Vishmadev Chattopadhyay

Vishmadev Chattopadhyay (; 8 November 1909 – 8 August 1977) was an eminent vocal artist in Indian Classical Music, a revered "Guru" (আচার্য্য or Ustad) in the Delhi Gharana of the vocal classical genre, and a music director in Bengali Film Industry in its early era.
Early life.
Vishmadev was born on 8 November 1909 at Sarai village near Pandua station of Hooghly district in West Bengal of Ashutosh Chattopadhyay and Prabhabati Devi. His family was known to have spiritual inclinations, being descendants of Sadhak Gangananda Swami, and had relations with the family of Shri Ramakrishna (born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay).
Education and music.
Vishmadev was known to have shown proficiency in music since his childhood, and considered as child prodigy. He studied at Sanskrit Collegiate School in Calcutta. Then he joined Calcutta Training Academy where from he passed his entrance examination. After passing he joined Vidyasagar College.
First lessons in Classical music was imparted to him by Shri Nagendranath Datta. He received training (তালিম) from Khalifa Badal Khan of Delhi "gharana" for fourteen years, and also collected some bandish from Ustad Faiyaz Khan from Arga gharana. His first album was released from HMV with two songs depicting "Toppa of Nidhubabu" (নিধুবাবুর টপ্পা) during May, 1926. The two songs of his first record were "সখী কি করে লোকের কথায়" in "Raga Khamaj" and "এত কি চাতুরী সহে প্রাণে" (Record No. P7402). His last recording released from Megaphone Company in July 1968 too contained the same song "সখী কি করে লোকের কথায়" (Record No JNG 6237). He earned fame and reverence for his contribution in "Khayal" in Hindusthani Classical Music. In 1933 he was appointed as a Music director cum trainer in the Megaphone Record Company.
In 1933 at the insistence of Nazrul Islam Vishmadev joined Megaphone Company as the Music Director and Instructor. He regularly published records on "Khayal". Sometime during 1936 Mr. J.N. Ghosh, the owner of Megaphone Company, along with poet Ajay Bhattacharya requested him to sing Bengali songs. On the day of recording Vismadev instantly composed music for the poem written by Ajay Bhattacharya and completed recording. the songs were: ‘ফুলের দিন হল যে অবসান’ and ‘শেষের গানটি ছিল তোমার লাগি’.
In 1937 Vishmadev joined Film Corporation as Music Director. He directed music for six Bengali movies and six Hindi movies . Sachin Dev Burman was his assistant in four theses movies. The first movie of this series, "Rikta" (1939), directed by Sushil Majumdar, was a milestone film as it made a great stir in the music world by mingling the tune of east and west for the first time in any Indian film .
The rabindra Sangeet legend Chinmoy Chattopadhyay received training on classical music from him at a stretch for twelve long years.
Memoirs.
Vishmadev is remembered as a maestro and an exponent in rendition of Khayal and Thumri, and extremely revered in his field. Observations from a few eminent personalities are compiled as under: