UNEQUAL MUSIC: (From left to right) Singer Swagatalakshmi, the Bangla band Bhoomi, and yesteryear hot Puja album artistes Asha Bhonsle and Hemanta Kumar

The long-playing records smell of moth balls and the old 78s are history. The compact disc is no new kid on the block either. But the changing times are not just about the form that music comes packaged in. The content — as the Puja season endorses — is not what it used to be.

Once, musician Sachin Dev Burman used to browse around for albums in Calcutta’s well-known record shops during the Pujas. The Puja albums — specially released during the festive season — still have their avid takers. But music lovers are not quite sure if they should look forward to Puja music.

The focus, the industry says, is no more on traditional or popular modern music that was once the mainstay of Puja albums. Today, the emphasis is on folk music, band music and remixes. “Bengali songs have undergone a transition over the past few years,” says Calcutta-based music critic Meena Banerjee. “The youth prefer either band music or rhythmic tunes to gyrate with. This has wiped out traditional numbers which consisted of devotional songs, kirtans, bhajans or classical music,” Banerjee holds.

For long years, companies have been releasing their music during the Pujas. The focus till the Sixties and Seventies was on adhunik or modern music. And the ones who ruled were the popular singers of the time — including the stars of the Mumbai film industry, Kishore Kumar, Hemanta Kumar, Asha Bhonsle and Lata Mangeshkar, whose songs in Bengali were released as Puja albums.

“Puja albums used to be a grand affair. Companies used to have separate singers and musicians assigned to them. Fresh tunes would be composed keeping the festivity in mind,” says an official of Saregama Music.

Many believe that the music of the Puja albums started changing in the early Eighties, when disco beats began to make their presence felt. “The music changed to reflect the changing times and public demand,” says the Saregama Music official.

Puja albums first appeared sometime in the early part of the 20th century when what was then the Gramophone & Typewriter Ltd company decided to take advantage of the festive mood by releasing special albums. But today, for the young buyer, who can download the music of his choice from the Internet these albums don’t hold the same kind of magic anymore. “The craze associated with the Puja album has gone,” says college student Supriya Talukdar. “Why would I listen to local songs? I need to keep in touch with international trends in music,” adds Sumit Mukherjee, who works at a call centre.

There was a time when the season meant the release of some 15 albums. These days, of some 300 albums in a year, 60 or 70 are Puja albums. “Music used to be once looked at as something divine. Today, people aren’t bothered either about the singer or the genre of music,” says Tintoo Bhattacharjee, a popular singer who released some 25 Puja albums during his heyday. Sumitra Sen, a leading singer of the Sixties, agrees. “As the quantity is increasing, people are definitely compromising on the quality,” she says.

But like most things, there are two sides to the music season. Surojit Chatterjee, the lead singer of the Bengali band Bhoomi, points out that the plethora of albums means that more and more aspiring singers can get their voices heard. “But on the other hand, people can end up buying trash if they don’t conduct a survey before shelling out money.”

The problem, clearly, is that the Puja releases of today have no set standards. A lot of good music, presented by both old-timers and newcomers, is rubbing shoulder with albums that are eminently forgettable. An industry insider maintains that not-so-talented singers often pay a company money to get their music released during the Pujas.

“Some of my contemporaries do bring out good music during the Pujas,” says singer-composer Swagatalakshmi at the launch of her new music album Canvas. “But sometimes the package is new, while the music is the same old adhunik songs of the old times that have been made a bit peppier,” she says.

What is evident is that whether or not people like the new trends in music, the tradition of releasing Puja albums is going to stay. An official at a leading music outlet points out that sales always shoot up during the season. “During the Pujas, people are in a spending mood, so they don’t mind buying a few CDs,” reasons Chatterjee of Bhoomi, which has released a Puja album this year.

The debate continues, but the music plays on.