Filmi (Hindi: फ़िल्मी संगीत, "of films") is Indian popular music as written and performed for Indian cinema (though "filmi" means may refer to other uses such as 'filmi actor' or 'filmi attitude'). Music directors make up the main body of composers; the songs are performed by playback singers and it makes up 72% of the music sales in India.
Filmi music tends to have appeal across India and overseas, especially among the Indian diaspora. Songs are often in different languages depending on the industry, for example in Hindi or Tamil. Playback singers are usually more noted for their ability to sing rather than their charisma as performers. Though these singers may release solo albums, their performances in film soundtracks tend to be more noticed due to the widespread appeal of movies.
At the "Filmi Melody: Song and Dance in Indian Cinema" archive presentation at UCLA, filmi was praised as a generally more fitting term for the tradition than 'Bombay melody' "to suggest that the exuberant music and melodrama so closely identified with the Hindi commercial cinema produced in Bombay (Mumbai) are truly pan-Indian."
Read more about Filmi: Origins, Music Directors, Playback Singers, Lyricists, Popularity Ratings, Accusations of Plagiarism, Wider Success