Raaja and KaNNa

‘He kept the pearl in the oyster and gave you’ – He.

‘She is a golden oyster’- She.

And who are they singing to? To their child as a lullaby.

These lines which appear in the third CharaNam, typify both the composer and the lyricist.

The flute in the beginning followed by the santoor and then the strings, set the mood for a different lullaby.

The santoor and the flute appear again but it is the sudden group of strings -which give shades of western classical- and the mandolin, which steal the show in the first interlude.

The second interlude takes us to a ‘neithal’ land with the humming, the single-stringed instrument and the santoor, singing with glee.

It is the santoor again in the third interlude, followed by the flute and see waves after waves.

Can the love in the family be depicted better than this just with music?

‘You are like the lamp in the temple, oh my dear with the plaited hair, the one who drinks milk lying on the cradle’- says mother.

‘Even if the catamaran disappears in the sea, a son’s face will always be etched in the father’s heart/ You, my dear wife, is the breeze while I am the boat’ – says the father.

Can a relationship between a husband and a wife and between a child and parents be described simpler than this?

That is why, they are the rare pearls found in deep ocean.

If you have not yet deciphered as to who those ‘two’ are, please read the fourth line. Or better still, listen to the third line in the Pallavi!

Dvaita or Advaita?

 My tryst with music started at a very young age without my being aware. Glued to that gadget called the radio- which would take around 2 minutes to ‘boot’, being a valve set-, I would be tuning in the stations standing on a stool as the radio was kept on a stand. I still have memories of this(I was around 4 years then). Though I did not know the ABC of music(it is a different issue that the word has none of these alphabets), something in it attracted me. That ‘it’ was film music.

My parents would regularly listen to the Carnatic music concerts every morning, but it failed to make a positive impact on me. My mind would whisper ‘how boring!’, though I did not have the guts to say this to them. I would wonder what was there in that music which made them nod their heads and express their appreciation with ‘aahaas’. I would wait for my turn in the evening when I would keep turning the knob on the gadget to listen to songs that attracted me.

My father being in government service was transferred to a city away from my home state and this brought in a change. Tamizh film music was restricted to just around 15 minutes every evening on a station called ‘Vividh Bharati’. Over a period of time, I discovered a station on ‘short wave’ with the broadcast being done from our neighbouring country called ‘Sri Lanka’. Here too, it happened only in the evenings, but for a slightly extended time.

Being exposed to a new culture and a new set of peers, made me listen more to Hindi songs and also to Telugu songs. There was also a programme in the night on Wednesdays, a programme dedicated to Hindi film songs, about which I had written here long ago.

Cut to the year 1976. Being a voracious reader of Tamizh magazines, I got to know about a new film and a new film director. Both were making waves and I was wondering what it was all about. Mind you, it was an era where people had to wait very patiently to listen to their favourite songs and I did not have the opportunity to listen to the songs from that movie, despite my curiosity being aroused after reading the reports/interviews.

My wait finally ended when one day the station played a song from that movie. My first reaction – What is so great about this? There is always a rebel sleeping inside me like and animal and would wake up whenever it feels the need to ‘hunt’. After a couple of other movies and songs of that ‘new’ music director, I started feeling ‘Oh, this seems and sounds different’.

After about 8 months or so, I was in Madras to spend my vacation. It was a Sunday evening and I was at one of my relatives’ houses. A song started playing and though I had listened to it before, I felt something, a feeling not easy- in fact next to impossible to describe. Even now, when I reminisce about that evening, I get goosebumps and I even become meditative.

From then on, there was no stopping. Music which I had been listening to from my childhood, seemed so different and beautiful. Not just beautiful, but also deep. Not just beautiful and deep, but also mesmerising. I felt as if I had discovered something new. I started listening to Carnatic music and realised why it was so beautiful. After a couple of years, I started listening to Hindustani music and realised why it was divine. After some more years, I started listening to Western Classical and realised why it was divine. But all along, I was listening to the songs of that ‘new music director’ even as he was churning out song after song, with each one sounding different and beautiful. My thirst continued and it continues till date with me discovering new in music every day; with me discovering new in that ‘new music director’s music’ every day.

The song I am going to talk about on this Music Day, is not the one which was a turning point in my life, but the one which talks about the beauty of music.

The initial humming of Sujata, takes me to a garden full of green trees with the birds fluttering their wings with glee. When the bass guitar enters along with the percussion and the violins following, I feel as if I have become a bird.

The Pallavi, which is the prelude in the vocalised form, makes me believe that ‘yes, I am indeed a bird’.

The violin in the beginning of the first interlude confirms this. But when the group of violins enter, I start questioning myself- ‘Am I not a human?’. When the flute interjects the violins, which by now have gathered momentum, the question continues.

The question deepens in the CharaNam.

Even as the piped instruments romance with the bass guitar in the beginning of the second interlude, I straddle between the avian and human life. The duality continues until the flute sounds something towards the end.

‘Is this real or is it a dream?’- I ask myself after that flute piece.

My question continues..

And my quest continues..

 

Unconventionally Conventional

 

It may sound odd (or even, even!) but the fact is that a majority of the women folk in our country, do not have a choice when it comes to certain things in life and this includes choosing a life partner. I can feel the quizzical expressions from some of you, but let it be understood that I am talking about ‘a majority’ and therefore it will be nice if the cosmopolitan cities are not taken into consideration, though there are still girls and women even in such places whose mouths are gagged.

That is why, this song, in which the girl dictates terms to her suitor by describing her ‘dream wedding’, impressed me way back in 1982 when this song was released, and continues to impress me even after nearly 43 years.

‘Do not even think of marrying me, because you will suffer for sure’ says she. Her ‘conditions’ include the groom himself playing the Nagaswaram, the wedding happening in a train with the mantras rendered by foreigners, ‘naiyyandi melam’ by a group from Nochhikuppam, the groom carrying the plate with milk and fruits and yes, the groom falling at the feet of the bride.

This description of ‘dream wedding’ starts with a humming followed by the Pallavi (Vocals- Jency) with the flute appearing along with the vocals.

After a banter between the guitar(bass strings) and the distortion guitar, the saxophone takes over moving with gay abandon.

The Nagaswaram goes in pure Suddha Dhanyasi in the first CharaNam, while it plays the ‘NaiyaaNdi meLam’ in the next CharaNam.

The ‘Vaarayo thozha vaarayo’ segment completes the celebration.

A celebration of the assertion of a woman!

Unique

 ‘How is that the one seen in the picture on the wall, resembles the one who is present here?’

This used to be a repeat question on my mind whenever I stepped into that saloon. That ‘whenever’ was ‘often’ as my hair grew faster than the grey cells inside the shell it covered, thereby entailing my jaunts to that saloon. If the last-mentioned word conjures up an image of a swanky place with a/c and plush chairs in your mind, I request you to erase (or should I say ‘delete’?) that image from your mind before I say ‘1 2 3’. The entire area would have been around 100 sq.feet and there was just one fan with a huge sphere at the centre nodding its head even as it moved probably teasing me saying ‘You are nicely caught’( ‘nalla mattikkitte’ in English). The reason for this ‘gesture’ will be known in a while.

The picture on the wall depicted Lord Muruga with a spear and the ‘hair-dresser’ was a carbon copy of that image, at least as far as my eyes could comprehend, though I couldn’t comprehend the reason for this co-incidence. After some months, I asked my father – Do you see the resemblance? My father in his trademark style, laughed out loud(no, the acronym for this was coined much much later, the only ‘Lol’ I knew then was the sound made by the ‘Bhairavars’) and said he had not noticed it and would do so the next time we visited. That he concurred with me the next time, and appreciated me for my observation and imagination, need not be mentioned as I believe in being modest and do not believe in blowing my own trumpet ( it is a different issue that I do not own a trumpet, leave alone play!).

With the assurance that this ‘resemblance’ story will continue in one of my future posts, let me move on to the main story. My frequent visits to the saloon were necessitated by two factors basically. One, the school where I studied was very strict when it came to enforcing discipline and one of their strongest beliefs was that the children should never sport long hair. The teacher would call the students randomly, ask him to turn sideways and then show the back to see if that hair growth needed a harvest. I remember some students being sent back home with a message to go to the saloon immediately, have the harvesting done and go back to the class. It is a different issue that some students found this a nice way to bunk the class!

Two, the growth of my hair. The rate of growth was inversely proportional to the rate of growth of the cells in my brain, a fact which should be obvious for people who see me now (no, as I said I believe in being modest and humble!).

What is of primary importance is that I would shiver in my shoes (though I used to wear only Hawaii chappals) whenever the day of my visit to that place arrived. And this was not without any reason. The ‘cutting process’ those days involved a hand-held machine which would just rummage through the forest on the head and bring down the ‘trees’ in a jiffy, an act that would make the present- day real tree-choppers proud. Before this, a pair of scissors would be used to first trim the region. So far, so good. But what happens next?

The hair-dresser would first apply water on the nape of the neck and then take a knife. He would trim the hair there with the knife so that it gives a great appearance. Whether it gave a great appearance or not, the moment he took the knife, I would have the urge to use the rest room. Something would churn in my stomach. My palms would sweat. My entire body would start shivering. All these because I was scared of the knife(in fact, there were not many things I was not scared of, those days!). I would imagine the knife piercing through my neck and the red fluid inside the body oozing out with force. The placing of the knife too would give me some weird sensations, difficult to explain. Whether the sensations were because of the knife or because of my imagination, was (is) difficult to say. But the fact is like Yudhistira in Mahabharata, I would see and experience hell for a while.

I would try my best to avoid this ordeal by coaxing my father. He even had a word with the hair-dresser- who became his good friend – to use the knife mildly on me. But I wanted ‘no-knife’ absolutely, which never happened in those 4-5 years as far as my memory goes.

The song of the day does not talk about the knife, but the fact that it revolves around a ‘hair-dresser’ makes it a song for the occasion- my story as well as the ‘day’.  

What strikes one in ‘Senorita, I love You’ from Jhonny (1980) the moment the prelude starts is the guitar that sounds differently. The different sound is because of the phaser connected to the guitar and as far as I know ILaiyaraaja is the only film music composer in India to have used this prolifically. The special sound moves on backed by the rhythm guitar. The strings join in and play in the higher-octave as if possessed by a spirit. The small flute coos like a cuckoo, as the celebration continues. The strings then move in circles, as if to wind up the prelude. But can a circle end at all?

SPB takes over to make it linear, with the instruments sounding in between, making it alluring.

That this composer is capable of producing different sounds – sounds not heard of hitherto in film music- is known to the passionate followers of his music. This song is no exception. A very funny sound creeps in after the initial sound from the strings of the guitar. What makes this sound even more exciting is the backing from the guitar strings-which play constantly, the bass guitar, the drums and the strings which take turns forming an exquisite pattern. Did not somebody say that change is the only constant? That ‘change’ happens here.

The composition starts in B-minor and goes in this scale until the second half of the first interlude. Once the funny sounds end, the strings take over and now it goes in G-major. A minor shift making a major difference!

Moreover, the rhythm in 4/4, which sounded peppy until now, sounds gentle once the strings enter. In fact, for a while there is no percussion at all, though the time signature remains the same.

The two sets of strings play two different sets of notes simultaneously in two different styles. The flute which enters after a while, makes the entire experience subtly exhilarating.

The CharaNam continues in the major scale with the funny sounds appearing after the first two lines and lasting for a count of 8 (two 4/4 cycles). The lines shift to the minor scale towards the end.

If it was the funny sound in the first interlude, there is a very different sound from a different instrument (which sounds a lot like the violin!) in the second interlude which steals the show and our hearts. I will not be exaggerating if I say that it sounds like a lullaby, with the bass guitar enhancing the feeling. Just before this special instrument, there is that brass flute which surrounds us like how chilly air surrounds us in a mountain.

The strings move in the higher-octave, sans the percussion, spreading joy.

Does it convey something, the ‘it’ meaning the special sounds and the arrangement?

To me, it says ‘Each and every experience in life is special, whether it is with the knife used for trimming the hair or the resemblance between the image of the God and the man who performs his duties’.

How about you?