My land is a land of music and melody. Since time immemorial, our songs and their modern forms have mesmerised me and urged me to reach out beyond the bounds of place and time, musically from within. Years later, at this age, I have been able to muster the courage to bring this out to all.

None of the 14 numbers chosen for this album are from my own country. In fact they do not belong to any particular country. These tunes, different in character, created at different times in different societies and have been recorded by various artists long before I was even born. Hence the onus of judging the authenticity of these numbers played by me rest solely onto the listeners.

The responsibility that I have taken on myself besides playing the tunes on the harmonica are that of recording, mixing, CD mastering along with creating this inlay.

I am deeply indebted to the medium called Internet for the music arrangements. I however, regret being unaware of the names of my accompanying musicians.

Well, I guess this, is globalisation…

– 31 December, 2009

*          *          *          *          *

I created this album titled “Those were the days” for private circulation only. I gave some copies of this CD to some of my friends and listeners, who were mostly from Calcutta (except for Mr. Vinayak Bhosekar and Ramana Kommanapalli, who were from Hyderabad). Later on, I uploaded 5 numbers (out of 14) on the internet for public viewing. Another one was uploaded by Ramana. I thought of uploading the rest of the numbers time and again, but somehow I could not managed to. Now, I am uploading all of them for this website again, so that someone interested can access all the numbers from this page at one go.

Sumanta Basu
Monday, 17 September, 2012.
Dum Dum Cantonment

***********************************************************************************************************

Guantanamera (1929)

Composed by: José Fernández Diaz | Performed by: Pablo Quevedo, Pete Seeger

***********************************************************************************************************

***********************************************************************************************************

The Banana Boat Song (1952)

***********************************************************************************************************

Que Sera Sera (1956)

***********************************************************************************************************

Tequila (1958)

Composed by: Daniel Flores | Performed by: The Champs

***********************************************************************************************************

Never on Sunday (1960)

Composed by: Manos Hadjidakis | Performed by: Connie Francis

***********************************************************************************************************

500 Miles (1962)

Composed by:  | Performed by: Peter, Paul & Mary

***********************************************************************************************************

Summer Holiday (1963)

Composed & Performed by: Cliff Richard

***********************************************************************************************************

Sounds of Silence (1964)

Composed by: Paul Simon | Performed by: Paul Simon & Art Garfunkel

***********************************************************************************************************

***********************************************************************************************************

Those Were the Days (1968)

Composed by: B. Fomin | Performed by: Mary Hopkin

***********************************************************************************************************

Speak Softly Love – Godfather (1972)

Composed by: Nino Rota | Performed by: Andy Williams

***********************************************************************************************************

Rivers of Babylon (1972)

Composed by: Brent Dowe | Performed by: Trevor McNaughton

***********************************************************************************************************

Que Viva España (1974)

Composed by: L. Caerts/L. Rozenstraten/M. Degómez | Performed by: Manolo Escobar

***********************************************************************************************************