, the decision was even tougher. Finally when all were declared winners, I said, why bother with the 1.5 hour episode? They could have straight away declared that result in the beginning. I was also surprised that Kartiki went ahead straight and there was a tie between the remaining two. All in all I felt that because of public pressure, zee had already decided that Shalmali and Kartiki need to go ahead. And I guess when they declared that two of the contestants will go ahead, those who did not agree with it or read between the lines simply dropped off calling it waste of time. Zee Marathi needs to come up with lot of explanation. Off course if they feel responsible. Like Deo saheb said, in old times, Radio officers would ask them even if the recordings were short by 1.5 minute. I feel the same commitment should come from Saregamapa Little Champs’ producer/director.

Zee Marathi Saregamapa – Arya Ambekar pays a great tribute

I know I am a bit late on this but today I got a mail for my You Tube subscription. Our friend ahonkan is back again and he posted all the videos of the tribute given by our

Saregamapa Little champs and I was once againg zapped. Saregamapa team did a wonderful job in paying a great tribute to our heroes. No other channel or program I saw that (except news channels off course) did an episode like this. I concept was really touching our heart and the execution superb.

While every little champ sang from bottom of their heart, it was Arya Ambekar who won our hearts. Not because she is from my home town but she was outstanding. Watch this for instance… “वंदे मातरम्”

And the others too. No wonder Pt. Hridaynath called her Aryaputra. Here is another one… “ए मेरे वतन के लोगों”

The start from Prathamesh was also equally good. “शूरा मी वंदिले”. But he did not get much opportunity after that. Since this was not a competition, it is not fair to judge the children but I am and my entire family is Arya’s fan. I wish we also had Shalmali Sukhtankar in that episode. We all miss you Shalmali. On the second day we felt that even more when they showed best of finals. I hope she will be back after the callback episode.

UPDATE [9th February]

Satish Rajwade’s Director’s Cut – Asambhav takes new turn

Ever since Satish Rajwade has returned back from his so called break/ vacation whatever, Asambhav is now back on track. Characters have become alive, seen doing something rather than just talking something emotional. Earlier the total time of 20+ minutes used to have only 2 minutes of action taking the story forward. Now as Inspector Vikrant Bhosale has spun his net around Sulekha, we are discovering new twists to the story every few days.

What makes Satish separate from other directors is his grip on the content. In one of his interviews quite a long time back, he had said that you will not find a shot which is not required in Asambhav. Well! that did not hold true all the time but once he is back we are seeing it getting realized again and again. I had thought that his return to the serial was unnecessarily made dramatic and glorifying the character just because he is director. But with yesterdays first session of interrogation of Sulekha it seems that I was wrong.

BTW, what an episode was that. Although, I don’t see soaps much, I doubt if there is any episode in history of Indian soaps where only two characters have carried an entire episode on their shoulders. Though Satish had story behind him making him a hero, what a performance from Nilam Shirke. Hats off to her. Outside Asambhav & Zee Marathi, Nilam tries to tell the world that she is not really a natural fit for vamp roles and she can play various characters. She is always projecting herself as lively bubbly character. But then poor lady! her super performance is typecasting her in a villain’s role. She will really need a big serial with real positive character to change her image. But I like her this way as well, why change? The reason could be she is good in comedy too.

What has happened over past few months now is that we have completely forgotten that when Asambhav started, Adinath & Shubhra were the leads of this serial. Today that equation seems to have changed and now it looks as if it is Vikrant and Priya are the leads. All along these two years, Shubhra’s character has been the most dumb one. Despite having powers to get clues to the future, she just does not do anything but make scared faces. Despite all this, Urmila Kanetkar is a big find. The way she changes from Shubhra to Sulekha or Shubhra to Parvati is something that needs great skills. The difference in Shubhra and Parvati’s character is also shown without loud acting. All those hero heroines doing double roles must take few lessons from Urmila. Nilam on the other hand has benefit of having vary contrasting characters and she has done that superbly as well. But I would rank Urmila one point above.

Anyways, this being my first post on Asambhav, its bit too lengthy. Will stop here and go watch today’s episode. 🙂

Shankar Mahadevan – You rocked on Zee Marathi Saregamapa

What an episode man… one after the other the Saregamapa Little Champs went on singing and finally Shankar took the entire episode to its pinnacle. Initially when Shankar started praising everyone and forcing Avadhoot and Vaishali to give ni to everyone, I was saying come on Shankar this is not Hindi Saregamapa. Not everyone gets history here. In fact what I liked the most is Prathamesh Laghate alias PL told Vaishali that he is OK with less marks. That is real Marathi manoos man. We know what we are and where we are. But after the first round, the champs settled down and the effect of the praise they got started showing off. Even Kartiki who is generally not as good sang extremely well. Mugdha was also good. But I liked Arya & for a change Shamika. Arya in my opinion was the best performer of the day. Shamika’s marathi rendering was one of the best I have heard from her till date. How much I missed Shalmali… It would have been a great episode with her. But…

Shankar is one of the performers who says the best words for all who sing in front of him. He cheers them. Gives them standing ovation and everything he can. But when it comes to singing, he is just unbeatable. He sang Hansadhwani with Arya and it felt even sweeter both because if his singing and Arya joining with him. His bumro bumro also helped Avanti. But it was when Rohit Raut sang Mayechya Halavya, Shankar just showed what a great singer he is and how much these little champs need to learn. The number of variations he created in the same line which is recorded were just mind boggling. One after the other it kept coming … All Rohit could do was to sing as per the recording. Just too much for the poor child.

I have heard the song Maa from Taare Zameen Par so many times but the live performance did bring drops of tear to my otherwise dry eyes. Music can be as powerful as to change the entire world. If everyone speaks the same language across the world, it is music. Zee Marathi has shown the way to all other stupid Hindi entertainment channels what quality of content means. Once it is there, you don’t need all those nakharas and well rehearsed and scripted dialogues in reality shows. What Zee Marathi shows is much real than any Hindi channel. Keep it up Zee Marathi.

 

Zee Marathi Saregamapa – Shocking Result. Shalmali Out of race

If Ketaki’s departure was unfortunate, Shalmali’s departure cannot be anything less than shocking. When there is a competition, only the best need to be chosen and yesterday’s results proved why democracy is failing not just in India but world wide. People never choose the best candidate. I am also responsible partially for this shocking result as I did not vote for Shalmali. Who could have imagined that Shalmali will go out of this race?

In the episode aired in Diwali & one after that, Rohit was doing badly. He was not able to sing and as Avadhoot Gupte pointed out yesterday that yesterday for the first time he sang rather than performed. I believe, he got lot of sympathy vote this time causing Shalmali Tipre Sukhtankar’s departure.

The finalist in the Zee Marathi Saregamapa Little Champs are all really good. It is very difficult to take one out. If you ask me the last two at this stage would definitely be Rohit and Kartiki for their lack of versatility. Avanti Patel is not consistent  and one bad performance can throw her out someday or may be she is the second Shalmali in this race. But Shalmali was never anything less than being in Top 3-4. My topper list is Prathamesh, Shalmali, Arya, Mugdha and may be Avanti. Avanti sings all songs with same emotions and smiling face. Hence she is on border. Arya is also inconsistent and her approach to add expressions is bit immature. Prathamesh and Shalmali would have really been top two but…

Mugdha’s SMS contribution seems to have gone down this week. I was fearing that she will win to competition purely on SMS rather than on merit. She is youngest of them all but still way to go. To conclude my thoughts on this whole episode, I would suggest that rather than taking SMS for a particular week, Zee Marathi can consider aggregating all the SMS in a weighted average (e.g. 1 week SMS will have 10% weight, next week 20% etc.) and then use this number to avoid such disappointment. It’s been a real shock for Shalmali and her fans (including me). I am sure being a Mumbai girl, she has tenacity to recover from this and she will rule Marathi music in years to come. Wish you all the best Shalmali.

Zee Marathi Saregamapa – Good luck Neha & How to beat Mugdha?

On Monday, Saregamapa Little Champs bid good bye to Neha Karmarkar. Neha started vey well in this competition but somewhere she lost track. Due to health problems some of her episodes were quite low. She tried to recover but could not do it as fast as our Puneri doll – Arya Ambekar. I am sure Neha will not lose her confidence. She did not cry but she did look nervous to me. I definitely wanted to see her in top 5.

On the other hand the magic run of Mugdha continues. Of all votes, (Pallavi said 7 lakh SMS) Mugdha bagged 35% that’s whopping 220K+ votes. That’s amazing but my suspicious mind does not stop me from thinking. Mugdha is definitely good and for her age, she is giving everyone much older than her a tough fight. I heard she is not as young as she looks. So how is she managing to get so many votes?

There is a good possibility that she has some admirers who are spending lot of money. She seems to be coming from typical middle class Marathi family like you and me. So her family may not be doing all this. They all are good people. But the other possibility is that someone know how to hack the online voting system and is sending votes to Mugdha free of cost. Does Zee Marathi has will or wherewithal to find this out? I believe they have.

I posted you tube video of Shalmali Sukhtankar in my earlier blog post.  Now that video is gone and its user ahonkan’s account is suspended by Google. This proves that Zee Marathi is actively tracking the copyrighted material or may be it was some bitter comments by ahonkan that irked Zee Marathi. But we have lost a good collection of you tube videos which we enjoyed a lot when we missed the show. I have to think of moving to Tata Sky Plus now.

Zee Marathi Saregamapa – Shalmali Don’t listen to Devaki

Tuesday evening Zee Marathi show Saregamapa Little Champs had judge Devaki Pandit back on the show as celebrity judge. We are now so used to the sweet comments by Vaishali & Avadhoot that we had almost forgotten all the “पण” comments. Devaki was in her usual self, pulling all little champs down to earth. Finally almost all got the same प-प marks with 1-2 exceptions. However amidst all these comments there was one comment which I did not like at all.

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–>We all know how serious Devaki is about her music. She has her own style of singing and has tremendous passion for correct (rather perfect) notes and renditions. She is always unhappy about her performance and that keeps her going. However expecting this from everyone is a bit too much. In terms of stage performances for light music, Devaki is not as good as she is for classical or semi-classical. In fact I find her quite boring. I have seen her singing live during the finals of the celebrity special show of Saregamapa. For such a bright and happy moment she chose a very sad song which was completely out of synch with the rest of the show. Even during the finals of last season, where Vaishali Made won the crown, Devaki sang a so-called remix of Pt. Jitendra Abhisheki’s song. She was horrible. Initially she was “बेसूर” and only after the editing of the show, the song was a bit better to our ears. Live stage performance (Light or filmy music and not the classical or semi-classical music) is a different ball game and Devaki is not made for that.

On the other hand, Shalmali is a complete performer. We saw her singing the “कशाला उद्याची बात” on Monday. That was a mind blowing performance. Her singing was good. She was completely involved and her whole body sang with her. The very next day, Devaki objected to this saying she should focus on correct sur and keep the facial expressions, acting etc. aside. I feel this is completely wrong. A performer need not be a bore. Because the playback singers can not act or dance, they are playback singers. Audience wants a complete package, therefore Indian film industry has this unique concept of playback. Actors act and dance and singers sing. But when you get all in one person, why should you object. Shalmali is completely involved into her singing and that not only gives her pleasure but it is a joy to watch her as well. Conventionally she is not a beauty but it is her involvement and commitment to the song which pleases our eyes and ears and touches us.

So Shalmali! you are good as you are. Listen to any other advise about singing better but don’t be a bore. Be as cheerful and as lively as you are, we will come and listen to you, see how you perform and enjoy it completely. Keep Asha Bhosale as your idol and be like her, perfect yet very much cheerful, lively and presentable.

Did Ketaki Mategaonkar deserved to go out

In yesterday’s Zee Marathi Saregamapa Little Champs, Ketaki Mategaonkar moved out of the race due to her bad performance in last episode. For past few episodes, she was experimenting. I believe that costed her dearly in this competition.

Ketaki is a very good singer just like her mother Suvarna. I believe two factors worked against her. Her song selection and to some extent, biased judges. Her selection of the Kelewali song from the thousands of songs, Mangeshkar family has sung/ composed, this song itself was non-starter. She got appreciation for her singing but the judges really were not fair to her giving  MM to her. She was definitely better than Kartiki and Sagar. Sagar is improving now but his earlier performances were definitely week and he should have been out by now. But he is lucky. Ketaki was not.

I am sure with all the grooming she has had and the support from her family, we will see her sing at professional level pretty soon. She will have to work hard and this result will make her take her singing seriously. Sometimes, she is very casual. May be out of overconfidence.