Birthday special: Hit songs from eminent music director Ajay Gogavale

Music director-composer Ajay Gogavale is quite popular in the Marathi industry and is also well-known in Bollywood industry. The singer has won a National Film Award for the best music director for 'Jogwa'. Ajay works in tandem with Atul, his brother. The duo, popularly called Ajay-Atul, has directed music in a number of Marathi and Bollywood films. Ajay was born to Ashok Gogavale, a Revenue Department officer in Alandi, Pune. They went to Mumbai to embark on their musical career and to work on an international non-film music album, Vishwavinayaka. Starting his musical ventures from temples to working on commercial jingles to directing music for films, his career has only seen the upward graph. On the occasion of the 42nd birthday, we bring you his best music composition which will surely entertain you.

Their return to Marathi cinema after the popular ‘Agneepath’ was no less popular than their last Marathi album before this, ‘Natrang’. Fandry was a festival hit and it had no songs. A Marathi production house picked it up and came up with a brilliant marketing idea to promote the film with a song and that too by Ajay Gogavale. The lyrics here too are written by Ajay-Atul. The song was picturized on the story of teenage love based in an interior village of Maharashtra. In the song, Jabya (Somnath Awghade) is a teenager who falls in love with his classmate Shalu (Rajeshwari Kharat).

‘Natrang’ was a wildly popular album with nearly every song as good as another. The film starring Atul Kulkarni and Sonalee Kulkarni is sung by Bela Shende and Ajay Atul, and lyrics are by Guru Thakur. This is the perfect example of a nautanki song. Sonaalee's grace and the music by the legend duo Ajay-Atul just acted as a catalyst in making the song a blockbuster. But in my books, Apsara Ali pips all others to become the best song of the album. The orchestration here is just too good. Bela Shinde’s low and soft vocals create a great base on which the chorus soars high. It is undoubtedly one of Ajay-Atul’s best songs!

‘Jogwa’ won the musical duo critical acclaim and also a National Award for Best Music Directors category. This song is a ‘Gondhal’ which is a traditional folk form of a dramatic narration of mythical stories. The song is about the Goddess Yellamma which is being sung by the ‘devadasis’ in the film. Ajay himself has lent his voice to the song. Director Rajiv Patil's film 'Jogwa' set on the backdrop of a village in Karnataka, where Goddess Yelamma’s strong influence leads to interpretation by some money minded people to exploit the villagers in the name of superstition.

This is a song from Ajay-Atul’s first album ‘Vishwavinayak’. Also sung by both of them, the words of the songs are traditional folk. Ram Gopal Verma helped them launch this album as they were also giving music for his ‘Gayab’ then. Kedar Shinde has very nicely used it in his enjoyable film ‘Aga Bai Arechya’ which was an adaptation of the Hollywood film ‘What Women Want’. The film is still known for its hit song which was crooned by Ajay Gogavale. The film starrer Sanjay Narvekar as Shriranga Deshmukh aka Ranga and Priyanka Yadav portrayed as Ranga's Wife.

'Moraya Moraya' from the movie 'Ulaadhal' is a Ganesh stuti, backed by a perfect Nasik dhol and traditional Marathi music by Ajay Atul again won the hearts of the audience. It featured Makrand Anaspure, Lokesh Gupte, Subodh Bhave, Siddharth Jadhav and others. Also sung by both of them, the words of the songs are traditional folk. This song is easily one of their most loved songs. It has been soulfully sung by Ajay and his brother Atul. Ever since this song released, there hasn't been a single Ganeshotsav where 'Moraya Moraya' hasn't been played.

This hit song from the Marathi movie 'Jatra' starring Bharat Jadhav and Kranti Redkar, is sung by Anand Shinde and Vaishali Samant and Ajay Gogavale. This upbeat number by music duo Ajay-Atul will definitely get you grooving instantly. It is a completely crazy track. This showed that they could compose wacky tunes too. The absolutely wild lyrics by Jitendra Joshi are what make the Hindi version pale in comparison to this one. This song was remade in the Bollywood film 'Agneepath' starring Hrithik Roshan, Sanjay Dutt, and Priyanka Chopra. 'Kombadi Palali' featured Katrina Kaif.