Bollywood's Most Renowned Music Composers

Rahman has been bestowed with the 'Padma Bhushan' and 'Padma Shri', two of India's highest national civilian honours, recognizing his contribution to music, in addition to several other awards including 4 Indian National Film Awards and 28 Filmfare Awards, India's leading recognition for films. He has also been conferred with honorary doctorates from the Trinity College of Music, Aligarh Muslim University, Anna University and the Middlesex University. He was also named by Time Magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, in 2009.

Ilaiyaraaja is an Indian film composer who works predominantly in the South Indian cinema since the late 1970s. Regarded as one of the finest music composers in India,[1] Ilaiyaraaja is also an instrumentalist, conductor, singer, and a songwriter. He has composed more than 5000 songs and is the only composer in the history of cinema to provide film scores for more than 1000 films, particularly being acclaimed for his background scoring.

Madan Mohan attended school there for the next six years. It is said that he inherited his talent for music from his mother, who was a poet and great admirer of music. His father was not very musically inclined, but grandfather Hakim Yograj and his younger brother, Prakash were staunch connoisseurs. He was a famed Hindi Film music director of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. He is particularly remembered for the ghazals he composed for the film industry, mainly using the voice of Lata Mangeshkar, Talat Mahmood and Mohammed Rafi.

Shankar Jaikishan (also known as S-J), were a duo who composed Indian music for the Hindi film industry, who worked together from 1949–1971. Shankar-Jaikishan, along with other artists, wrote "everlasting" and "immortal melodies" in the fifties and sixties. Their best work was noted for being "raga-based and having both lilt and sonority".

Kalyanji–Anandji are an Indian composer duo from Gujarat: Kalyanji Virji Shah and his brother Anandji Virji Shah. The duo are known for their work on Hindi film soundtracks, particularly action potboilers in the 1970s. Some of their best-known works are Don, Bairaag, Saraswatichandra, Qurbani, Tridev and Safar. They won the 1975 Filmfare Award for Best Music Director for Kora Kagaz.

Laxmikant–Pyarelal were a popular Indian composer duo, consisting of Laxmikant Shantaram Kudalkar and Pyarelal Ramprasad Sharma (born 1940). They composed music for about 635 Hindi movies from 1963 to 1998, working for almost all notable filmmakers including Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand, B.R. Chopra, Shakti Samanta, Manmohan Desai, Yash Chopra, Subhash Ghai and Manoj Kumar.

One of the most celebrated music directors of the era, O. P. Nayyar has rendered some timeless classics for music fans to reminisce. Embarking on his musical journey with the 1949 film Kaneez, his first film Aasmaan as an independent music director came in 1952, after which he went on to compose for a host of Hindi films. At that time Radio Ceylon, was the only source through which one could hear O.P.'s new songs. During his career, the music director has extensively worked with a range of artistes. His favourite singers with whom he worked in most of his films include Asha Bhosle, Mohammed Rafi and Geeta Dutt.

Sachin Dev Burman was born on 1 October 1906 was an Indian music composer. He was one of the most well-renowned Bollywood film music composers. S D Burman composed music for over 100 movies, including Hindi and Bengali films. Apart from being a versatile composer, he also sang songs in light semi classical and folk style of Bengal. His Son Rahul Dev Burman was also a celebrated music composer for Bollywood films. He has also sang about 14 Hindi and 13 Bengali film songs.

He was a South Indian music composer.. K. V. Mahadevan was born in 1918 at Nagercoil, Krishnancoil, Kanyakumari district. A contemporary of M. S. Viswanathan and T. K. Ramamoorthy, Mahadevan scored music for over 600 films, spanning four decades, after starting his career in the 1942 with Manonmani. Poor health hastened the end of his career in the mid-1990s, and his last film was Swathi Kiranam in 1992.

Manayangath Subramanian Viswanathan, also known as M.S.V, is a Kollywood music director and composer from South India. He is popularly known as Mellisai Mannar. He has composed songs in Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu for over 1200 films His major works over the past five decades have been in Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu films. He has also acted and sung in a few Tamil films. The Former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu J Jayalalithaa conferred the Thirai Isai Chakravarthy title on him in August 2012 and presented him with 60 gold coins and a new car. Viswanathan composed film music together with composer and violinist T. K. Ramamoorthy in the 1950s and early 1960s, as Viswanathan–Ramamoorthy and since then he has worked independently as a composer.