Saregama

Saregama India Ltd. (Saregama refers to the first four notes of the Indian musical scale) is India's oldest music label owned by RP- Sanjiv Goenka Group of companies.[1][2] The company is listed on the NSE and BSE with its head office located in Kolkata and other offices in Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai. Apart from music, Saregama also produces films under the brand name Yoodlee Films and multi-language Television content.[3]

This article is about the music company. For the musical notes in Indian music, see Sargam (music). For musical reality TV show, see Sa Re Ga Ma Pa.

Saregama India
TypePublic
IndustryRetail
Founded13 August 1946 (The Gramophone Company Of India Ltd.), 3 November 2000 (Saregama)
HeadquartersKolkata, India
Area served
Global
Key people
Vikram Mehra (MD)
ParentRP-Sanjiv Goenka Group
Websitewww.saregama.com

Saregama owns music repertoire across Film music, Carnatic, Hindustani classical, Devotional etc. in all prominent Indian languages. The first song recorded in India by Gauhar Jaan in 1902 and the first film made in Bollywood ‘Alaam Ara' in 1931 were under the music label. Some of the prominent Indian artists who have produced their music with Saregama are Lata Mangeshkar, M.S. Subbulakshmi, Shamshad Begum, Asha Bhosle, Mohd. Rafi, Kishore Kumar, Mukesh, Jagjit Singh, Pt Bhimsen Joshi, Pt Jasraj, Chamkila, Gurdas Mann etc.

The company has expanded its catalogue to become the largest in-perpetuity global owner of both sound recording and publishing copyrights of Indian music across 14 different languages.[4]

History

EMI

In 1901, the company began operations by recording the first song in India, as the first overseas branch of Electric & Musical Industries Limited, EMI London.[5] It was incorporated in Calcutta (now Kolkata) as The Gramophone and Typewriter Ltd. The following year, Gramophone inventor Emile Berliner's assistant Fred Gaisberg came to India "on a mission to capture [its] music". Gauhar Jaan became the first Indian artist to be recorded there, on 5 January 1902. In 1907, a record factory was started in Dum Dum in Calcutta, the first outside the UK.[6]

On 13 August 1946, it was incorporated as a Private Limited company with the name of ‘The Gramophone Co. (India) Limited'. It was converted into a public company on 28 October 1968 and consequently the name of the company was changed to ‘The Gramophone Company of India Limited'.[7] RPG Group took over the company in 1985 from EMI when the company's financial health was poor. The name of the company was then changed from The Gramophone Company of India Limited to its current name Saregama India Limited on 3 November 2000. In 2005, the remaining EMI stake was sold off to the parent company.

Saregama Carvaan, a multipurpose portable music player launched in May 2017.

HMV

For the first 100 years, the company retailed its products (records, cassettes, CDs) under the brand name HMV[8] which was synonymous with film music in India. From 2000 onwards, it started retailing its products under the brand name, Saregama.

Dum Dum Recording Studio

Saregama's recording studio, called Dum Dum studio, was built in 1928 in Calcutta.[9] It is one of the oldest studios in Southeast Asia. Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore had recorded his songs and poems in his own voice at this studio. Rebel poet Kazi Nazrul Islam's voice was also recorded here.The Dum Dum Recording studio was also a house to manufacturing and production of Gramophone Records and thereafter Music Cassettes. With advent of digital formats, the physical formats progressively went out of consumer patronage and consequently, these manufacturing facilities were shut down.

Saregama Carvaan

3.1 Carvaan

Carvaan is a portable music player with a pre-loaded collection of mainly vintage Bollywood songs. It is an easy to use device and comprises in-built stereo speakers. Since its inception, Saregama has launched multiple variants of Carvaan in different languages like Hindi, Punjabi, Tamil, Bengali and Marathi.[10]

In 2018, Saregama Carvaan Premium was launched with additional features. There are 52 additional stations (as compared to the base model) and app support is provided for iOS and Android to create playlist and controlling the music system.[11]

In the year 2019, Saregama launched Carvaan 2.O. In addition to the collection of 5000 songs, Wi-Fi connectivity is available which provides access to over 150 audio stations and over 20,000 songs. The content pushed as podcast includes devotional, children rhymes, talk shows, travel, food, health etc.  

Carvaan Gold and Carvaan Gold 2.O are the premium versions of Saregama Carvaan which have all the old features of Carvaan along with Wi-Fi connectivity, additional audio stations, Champagne Gold and Rose Gold colours, and harman/kardon sound system.[12]

The other variants include Carvaan GO and Carvaan Mini.

3.2 Carvaan GO

Carvaan GO is a portable digital audio player with in-built speakers and a pre-loaded collection of 3000 retro Hindi songs of popular singing legends of the yesteryear. The songs are divided into various categories such as Artistes, Specials and Playlists. The personal device has a rechargeable battery with approximately 7-hour playtime. The additional features include Bluetooth, Aux Cable, micro SD, and FM/AM options.[13]

3.3 Carvaan Mini

Carvaan Mini is a portable music player with multiple variants of Bhakti, Rabindrasangeet, and Gurbani. Other variants have a collection of 351 songs dedicated to Hindi Legends, Marathi legends, Bengali Legends, Kannada Legends, Malayalam Legends, Tamil Legends, Telugu Legends, and Carvaan Mini M. S. Subbulakshmi consisting of 351 songs.

Saregama recently launched Carvaan Mini Shrimad Bhagavad Gita, pre-loaded with 18 Adhyays, 700 verses of Bhagavad Gita and 101 Krishna Bhajans.[14]

Awards
Sr. No Month/Year Awards Purpose
1 Nov-17 IPRCCA 2017 Best use of PR by a Brand - Silver[15]
2 Apr-18 Brand Equity Marketing Awards 2018 Innovation of the Year Award[16]
3 Apr-18 Apac Effies  -The Womb (Agency) One Gold and Two silvers : 'Let's create viral products' for Saregama [17]
3 May-18 WAARC Innovation Awards to The Womb (agency) Special Award for Category Innovation and Silver for Effective Innovation [18]
4 Aug-18 IndIAA Awards 2018 The Perfect Gift[19]
5 Aug-18 Marquees 2018 Reimagining for the Better[20]
6 Aug-19 IndIAA Awards 2019 Shaadi ka naya gift[21]

Yoodlee films, a Saregama venture has also produced movies that have won awards in various national and international film festivals:-[22]

  • The film Hamid won 2 National Award in 2019. One in the Best Urdu Film category and second was worn by Talha Arshad Reshi in Best Child Actor category.[23]
  • Hamid won Best film award and Rasika Dugal won the Best actress award at the UK Asian Film Festival 2019
  • Hamid by Aijaz Khan (India)won Muhammad Al-Ameen award - a diploma of honour for best film on peace at 37th Fajr International Film Festival
  • Aijaz Khan won Best Director and Rasika Dugal won Best Actor at Rajasthan International Film Festival
  • A special mention for Sushama Deshpande for her acting in the movie Ajji, at the Indian Film Festival, Los Angeles
  • The movie Ajji won the Fresh Blood competition at the Beaune International Thriller Film Festival
  • Ali Haji won the Best Child Actor Award for the movie Noblemen at New York Indian Film Festival 2018
  • Madhumita won the Best Director award for the Tamil film KD at the UK Asian Film Festival 2019

Saregama Music Cards

Saregama Music Cards are USB memory sticks which comes pre-loaded with 200 HD-quality songs of various genres e.g. Legends, Romance, Lata Mangeshkar, Kishore Kumar, RD Burman, Illayairaja etc.[24]

Saregama Classical App

Saregama Classical is a music based streaming app available on android and iOS devices[25][26] with music of artistes in three major subgenres of Indian Classical music, i.e. Hindustani, Carnatic and Fusion. Works of legends like M S Subbulakshmi, Pt. Jasraj, Pt Bhimsen Joshi, Pt. Ravi Shankar, Usd. Bade Gulam Ali Khan, Karaikudi Mani, N. Ramani, Lalgudi Jayaraman are available as part of the app.

Saregama Bhakti App

Saregama Bhakti, an Indian devotional music based streaming app which offers Hindu devotional music from renowned artistes like Lata Mangeshkar,[27] Anup Jalota, Suresh Wadkar, Jagjit Singh, Asha Bhosle etc. The app also offers audio recitals of granths like Tulsi Ramayana, Geeta Govinda, Sundar Kand, Satyanarayan Katha, Sai Satcharitra Granth and Krishna Charit Manas etc. The entire content catalogue of Art of Living is also available on the app.

Yoodlee Films

Yoodlee films is the film division of Saregama India Ltd. through which it plans to produce 100 films by 2022.[28] Besides traditional script sourcing by the studio, the company also uses Crowdingit platform, which crowdsources scripts for this project.[29]

Television Content

Saregama produces content for TV channels in Tamil, Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi and Bengali. The company has created many serials and shows.[30]

  • Soolam (2001)
  • Velan (2002)
  • My Dear Bhootham (2004)
  • Raja Rajeswari (2005)
  • Athipookkal (2007)
  • Valli (2012-2019)
  • Pillai Nila (2012-2014)
  • Chandralekha (2014–present)
  • Roja (2018–present)
  • Anbe Vaa(2020–present)

References
  1. "New IPL teams: Sanjiv Goenka's New Rising gets Pune, Intex gets Rajkot". The Economic Times. 9 December 2018. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  2. "How data is helping India's oldest music company Saregama revive its fortunes | FactorDaily". FactorDaily. 14 June 2017. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  3. "SaReGaMa's production house Yoodlee Film's to release BrijMohan Amar Rahe on 1st December 2017". International Business Times. 21 November 2017. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  4. "Saregama Carvaan: Nostalgia in a box". www.fortuneindia.com. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  5. "Saregama India Ltd". Money Control. 23 March 2018. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  6. "RPG Music: House of Music". Archived from the original on 11 May 1997. Retrieved 15 November 2018.
  7. "Saregama India Ltd". The Economic Times. 23 March 2018. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  8. "Saregama plans to sell land in revival bid". The Hindu Business Line. 8 May 2004. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  9. "The house of vinyl". Livemint. 23 September 2010. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  10. Munshi, Suman (10 May 2017). "Saregama Carvaan a journey with the time machine : Digital audio player with pre-loaded 5000 retro songs". IBG News. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  11. "Saregama Carvaan Premium With Companion App Support Launched at Rs. 7,390". NDTV Gadgets 360. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  12. "Saregama Carvaan 2.0 With 5,000 Preloaded Songs, Wi-Fi Launched". NDTV Gadgets 360. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  13. "Saregama launches portable Carvaan Go speaker with 3,000 evergreen songs at Rs 3,990". The Indian Express. 16 April 2019. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  14. "Saregama launches Carvaan Shrimad Bhagavad Gita; Lata, Jagjit bhajans in playlist". The Economic Times. 3 September 2019. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  15. "Value 360 and Viacom 18 win big at IPRCCA; Roger C.B. Pereira conferred with Lifetime Achievement Award - Exchange4media". Indian Advertising Media & Marketing News – exchange4media. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  16. www.ETBrandEquity.com. "Brand Equity Marketing Awards: And, the winners are... - ET BrandEquity". ETBrandEquity.com. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  17. Delhi, BestMediaInfo Bureau; April 30; 2018. "India brings home 20 metals at 2018 APAC Effie Awards". www.bestmediaifo.com. Retrieved 25 October 2019.CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  18. "Carvaan wins WARC Prize for Asian Strategy | WARC". www.warc.com. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  19. "Chrome Pictures Victorious at The INDIAA Awards". afaqs!. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  20. "Advertising Club honours best brands with Marquees 2018". The Hindu. Special Correspondent. 5 September 2018. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 25 October 2019.CS1 maint: others (link)
  21. "Ogilvy dominates the IndIAA Awards". Campaign India. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  22. Menon, Bindu D. "Striking a new note, Saregama moves into film content creation". @businessline. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  23. "National Awards 2019: Hamid wins Best Urdu Film, director Aijaz Khan says 'didn't expect award at all'- Entertainment News, Firstpost". Firstpost. 10 August 2019. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  24. "SAREGAMA MUSIC CARDS PEN DRIVES". Indiamart. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  25. "Saregama Classical, an app for the connoisseurs of Indian classical music". Indian Express. 23 September 2015. Retrieved 24 March 2018.
  26. Ananth, Venkat. "Saregama Classical hits the right notes with new app". LiveMint. Retrieved 6 July 2019.
  27. "Top 5 Devotional Apps You Need In This Festive Season". Digital Conqurer. 14 October 2016. Retrieved 24 March 2018.
  28. "Striking a new note, Saregama moves into film content creation". The Hindu. 2 December 2016. Retrieved 24 March 2018.
  29. "crowding it. – everyone deserves to tell stories". www.crowdingit.com. Retrieved 28 November 2018.
  30. "Striking a new note, Saregama moves into film content creation". @businessline. Retrieved 17 August 2018.
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