Antakshari – Singing game on Zee Tv – Annu Kapoor, Pallavi Joshi memories
Antakshari had been popular among family audiences ever since its inception in India. Hosted by famous actor Annu Kapoor from 1994 to 2005, it ran for 18 years with many other hosts such as Rajeshwari Sachdev, Pallavi Joshi, Durga Jasraj, Renuka Shahane, and Shefali Chhaya.
But it was the 1993 season when it became the most popular show of all time. At that point in time, people would wait eagerly every week so they could come on the show to sing their old favourite songs and new hit movie tunes. The programme’s creator Gajendra Singh knew what he wanted – this music-based TV show which attracted audiences nationally – much before anyone else did!
In Loop Mode in Antakshari
Pallavi remembers how once Gajendra required they sing the song ‘Mere Dil ka woh shehzada’, which they did not need then to. Annuji told me he would have us singing this tune for so many years that he would never need to hear it again. She said with a laugh before continuing, We filmed for this event on a stage created over some of the water when Annuji skipped into the pool while I was singing.
They had to keep singing until he could repay. Ask him about what happens when they work with different hosts and Annu says, I got along well with everyone. When we started working together, none of them were patronizing or overbearing towards each other unlike what is reported in the media.
Rounds of the Game in Antakshari
This past month, the show has joined an Antakshari competition and after one episode, it seems to be doing rather well. It had some difficulty but here are a few rounds that were completed- Opening Round: 15 questions from popular movies such as ‘Chori Chori’ or ‘Kranti’; for instance- what was Amitabh Bachchan’s first movie?
Pieces can be used through some apps.
Round 5 (Tune identification round): In this game players have to identify songs based on short snippets of the music. Round 6 (Dialogue identification): This portion of the game involves identifying movie dialogue from dialogue clips that are synchronized together so people can play alongside one another.
Recipe for the success of Antakshari
Pallavi, who spent 5 years up on display, felt that her life would be a success. She said,It had intrinsic Indian values. But today, such informal have taken a backseat. Pallavi was unsure of her fate as an entertainer before she took the risk in joining this show- to which she says I wasn’t sure if I could perform on stage. Before going out onto the first episode of Sa Re Ga Ma Pa L’il Champs, Pallavi complained about being too scared and couldn’t leave her dressing room; but now? I never want to stop singing, she professes.
She humbly admits, every day she would sing ‘Oh Tohra Mann Darpann Kee Laaye,’ but my mother – a music teacher – gave me some pointers on how to improve. Eventually, the singers of a musical group offered her advice about which songs suited her voice. She had sung three different tunes every time and rehearsed for 2 days before going public with it.
There was one exception when she forgot to think of what tune fitted the situation; Annuji who happened to be there said this is such beautiful music, said Pallavi after they finished singing an old Bollywood tune called Shyamchi Aai. When asked if he sang well, she confessed that Annuji did indeed do justice to his performance.
Rules
As well as the usual antakshari game, which requires players to match up an alphabet letter with a song title-you can also play word antakshari. This time, you’ll pick a random word and give it to one of the two teams who then have to find a song that starts with this chosen word. For example; if ‘Aaja’ was picked for a team, they would need to sing ‘Aaja sham hone payee’, ‘Aaja Aaja main hoon Pyar term’ or Aaja Piya the Pyar doon, etc.
One variant on this could be selecting an arbitrary word from the current song playing and giving it to another team so they can start singing at this point too – such as taking ‘Pyar’ from ‘Aaja আইএ amain kabhi প্যार thha nahin jaata hota’.
You can also have a game where the teams will sing songs from just one Celebrity. You do variations with Music Directors, Singers, even Movies too. If you can arrange for buzzers and chits, you can put different words in each so that when a word is called out by someone on the other team, everyone has to say it back in order before they get another go at guessing what song it is.
And if somebody gets it right – they’ll press their button or shake their wired rattle to signal that they’ve gotten something right; which would initiate them singing along until they’re interrupted by somebody else. It’s all good fun!
Conclusion
There are some great ideas that came to mind when I started thinking about this. One of them would be preparing pieces of paper with the lyrics of a song on it. Whoever guesses the lyrics first gets to take over singing duties for the rest of the game, while everyone else tries to predict what that next song is going to sound like based off who starred in it.
