Three things prompted me to
write this post.
1. An article about a recent
song which is ‘inspired’ from a Carnatic
varNam and a Thiruppugazh.
2. An article about how TFM has warmed up unusual and
unconventional voices.
3. A translation project in
which I am involved.
First of all, let me clarify
that the idea behind mentioning (1.)
is not to discuss, review or denigrate that song as I am very clear that other music directors will not be
compared/criticised in this forum. By saying this, I am not sitting on any
judgment about the song (I am sure 99% of the people here know what song I am
talking about). But I shall surely
explain as to why it finds a mention here.
The author, it seems was made to listen to the song by his 12-year old
daughter and was very impressed with the ‘varNam’
and mainly ‘Thiruppugazh’
inspiration. He goes on to say that he explained about the latter and that to
his surprise, his daughter-who is known not to go to anything other than
‘modern’- started showing a lot of interest and got to know something about AruNagirinathar. The author concludes
that it is an herculean task to make ancient
literature attractive to an indifferent audience and if popular film music be the medium to attract such skeptics, one should welcome
it. But not before he also makes a mention of the Hindi film songs of the
‘80s which simplified the Qawaali
form and as to how the audience (listeners) lapped it up.
The second article is on how
the present day music directors use very different voices – not essentially musical- to ‘enhance’ the appeal. It says
the voices are used more because of the situation in movies and how novel this
is.
The third one may not directly
concern music but the article I
translated, is on one of the traditional forms of folk arts.
Let me now go one by one.
I do not have any problem with
what the author of the first article said. But what I found rather strange –and
even uncomfortable- with the article was that there was no mention about ILaiyaraaja or his songs when it is a
known fact(at least to the cognoscenti ) that he has done so much to bring our classical music and folk music within the reach of the common man. I am not going to list
out what all he has done (I have already been doing it in my posts here) but am
only going to give one example
today. But how the author-who is a professor
in a prestigious institution and who I am sure has a good ear- missed even
making a passing reference to ILaiyaraaja,
beats me.
Let me move on to the second article.
This article too fails to make a mention about Raaja sir’s usage of very different and unusual voices(Samuel Grub in ANNe ANNe or Dr.Kalyan
in ‘Sing
Swing’). Ad also about the fact
that apart from using different voices, he also made the famous singers change
and modulate the voice to suit the situation( Malaysia Vasudevan in ‘Kaadal Vandhirucchu’, SPB in ‘Nachchina foodu’ or both
in ‘Engengum
KaNdenamma’ are just some examples). We are going to see one more
example very soon anyway.
As I said, the article which is part of my project does not have anything to do
with music or ILaiyaraaja but the
way it talks about a group of people involved in reviving ‘Therukkooththu’ is very inspiring and I thought a mention must be
made about this fact in this post.
I said that the cognoscenti
knows about what ILaiyaraaja has
done in terms of bringing classical
music(and even arts) close to the common man. Now, see this..
‘Raa
ra veNu gopaala’ is a swara jati
taught to all beginners in Carnatic
Music. Swara jati is taught after
geetam and before varNam. I can understand that all these
terms sound foreign to some of you but let me assure that I shall define and
explain all these forms in one of my forthcoming posts in my other blog.
But for
now, let me focus on this ‘VeNugopala’
and its relevance here.
The 1981 film ‘Ellam inbamayam’(which
itself is a takeoff from a very popular yesteryear song sung by MLV and
P.Leela) was conceived to tickle the audience’s funny bone. That it failed in
its mission is a different story altogether and since I know this is not Vintage Raaja thread( written in a group run by me in fb) where I tear the Tamizh film directors to pieces, I am not going to talk about this. But the
film had some very funny songs (one was a ‘sneezing’ song!). In any case, I
have always been enamoured of ‘Maaman voodu’ not least because it
used the tune of ‘Raa ra veNugopaala’.
It is one thing to be inspired by a tune(or even copy a tune)
and quite another to use it cleverly and brilliantly. Needless to say Raaja sir is adept in using even an
inspired tune with great felicity and innovation. In fact, the dialogue which precedes the song (after
the initial naiyyaaNdi meLam) throws
light on what made him use a traditional
song. Surely the situation demanded the usage of such a tune in a song sung in
a slum with the audience comprising of people from higher echelons of society (listen
to the dialogue carefully).
But what is most striking is
the way the tune has been used-without in anyway deviating from Bilahari. And what steals my heart is
the way the percussion goes in tisram while the vocals go in chatushram(here too, note the dialogue
between the ‘percussionist’ and the singer).
How wonderfully the voice of Malaysia Vasudevan is used is a point
which has to be noted by the present day generation and most importantly the
people who write articles about ‘voices’ without paying attention to the yesteryear songs.
The nagaswaram and the urumi
meLam form the fulcrum of the song while the mandolin and guitar
support these perfectly. The friendly banter between the instruments and the
lyrics will never fail to bring a smile on anybody’s face.
And along with that smile will
surely be an expression of wonderment, awe and even guilt on the faces of
people who have missed this song all along and claim that it is the present day
music which takes us back to our roots.
And when it happens, my face
will sport a very special smile..
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