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Bollywood (Hindi: बॉलीवुड, Urdu: بالی وڈ) is the informal name given to the popular Mumbai-based Hindi-languagefilm industry in India. Bollywood is often incorrectly used to refer to the whole of Indian cinema; it is only a part of the Indian film industry. Bollywood is one of the largest film producers in the world, producing more than 1,000 films a year,[1] with an audience of 3.6 billion people.[2] The name is a portmanteau of Bombay (the former name for Mumbai) and Hollywood, the center of the American film industry. Though some deplore the name, arguing that it makes the industry look like a poor cousin to Hollywood, it seems likely to persist and now has its own entry in the Oxford English Dictionary. Bollywood is commonly referred to as Hindi cinema, even though Hindustani, the substratum common to both Hindi and Urdu, might be more accurate. Bollywood consists of the languages of Hindi, Urdu and English. The use of poetic Urdu words is fairly common. The connection between Hindi, Urdu, and Hindustani is an extremely contentious matter. There has been a growing presence of Indian English in dialogue and songs as well. It is not uncommon to see films that feature dialogue with English words and phrases, even whole sentences. There are a growing number of English films. A few films are also made in two or even three languages (either using subtitles, or several soundtracks).  Bollywood Song and Dance   Songs in Bollywood are sung by professional playback singers, rather than actors, who lip-sync the lyrics. Pictured here is Mukesh, a famed playback singer.

Bollywood film music is called filmi music (from Hindi, meaning "of films").

Songs from Bollywood movies are generally pre-recorded by professional playback singers, with the actors then lip synching the words to the song on-screen, often while dancing. While most actors, especially today, are excellent dancers, few are also singers. One notable exception was Kishore Kumar, who starred in several major films in the 1950s while also having a stellar career as a playback singer. K. L. Saigal, Suraiyya, and Noor Jehan were also known as both singers and actors. Some actors in the last thirty years have sung one or more songs themselves; for a list, see Singing actors and actresses in Indian cinema.

Playback singers are prominently featured in the opening credits and have their own fans who will go to an otherwise lacklustre movie just to hear their favourites. Going by the quality as well as the quantity of the songs they rendered, most notable singers of Bollywood are Suraiyya, Noor Jehan, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosle, Geeta Dutt, Shamshad Begum, Alka Yagnik, etc among female playback singers and K. L. Saigal, Talat Mahmood, Mukesh, Mohammed Rafi, Manna Dey, Hemant Kumar, Kishore Kumar, Kumar Sanu, Udit Narayan, Sonu Nigam among male playback singers. Mohammed Rafi is often considered the arguably finest of the singers that sung for Bollywood, followed by Lata Mangeshkar, who, through the course of a career spanning over six decades, has recorded thousands of songs for Indian movies. The composers of film music, known as music directors, are also well-known. Their songs can make or break a film and usually do. Remixing of filmi songs with modern beats and rhythms is a common occurrence today, and producers may even release remixed versions of some of their films' songs along with the films' regular soundtrack albums.