Laxmikant Shantaram Kudalkar (3 November 1937 – 25 May 1998) and Pyarelal Ramprasad Sharma (born 3 September 1940) formed one of the most successful composer partnerships in Hindi cinema. Laxmikant learned the mandolin. Pyarelal’s father, the trumpeter Pandit Ramprasad Sharma, taught him the basics of music, and he learned the violin from the Goan musician Anthony Gonsalves.
They began as assistants and arrangers to other composers, including Kalyanji–Anandji, and began their career as a duo in 1963 with Babubhai Mistri’s Parasmani. Their major breakthrough was Dosti (1964), which won them their first Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.
They won the award seven times in all, for Dosti, Milan (1967), Jeene Ki Raah (1969), Amar Akbar Anthony (1977), Satyam Shivam Sundaram (1978), Sargam (1979) and Karz (1980). They also scored Hero (1983), Mr. India (1987), whose soundtrack was the best-selling of its year, and Ram Lakhan (1989).
They made three films with Raj Kapoor and were frequent collaborators of the director Subhash Ghai. They worked with all the leading singers of the time, notably Lata Mangeshkar and Mohammed Rafi.
Laxmikant died in 1998, which ended the partnership. The duo is regarded as one of the defining names of the golden era of Hindi film songs.
Featured image: Pyarelal of the Laxmikant–Pyarelal duo (centre), cropped from a group photo (cropped). Photo by Creativo Camaal (Lens Naayak Photography), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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