ilayaraja on S Anand

Classical Ilayaraja 15

Sun, 11 Feb 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 15th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

Dharmavathi is the 59th melakartha raagam. Sa Ri2 Ga2 Ma2 Pa Da2 Ni3 Sa as arohanam and the converse as avarohanam. It is the prathimadhyamam of Gowrimanohari (23rd melam). About couple of years ago Rahman tuned a superb Dharmavathi song in Vandicholai Chinnarasu. The song is sugam sugam vendum. I think the singer of the song is Vani Jayaram. It is one of the best songs that Rahman has tuned in his short career so far. It is a very sexy song. He starts the tune in the madhyama sthayi like Sa Ga Sa Ga, with a very very prominent chord sequences in the background. While another song from the same movie became a good hit (senthamizh naatu thamizhacheeyE sung by the late Shahul Ameed), this lovely song based on a pure classical raagam did not become a hit. Earlier, Rahman has tuned one more Dharmavathi in the movie Gentleman. The song is ottagathai kattikko, which came as an unbelievable melody in that movie with a fantastic rhythm played in the pukka South Indian instrument “thavil”.

Of course, Rahman had exhibited the usual (predictable) “cinema musician’s tendency” of deviating from the raagam by using some foreign swaras in both the above songs. Even though there is predominant use of Da2 in sugam sugam, in the charanam he uses Da3 Ni3 prayogam like Neethimathi raagam (60th melam). In ottagathai kattikko, he very liberally uses both Ni2 and Ni3, making it difficult to bring it under either Hemavathi (58th melam) or Dharmavathi. For our purposes to discuss Dharmavathi, I called ottagathai kattiko as Dharmavathi in this essay.

Rahman said in one of his early interviews that he avoided listening to contemporary music as did not want to get influenced by that music. He wants his music to be original and new! Alright bro, make music without the influence of your forefathers! Let us see, if you can!

This is an ever changing world. People are born constantly and people are dead similarly. We all have come into the world not like Mr. Jesus Christ without a father. We have our roots strongly based on our immediate previous generation, and less significantly on the innumerable generations in-between from the ages of origin of man to now. Newtonian concept of gravity was put to disuse by the “nascent” Einsteinian concept in the 20th century. The important thing to remember and appreciate is that Newton did prominent work on gravity before, and his ideas pre-existed the period of Einstein. If it were not for Newton to intrigue Einstein, the latter would not have become such a great scientist. If it were not for the stimulus of advaitha of Sankara, neither would have Ramanujam come up with his visishtadvaitha, nor Madvacharya with his dvaitha philosophy. Nature requires a pre-existent state to progress to the next state. It sends Nagesh first in the time window to do his comedy and then Vadivelu. It sends Shatrugan Sinha first and then later Rajnikanth. We are all a small part of the continuously self-propagating enormous force that originated in the big bang. Nobody can molt the profound ancestral influence to become a “new” creator (in absolute terms).

Ilayaraja too, has tuned wonderful Dharmavathi’s. His first was probably in the movie Vikram. The song is meendum meendum vaa. S.P.Balasubramaniam and S.Janaki! He starts his song in madhya sthayi like Sa Sa Sa Sa (meendum meendum) and then all of a sudden jumps one octave to the thara sthayi Sa (vaa). He has used Mridhangam as a wonderful rhythm support in that song. In the charanam the tune is just excellent. Pa Pa Pa Ma2 Da2 (thekku marathil) Pa Pa Pa Ma2 Da2 (sedhukki vaitha) Pa Pa Ma2 Pa Ga2 Ma2 Pa (dhegam idhu thaana). Even in the charanam he frequently jumps from madhyama sthayi Sa to thara sthayi Sa. To me, it seems like Rahman got the idea to tune his sugam sugam from meendum meendum vaa. Both are very sexy, romantic playboy channel duets! Both of them are great in their own aspects.

Ilayaraja’s possibly second Dharmavathi is illam cholai poothadha in the movie Unakkagave Vazhgiren. This was not a big hit like kanna unai thedugirEn vaa in the same movie. However, illam cholai is one of the milestones in his career. I would say that it is one of his top bests. It has been sung by S.P.B. He starts like Ma2 Pa Sa (illam cholai) Sa Ri2 Sa Ni3 (poothadhaa). He prolongs the kaakali nishadham and beautifully gives a gamakam and then travels down to panchamam. Initially he uses tabla for accompaniment and then in the charanam there is wonderful mridhangam, the usage of which is very typical of him. Listening to this song is one of the best musical experience that I have had in my life! In Varusham Padhinaaru his E aiyyaasaami is a kind of Dharmavathi with lot of mixture of Ma1. In Veera, his konji konji is quite a pure Dharmavathi. Maragadhamani has given a very pure Dharmavathi in thaththithom in Azhagan. He has excellently used keyboard with fantastic gamakams in that song.

Dharmavathi has two very melodious janya raagas. One is Ranjani. Sa Ri2 Ga2 Ma2 Da2 Ni3 Sa; Sa Ni3 Da2 Ma2 Ga2 Sa. The best song in Ranjani in cinema is muthupandhalil rathina oonjalil sung by T.N.Seshagopalan in the movie Thodi Raagam. Kunnakudi has tuned it in an unparalleled manner. MSV has used Ranjani in few of his cinema raaga-malikas (Ezhuswarangalukkul has a bit of Ranjani in Aboorva Raagangal, and also ranjaniyai azhaithEn in the movie Mrudhanga Chakravarthi). The other popular janyam of Dharmavathi is Madhuvanthi. There is a subtle Ma1 usage in this raagam. In the movie Nandha En Nila, obscure music director V.Dhakshinamurthy has tuned one excellent Madhuvanthi song. The song also starts like nandha en nila. My Houston room-mate Karthik used to repeatedly listen to this song again and again for hours. If you listened to this song, you will know the addictive potential of this song. Like “heroin addict”, “ganja addict”, we can proudly call ourselves as “nandha en nila addict”! It is one of the best ever recorded Thamizh cinema song!

The 10th chakram (in other words, the 4th chakram of the prathimadhyama melaraagas) has probably the more popular raagas among the prathimadhyama melams. The 55th is Shatvidhamargini, 56th - Shanmukhapriya, 57th - Simhendra Madhyamam, 58th - Hemavathi, 59th - Dharmavathi, 60th - Neethimathi.

Ilayaraja has given a lot of Shanmukhapriya songs. thamthanathamthana thalam was his first Shanmukhapriya (in Bharathiraja’s Pudhiya Vaarpukkal). One of his very early classical ventures that proved to the Thamizh cinema world what kind he was! It is a very fast song sung by Jency. In his earlier days he seems to have really liked tuning fast songs (like mazhai varuvadhu in Rishi Moolam)! In thamthana song, the thabla rhythm, veenai and flute interlude are mesmerising. His other Shanmukhapriya songs are kaadhal kasakkudhaiyaa (Aan Paavam), thakita thadhimi (Salangai Oli), ooru vittu ooru vandhu (Karagaattakaaran), sollaayo vaai thirandhu (Moga Mull). We have to remind ourselves of the earlier music directors contribution in this raagam that includes pazham nee appa (Thiruvilayadal), muththaitharu (Arunagiri Naadhar), kurangilirundhu (Thookuthooki), maraindhirundhu (Thillana Mohanaambal). Devendran has tuned kannukkul nooru nilava in Vedham Pudhidhu. One interesting thing to note is that even Thyagarajaswami has given only one krithi in this important raagam, while cinema fellows have been handling it quite often, the maximum number being by Ilayaraja!

Shanmukhapriya uses Ri2, Ga2, Ma2, Da1 and Ni2. If we change the Ni2 to Ni3 we get Simhendra Madhyamam. Probably, his first number in this raagam came in Panneer Pushpangal. The song is aanandha raagam. This song has got one of the most abnormal starts! It starts in thaara sthayi Ga! It goes likes this: Ga2 Ri2 Sa (aanandha) Sa Ri2 Ri2 Sa (raagam). A beautiful start and a wonderful job by Uma Ramanan! His second song in this raagam came in Mukta Sundar’s debut film Kodai Mazhai. The song is kaatrodu kuzhalin naadhamE. The song has been sung by Chitra. A highly classical song. The heroine gives a dance performance on stage for this song. This song also starts in a very high pitched Ga2 of thara sthayi! I first listened to this song while watching the movie in the theatre, and the song was just gripping! His next Simhendra Madhyamam came in Oruvar Vaazhum Aalayam. The song is nee pournami. He starts this song in middle octave Ri2! The song goes like this: Ri2 Ga2 Ri2 Ga2 Sa (nee..) Ga2 Ma2 Pa Ma2 Pa (pournami). The swara structuring of this song is just marvellous. He uses groups of swaras up and down like a thrilling roller-coaster ride, and later in the end of the song he starts presenting alternating swaram-sahityam sequences that are just wonderful! His last Simhendra Madhyamam song is thalaattum poongaatru in Gopura VaasalilE.

We have discussed Hemavathi raagam in our earlier essays. Nobody has tuned Shatvidhamargini or Neethimathi in cinema! These are extremely rare raagas even in classical sadas. If we just change the Ga2 to Ga3 in the raagas discussed above, we get all the important raagas of the next (11th) chakram. 63rd - Lathangi, 64th - Vachaspathi, 65th - Mesakalyani (commonly, called as Kalyani). We know that Ilayaraja was the most prolific music director in tuning Kalyani in cinema. Did anybody think that he would use the other important raagams from this chakram in the nineties?!

Once upon a time there was a director called as “P.Vasu”! He used to shoot whatever perversion that came to his mind during the most uninhibited of his dreams as films! He had the extreme fortune of getting “Ilayaraja’s kadaaksham” in most of his movies, and the films would be jam-packed with superb songs! Just because of Ilayaraja, those films would “runno runnunu run” tirelessly in the theatres, with money “fallo fallunu falling” down the roofu! Mmmmm…… Did P.Vasu know that he got one of the two great Lathaangi songs ever tuned in one of his junk movies? The first popular Lathaangi is aadaadha manamum uNdO in Mannadhi Mannan. The song has been sung by T.M.S and M.L.Vasanthakumari. Great song!

The other popular Lathangi came from the harmonium of Ilayaraja! The movie is Walter Vetrivel. The song is raasavE chitterumbu. He has presented an incredibly pure Lathangi in a “tappaanguthu kind of format” in this song. It was a mega-hit song reverbrating throughout the Thamizhnadu, from the slums to the elite! Prabhu Deva and Sukhanya dance for this song. It is one of the songs, which, when a common laymen rasika listens, he just feels it as a “great” tune, while a knowledgeable rasika immediately recognizes the intelligent use of a hardcore classical raagam and becomes wonder-struck! Ilayaraja has tuned another Lathangi in eeramaana rojavE (adhO mEga oorvalam). But, that song was not a big hit. He also gave a Vachaspathi in one of his songs, nikkatumaa pOgattumaa neela karunguyilE (Periya Veetu Pannaikkaran). A beautiful song. But, it was not a big hit. I don’t think anybody else has tuned Vachaspathi in cinema.

Vijayanagari is a janyam of Hemavathi. Actually, this raagam was “discovered” by Harikesanallur Muthiah Bhagavathar in this century. He just omitted Nishadham in Hemavathi and called it as Vijayanagari. There is a famous M.K.T song soppanavaazhvil magizhndhu in this raagam. Ilayaraja tuned one Vijayanagari in paadaadha thEneekkal. The song is vanna nilavE vaigai nadhiyE. He has beautifully used the Ma2 of this raagam. But, from puritans point of view, he has done a mistake. He has also used Ga3 to give a very sad appeal to the song. That is not permissible.

Vijayanagari is very closely related to Sivaranjani. While Sivaranjani is a janyam of the 22nd melam (Karaharapriya), Vijayanagari is a janyam of the 58th (the prathimadhyamam of the 22nd). Sivaranjani is also a very “soga” raagam. Kadalai urundai is called the poor man’s meat, as it has reasonably all the essential amino acids as meat, but at a lesser cost! Like that, we could call Sivaranjani as the “cinema rasika’s Mukhari or Bhairavi” as it has the same dose of “sadness”, but, in a lighter form. Sivaranjani’s arohanam and avarohanam are: Sa Ri2 Ga2 Pa Da2 Sa; Sa Da2 Pa Ga2 Ri2 Sa. Nowadays musicians liberally use Ga3 to add beauty to this raagam.

To list all the Sivaranjani songs of Ilayaraja is impossible. To list a few that comes to the mind immediately: adi aathaadi (Kadalora Kavidhaigal), unnai thaanE (Nallavanukku Nallavan), poovaNNam pOla nenjam (Azhiyaadha Kolangal), solai pushpangalE (Ingeyum Oru Gangai), kaathirundhu (Vaidehi Kaathirundhal), pon manE (oru kaidhiyin dairy), vaa vaa anbE (Agni nakshatiram), valli valli Ena (Deiva Vaaku), adhikaalai nera kanavu (Naan Sonnadhe Sattam), kuyil paatu (en raasavin manasilE) etc. Also, Sivaranjani is one of the unique raagas in the sense that, it is probably the only raagam that has been handled by every Tom, Dick and Harry calling himself as a music director. Manoj-Kiyan tuned tholvi nilayEna (oomai vizhigal), S.A.Rajkumar tuned paattu oNNu naan paadattuma (Pudhu Vasantham), Shankar Ganesh tuned aval oru menagai (Nakshathiram), lately Rahman has tuned kannum kannum (Thiruda Thiruda), thannerai kaadhalikkum (Mr.Romeo). In Karuthamma, Rahman has scored a fantastic song (poraalE ponnuthayee). It is also Sivaranjani based, with weightage given to Ga3 (like Mohanam) in the happy version, and to Ga2 in the sad version. This song unquestionably proves that Rahman is one among the most remarkable music directors in Thamizh cinema now.

The present continuous success in the Indian filmdom might make Rahman feel as though he has gone to the top of the globe. The total ouster of Ilayaraja from the #1 position might give a feeling of superiority than other creators now. Perhaps, that is the reason why he said that he avoided listening to contemporary music! Ilayaraja had the same status once upon a time. He behaved like a narcist then! He quarrelled with everybody in the cinema field because of his superioritic complex. He spoke ill of Vairamuthu on air when both he and Vairamuthu had been selected for national award! This behavior pattern is not unique to Ilayaraja! Almost everybody who comes to the limelight for some reason seems to become gripped by the evil “conceit”! Jayalalitha performed the marriage of her step son in such a grand manner only because of “conceit”! The mind seems to constantly work with the central thought “I”, “ME”, “MINE”! Nothing else matters to the mind!

Pigs like Jayalalitha and Sasikala, Maestro’s like Ilayaraja, Rahman, superhuman beings like Mother Teresa, billionaires like Bill Gates, and all of us would be dead and sleeping in our graves in just another millennium from now! We will all be forgotten and even our own progeny would not know us! When that be the likely practical eventuality, then why conceit? 65 million years ago, in the Jurassic age, the dinosaurs ruled the earth! Where are they now? 65 million years from now, the homo-sapiens species might be extinct, and even Ilayaraja’s microgram worth of dust might not be found in that world! Then, why conceit? In the inconceivably large space-time co-ordinates of Mother Nature, the infinitesimally small human being fails to realize his mortality during his life time. He dances proudly for “HIS” achievement, fails to acknowledge other’s talents, yells at his competitor with contempt and conceit! Oh, the director of all such conceited activity - THE MIND! You are a conundrum!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

Sophiya 13 Feb 2007 8:17 am: Nice!!!!
Adyan 13 Feb 2007 8:18 am: Well and Informatory
AISHWARYA MOHAN 19 Feb 2007 2:35 pm: SIMPLY COOL…………
m.srinivasan 23 Feb 2007 12:41 pm: Expose false claims of so-called veterans with bought out titles before thier names
Mani 1 Mar 2007 4:15 am: Superb man.. Keep up the good one … read some of your lines with joy.. all the songs are good.. Liked “Pigs like Jayalalitha…. " poor pigs..
sundar 4 Mar 2007 8:06 am: A very neat and detailed study of useage of ragas in tamil cinema.. Though I am layman liked it very much
venkat 12 Apr 2007 7:03 am: good music analysis
Kesava Prasad 11 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: Wonderful research and wonderful raagas to talk with….just like “Simhendra Madhyamam, Lathanki, Vajaspathi” those r rare raagas used in film songs…what about Hamsa nadham…..Thendral vanthu ennai thodum, Isayil(Hey Raam)..I like simhendra Madyamam in How to name it album too…..
sudhir 11 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: was indeed an in depth analysis of the usage of the ragaas in film music. Scathing comments towards the end were a bit of an eye sore, however, it was really bold to call a spade a spade. However, the analysis seems to be restricted to the opening sequences of songs, the way the ragaas have been tinkered. What is mesmerising about the music of Ilayaraja is his wondeful interludes in the songs. any comments?
Jeganathan 11 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: Hai I am Iilayraja fane Ilayaraja songs download please
Ani 11 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: Hello I believe a person’s work of art goes with the person’s personality. I dont have a baseless comment here but i will leave it at that for now. I dont understand how you can be all in praise of raaja till the end of the article and then write totally unnecessary comments about him in an article titled “classical ilayaraja”…what are you setting to prove here? By praising a guy, analyzing his works and then spitting on him in the end, you know more about things than the artist himself? And wat do u know about how or why raaja might have spoken about vairamuthu or watever else he did. Its your site after all and u CAN write watever crap u want…but u MAY NOT write random stuff about a genius and get away without atleast such a comment from one guy in the world.
K.Sridhar 18 Sep 2008 6:58 am: Dear Sir,
Gone through your analysis after a long time, I wish to mail you. I dont know whether you will read this.; Kindly reply my mail. After that I shall contact you for some assistance/guidence for a programme, which is based on carnatic raagas.
Sridhar.K
vinanthi 29 Nov 2008 7:03 am: cool..could u jus tel me which movie does this song belong to?isayil thodungudamma..viraha naadagame..vasantham kandadamma.and so on
Vidhya 24 Mar 2009 3:45 pm: The post was good. Nice to see how our movie songs can relate to carnatic music. I just have one concern tho…isnt vijayanagari raagam supposed to be a janyam of dharmavathi (59th melakartha)? I am not a music expert…just trying to get it clarified for my knowledge sake.
vivekananda 11 Jun 2009 2:36 pm: dear sir, Ur analysis is good but i didnt like the way u wrote about raaja sir at the end. Raaja sir is still undoubtedly the number one in cinema music and this is undisputed. Do not like about great personalities like raaja sir and rahman like this. it deeply hurts us.
Kesava Prasad 8 Sep 2010 11:37 am: To Vinanthi….Isayil thudanguthamma is from film “Hey Raam” and the raga is Hamsa Naadham….Thendral Vanthu ennai thodum, Minnaram Manathu (Malayalam) are some of the other songs in same raagam composed by Raaja Sir…
Arvind 31 Dec 2011 9:37 am: Dear Sir, Many of the links are dead now….would it be possible for you to update them for ease of browsing….Everytime, to google the terms and see is bit painful….. thank you for your supreme efforts!!! Sincerely, Arvind Madhav
Nivetha Sekar 12 Mar 2012 1:39 pm: wonderfull. superb. no words to explain
smdyuvaraj 21 May 2011 6:10 pm: good analysis…but I wanna to register one thing what you said about Illayaraja - do you know what Vairamuthu had said abt Illayaraja..did u analyze why Raja said like that abt vairamuthu…no one is perfect in this world…let me ask you..did not you speak bad abt others in your life…don’t write what ever you think abt Raja….most of the top directors, top stars who act now would not have been in tamil industry if there is no Illayaraja…he is guy who deticated his life to music…write good things buddy :)
SELVAAM KB 29 Sep 2011 9:13 am: Do not compare ilaiyaraja and rahman pls. Raja sir is a jennies
venkiee 26 Feb 2011 9:06 am: regarding ilayaraaja`s behaviour he hardly knows anything other than music i hope , he seldom appears in public appearance even his own movie audio release even today raaja scores 12 films ( 2011) his reputation is same as then ar rahman is a technological genius but raaja is the god of music even today most of the radio station survives by the name of ilayaraaja… raaja and vairamuthu problem did not bring ar rahman u cant hide the scent of the flower…whatever raaaja is the god of the music for me i compare raaja with sd burman salil chowdary and c ramachandra not with any others even naushad or roshan or ar rahman every one in these line are great but only few are greatest…raja is on number one of alllllllllll….according to me
BALAJI 6 May 2011 6:35 am: nice i did not know the raagas but in your explanatory i will realise the thing which was exatly allocate nice work
Chandrasekaran Viswanathan 27 Oct 2013 12:10 pm: Dear Sir, I like your analysis very much. Let there be ego, superiority complex,etc among them-but our (music lovers) admiration and love for them is unquestionable.
DR. V. RAMANATHAN 6 Nov 2014 1:49 pm: Illayaraja has handled almost all common ragas of Karnatic Music so aesthetically that sometimes you feel that they eminate better RASAS not found even in some Kritis and Keerthanas . I think such a man is licenced to have some EGO.
Prabhu S 22 Apr 2015 6:34 pm: Hello Sir, Your style of writing is very interesting. Your explanations on the various Raagas would elicit interest even in ordinary music lovers. Just curious to know what is your profession and where are you now.
suresh 9 Jan 2016 11:33 am: Sir, In azhiyatha kolangal song both raja sir & salil chowdhury composed the song. Am I right sir
VImal. S 14 Oct 2016 9:36 am: Really Awesome. A clear cut of End. Brilliant Article.!

Classical Ilayaraja 14

Sat, 10 Feb 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 14th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

The invincible AIDS virus is fast spreading in India. That is news! (Accidentally turned) bigamist Thamizh writer Balakumaran once stated in an interview that women are like masturbating bowl to men in India. Yeah, lorry drivers acknowledge that statement candidly! They will take the “sarakku” from Chennai to Thirunelvelli by their overnight lorry-borne express. In the gloomily lit bus-stations in-between, they will stop not only for “barota kuruma”, but also looking for their in-expensive bowls of masturbation! There… will come the familiar figure of the betel-nut chewing red-mouthed sexy queen! Our driver’s mouth will twist into a lusty leer! The indomitable Freudian force will drive the male instrument to do its procreative job in few minutes. There… will go our night queen, having earned few bucks to support her indigent family of innumerable malnourished children. In the above encounter between the two beings, not only the rapturous joy of sex, and money will have transacted, but possibly, the seemingly indolent “HIV” fellow too!

Ilayaraja writes in his nila adhu vaanathu mElE song,

pasikkudhu pasikkudhu dhinam dhinam thaan
thinnaa pasiyadhu theerndhiduma?

Good question, boss! The hypothalamus in the brain is a “dhammathoondu” structure! You can place it on your nail top and squeeze it, like your grandmother used to squeeze the helpless lice from her hair! But, it is this “thammathoondu” structure that orchestrates the various vital functions of the body. When you have not eaten for a while, and when your blood sugar concentration falls, it is your hypothalamus that feels your hunger and instructs you to eat! When you’ve not drunk water for a while, and when your blood sodium rises (dehydration), it is this hypothalamus that senses it and drives you crazy to drink! But, Ilayaraja tries to equate “hunger for food” to “hunger for sex and pleasure”! It is true that TTC bus driver gets free food at those unhygienic hotels in Thindivanam for bringing lots of customers and business for the hotel. Maybe, that is the reason why he eats three days worth of meal when he stops for those 20 minutes during your trip from Chennai to Srirangam! That is an unusual case. Most of us eat because our hypothalamus commands us to eat after sensing our low blood sugar concentrations! But, why does the lorry driver seek courtship in the shady towns of India during his long distance operation? Nothing decreases in his blood, making the hypothalamus “hungry for sex”. The hypothalamus simply feels like having sex!

Ilayaraja showed an abnormal choice of raagam (Reethigowlai) when he tuned thalayai kuniyum in Sridhar’s Oru Odai Nadhiyagiradhu. He had done that earlier in choosing the same raagam for his chinnakannan azhaikiraan in Kavikkuyil, and then in tuning raamanin kadhai kElungal in Sippikkul Muthu. It is a very easily identifiable, very classical janya raagam that was relished by composers like Thyagaraja. But, none in the cinema arena seems to have used it in the pre-Ilayaraja period. In mid seventies, here comes the uneducated music director from Madhurai jilla….! He tunes a couple of “tappanguthu” that marks his initial success! Within 2 to 3 years after his debut, he calls one of the most memorable geniuses of Carnatic music, Shri Balamurali Krishna to sing one cinema song for him. “Alright thambi” says Balamurali, and goes to the recording theatre…..

Was Balamurali surprised initially when Ilayaraja played the tune for him in his harmonium? If I were him, I would have been! First of all, out of the blue, why Reethigowlai? Why not the hackneyed Hindholam or Mohanam? This absolutely classical raaga selection shows his desire to venture into pure, traditional raagas! It is like A.R.Rahman springing a surprise by tuning purely classical Yadhukula Kamboji interludes in kuluvaliyE (Muthu)!

Reethigowlai is the janyam of Karaharapriya (22nd melam). It is a vakra raagam and hence with a convoluted arohanam and avarohanam. Sa Ga2 Ri2 Ga2 Ma1 Ni2 Da2 Ma1 Ni2 Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Da2 Ma1 Ga2 Ma1 Pa Ma1 Ga2 Ri2 Sa. Its raaga lakshanam is so unique that it gets imprinted in our mind easily. Beginners in carnatic music identify Reethigowlai rather facilely and this gives great encouragement to venture into learning other raagas. The jubilance of identifying a raaga by ourselves initially is unparalled and even a triple 800 score in GRE Pre-Test wouldn’t make you that happy! Oh man, what a joy! In that aspect, Reethgowlai could be compared to a steroid shot to Ben Johnson! In all his three Reethigowlai songs Ilayaraja presents the raagalakshanam excellently in a very concise 4 minute form.

He starts his Kavikkuyil song as Sa Ga Ri Ga (chinnakannanan) Ma Ni Ni Sa (azhaikiraan). He has just used the arohanam of Reethigowlai without any extraneous manipulation of the raagam. In his Sippikul Muthu song he goes like Sa Ga Ri Ga (raamanin) Ma Ma (kadhai) Ni Ni Sa (kElungal). A very small variation to chinnakannan song. He made lakhs of rupees for the former and lakhs for the latter! That is why he often says in interviews “there are only seven notes in music. Musicians have made infinite number of songs only with those seven notes by cheating!”. He is in a way right and in a way wrong. The above two songs are cheating of the first order. He has cheated less in thalayai kuniyum thamarayE where the pallavi goes like Da Ni Sa (thalayai) Ni Da Ma (kuniyum) Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa (thaamarayE).

Music is not just the melodious manipulation of different discrete frequencies of the continuum of “energy” commonly called as the sound. It is much more than that. There is another important variable in good music. That is the TIME! If I sing Sa today and sing Ga tomorrow, and Ri day after tomorrow and so forth sing one by one note of Ilayaraja’s chinnakannan azhaikiraan in whatever period it takes to complete the song, will it still be good music? This tells us the importance of MIND in music! There is NO music out there in the physical world! It is all in our MIND! When different swaras are sung, it is the MIND that intelligently concatenates the swaras and sees it as music. It sees a musical quality that is in actuality nonexistent in the frequencies of sound, and derives pleasure by listening to it! Following the same concept, the MIND derives “sexual pleasure” from the physical intercourse of two bodies, or “eating pleasure” from eating buttered pecan ice cream, when it is set for those appropriate moods. Behaviourly, the MIND seems to be a big pleasure seeker. Philosophically it seems to be the greatest fool in the world, constantly seeking the ephemeral, mundane pleasures that are never-the-less, virtual!

Reethigowlai is in no way related to Gowlai, Mayamalavagowlai, Kedaragowlai or Narayanagowlai. It is indeed closely related to Ananda Bhairavi about which we have discussed in our earlier essays.

Other raagas that beginners start recognizing very easily in their journey through the vast empire of carnatic music are Sahana, Kanada, Atana, Natai, Gowlai, Anandha Bhairavi etc. All the above are vakra raagas. We have two popular songs in Sahana that had a tremendous impact on the common rasika. ParthEn sirithEn (Veera Abhimanyu) and indha veenaiku in Rayil Sneham. The former tuned by K.V.Mahadevan and latter by V.S.Narasimhan. I hear that there is a song rukku rukku in Sahana in Avvai Shanmukhi. BTW, Sahana is a janyam of Harikaambojhi (28th melam) with Sa Ri2 Ga3 Ma1 Pa Ma1 Da2 Ni2 Sa and Sa Ni2 Da2 Pa Ma1 Ga3 Ma1 Ri2 Ga3 Ri2 Sa. Strangely Ilayaraja does not have any Sahana product from his industry! Atana is a janyam of Sankarabharanam (29th melam) with a complex swara sequence. It is a bhashanga raagam as it has a double Nishadham. K.V.Mahadevan gave a superb Atana in yaar tharuvaar indha ariyasanam (Mahakavi Kalidas). In Salangai Oli Ilayaraja used balakanakamaya (Thaayagaiyer’s Atana composition) in the scene when Manjubarghavi dances on the stage and Kamalahasan starts dancing in the kitchen (unable to control his inherent dance flow). Atana is a very brisk and “gambeeramaana raagam”!

Chalanaatai is the last (36th) melam in the suddha madhyama raagas and hence using 3rd Ri, Ga, Da, and Ni. Ilayaraja is the only one who ever chose to use this rare raagam in cinema. The song is panivizhum malarvanam in the movie ninaivellam nithiya. Sridhar directed that movie. Oh boy, Sridhar- Ilayaraja combination has given several marvellous songs to Thamizh music! Vairamuthu’s lyrics reached wonderful heights in that song. Ilayaraja’s use of this vivadhi raagam is very intelligent and guarded, avoiding any un melodious use of the vivadhi swaras. This song proved to be a terrific hit when compared to his use of the last (72nd) melam in the prathimadhyama raagas, which is Rasikapriya. He used that raagam to tune sangeethamE in kovil pura. He starts his Chalanatai like Ga3 Ma1 Pa (unpaarvai) Ma1 Pa Ma1 Ri3 Sa (oru varam). Then he goes Ga3 Ga3 Ga3 Ga3 Ri3 Ri3 Ri3 Ri3 (inivarum munivarum) Sa Sa Ri3 Ri3 Sa Sa Sa Sa (thadumaarum kanimaram). A beautiful interplay of immediately adjacent vavadhi swaras with an unanticipated melody that is much more than you could bargain from using such raagas. In the charanam he starts using Da3 and Ni3. He starts the charanam like Sa Ni Sa Sa Pa (chelai moodum) Da Da Da Pa (illam cholai) Sa Ni Sa Sa (maalai choodum) Ri Ri Ri Sa (malar maalai). The tune development is just excellent!

I was in Srirangam when this movie was released (in early eighties). In the Vadakku uthirai veedhi sandhu, there was a guy called as “paaku cheeni”. He was so crazy with this song that the cassette would be playing all the time in his house. While playing kabadi or cricket in the streets I used to get the benefit of listening to this lilting song for free, not knowing what a rare raagam it was! Look what Vairamuthu writes in that song:

Just being seen by you is a great boon;
even an ascetic to come in future would
loose his hold on celibacy on seeing you;
you are a tree bearing beautiful fruits (breasts)

You are a garden that wears sari
you are a flower that is worn by flowers
twenty moons would shine in your finger nails;
youthful dreams would bud in our eye corners
as our fingers play on each other,
as the distance between us decreases,
the glowing light would dim and our
eyes would close (in the ecstasy of love)

Oh man, what a language he has written! An unbelievable choice of words and thought in describing the beauty of a women. In a recent song (telephone maNipOl in Indian), look how the poet describes the beauty of a women in modern terms incorporating the latest technological advances in his poetry!

Is she the one who laughs like a telephone bell
is she the one who is like a Melbourne flower
did lord Brahma use a computer to sketch her figure
has her voice been made up of digital signals
is she the latest cellular phone

A wonderful movie by Shankar with great songs by A.R.Rahman. I think the above song is by Vairamuthu. It is amazing how these poets get such novel ideas to describe a simple thing. Grandiosity seems to be an essential quality of a poet’s mind.

Naatai is a janyam of Chalanaatai. The arohanam and avarohanam of Naatai are Sa Ri3 Ga3 Ma1 Pa Ni3 Sa and Sa Ni3 Pa Ma1 Ga3 Ma1 Ri3 Sa. Notice the vakram Ga3 Ma1 Ri3 Sa. Often singers sing Natai like Chalanaatai using all the swaras. Ilayaraja used Muthuswamy Dikshidhar’s Naatai krithi mahaganapathim in the movie Sindhubhairavi. Apart from that he has tuned one Natai (peigalai nambadhE - a jolly song in Mahanadhi). Only Kamal can make such daring pictures about sexual abuse of children. In the early part of the movie, “peigalai” song has been used to show what a happy family Kamal leads. It has become a common feature in India for the government to crumble to dust once in two years costing crores of tax-payer’s rupees for re-election! People have gone immune to all these and they just seem to mind their own business (like finishing B Sc and then studying a crash course in C language programming at NIIT to become a “consultant” to come to the USA). Who cares if the government survives or falls! But, a “mahanadhi” viewer is left with tears rolling down the cheek and extreme sympathy for Kamal at the horrendous turn of events in his life (even though it is just a movie). Kudos, to Kamal!

Ilayaraja’s use of Naatai for that song is quite a surprise. He has presented a pure Naatai in that song. Ga Ma Pa (peigalai) Pa Pa Pa (nambadhE) Pa Ni Sa Ni (pinjilE) Pa Pa Pa (vembadhE). The song ends with S.Varalakshmi singing the tail piece. Gambeera Naatai is a pentatonic raagam where there is no vivadhi swaram. So, it is distinctly different from Chalanatai and Naatai. The aarohanam and avarohanam of Gambeera Naatai is Sa Ga3 Ma1 Pa Ni3 Sa and Sa Ni3 Pa Ma1 Ga3 Sa. You could call it as a janyam of Sankarabharanam or Chalanaatai. Ilayaraja’s innum ennai enna seyya pogiraai in Singaravelan has been tuned in Gambeera Naatai. He has used the raagam remarkably. S.P.B and Janaki have done wonders in the charanam where most of the tune is set in thara sthayi! Earlier T.Rajendar scored one song in the same raagam (kaadhal oorvalam ingE in Pookkalai Parikkadheergal). That is also an excellent song.

If we change the 3rd Ni in the avarohanam of Gambeera Naatai to kaisiki Nishadham (2nd Ni) we get Thillang. Ilayaraja has given few Thillangs so far. Probably the first one was kothamallee poovE in Kallukkul Eeram. His other Thillang song is manadhil urudhi vEndum in Sindhu Bhairavi (a fantastic Bharathiyar poem). Look what Bharathiyaar says in that poem: PERIYA Kadavul kaaththal vendum!! Webster’s English dictionary gives the meaning for God as “the one supreme being, the creator and ruler of the universe”. If so, how can we have a “Periya” Kadavul (big God)? I guess Bharathiyaar compares God to human beings and says “Periya Kadavul”. In Kaiveesamma Kaiveesu there is one Thillang (anbE thaan thaay aanadhu). MSV has given a great Thillang nalladhOr veeNai seidhEn. That is in K.Balachandar directed Varumayin Niram Sivappu. Kamal is a big Bharathiyaar fan in that movie. Nalladhor is also a Bharathiyaar song. Ilayaraja has used a raagam that is closely related to Thillang in Kavarimaan (Thyaagaiyer’s Brovabaarama in Bahudhari raagam).

Because of the unique “vakra” phrases, many of the above mentioned vakra raagas are very easily identifiable. Vakra raagas are a boon to beginners as they help to get a start in carnatic music. If there is a vakram in a raagam, and if that is what gives the important raagalakshanam to the raagam, then that is how it has to be sung! You cannot go like Sa Ri2 Ga2 Ma1 in Reethigowlai or sing like Ma1 Ga3 Ri2 Sa in Sahana. These are absolutely not permissible. Why these strict strictures?

I read in a book recently that there was a Chinese sage called as Li Ling. He would usually be naked in his house. When somebody asked about it to him, he said “I consider the whole world as my house and my house as my cloth. So, why the hell are you entering my trousers?”!! Nature made men to intercourse with women to procreate and sustain life on earth. That is a rule. If man tries to enter into another man’s trouser ignoring the ordinance of Nature, AIDS awaits him inside the other man’s trouser! If the lorry driver in India defies the present day societal norms and seek polygamous pleasure, then AIDS awaits him at the gates of pleasure! Regulations and rules make our life go smooth. Rules enriched carnatic music and gave rise to an excellent variety of raagas. Till Nature gives her treatment of gradual evolution to things, what be now, let be in future!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

sundar 4 Mar 2007 8:45 am: It’s nice blog post… keeps travelling in various directions…it discusses about AIDS….and about ragas….suddenly about Kamal……but Njoyable
Aravindha Chellappa 10 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: Hey pal, Your blog/web development pad/website is really good. Only down-side is that it is a wee-bit long. But, all-in-all, its very good. Keep posting. Bliss & Peace, Aravindha.
Liyakath 10 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: Not in words for Ilayaraja. He was amazing.
booma 1 Dec 2008 7:51 am: ilayaraja is a amazing music director.no one can compared with him today also.there is no doubt in this sentence
Vijay Krishnan 12 Nov 2009 9:28 am: Hey Meetadha oru veenai from Poonthottam is also ReetiGowlai i suppose and How could you forget Ore naal unai naan nilavil paarthadhu, Sahana from Raja Sir.i dint read the entire..but when i saw that no product in sahana by Raja sir, i came down fast to comment…… :)
Mahesh 17 Apr 2011 7:48 am: “But, none in the cinema arena seems to have used it in the pre-Ilayaraja period.” Telugu legend singer Ghantasala has used this Reetigowla raga in 1960’s ….the movie is Sri venkateswara mahatyam….. you can see Ghantasala himself singing in the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljHA_ugevEA
r.k.seethapathi Naidu 16 Dec 2011 11:39 am: As u stated,the world will diminish,people will perish:But,Music…… will be in AIR for life time…..

Classical Ilayaraja 13

Sun, 04 Feb 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 13th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

A.R.Rahman is the number one copier in the world. My friend is very much convinced on this matter. He called A.R.Rahman as a mammoth recycling bin that takes its own previously tuned songs and polishes it and presents it in a different form. How dare he copy the great kousalyaa suprajaa tune and use it as the interlude music in maargazhi poovE (May Maadham). My friend boils with anger. How dare the freshmen music director of the movie Meendum Savithri (Ravi Devendran) copy the interlude of maargazhi poovE (which is itself a copied bit from kousalyaa suprajaa) and present it in his song. A chain of copying! My friend has lost his peace and is now a terribly agitated individual. His head is hot with anger!

Is it correct to call the flute interlude in maargazhi poovE as a copy of kausalyaa suprajaa? A.R. Rahman has tuned his maargazhi poovE in the raagam Hindholam. Subbulakshmi’s Kausalyaa Suprajaa is in the raagam Sudha Saveri. If Rahman indeed copied willfully, how could he present a Sudha Saveri tune in a Hindholam song?

The concept of Sruthi is very illusory. We know that if we sounded a note with any frequency (X) and another note twice its frequency (2X), then there is an entire octave between these two notes. Be X = 1 hertz, and 2X = 2 hertz, or be X = 100,000 hertz and 2X = 200,000 Hz, there is one and only one octave inbetween these two respective sets of notes. Thus we will have an entire Sa Ri Ga Ma Pa Da Ni Sa between these notes. So, you can take any frequency (Sa) and play the 2X frequency of that fundamental frequency (upper Sa) and make a shruthi. Additionally if you played X x 2 * 7/12 (read this as X times 2 to the power 7/12) with X and 2X, then, you are adding the panchamam to the two Sa’s and you get panchama shruthi. Instead, if you played X x 2 * 5/12 (X times 2 to the power 5/12), you are adding madhyamam to the two Sa’s and it is called as the madhyama shruthi.

Shruthi forms the territorial boundaries in music. Any swara derives its identity only with reference to the shruthi. A single note when played alone is probably meaningless in classical music without the Shruthi. Shruthi by itself is pleasant music. In katcheris you may often see somebody sitting on the stage and playing the thambura. The thambura just gives the Sa Pa Sa notes to the Katcheri. That is the SHRUTHI!! Ilayaraja has many times just used the Sa Pa Sa shruthi as the background score in cinemas and lilted the audience by the magical effect of the SHRUTHI! Rahman also has used the drone of the Shruthi conspicously in many of his songs and added great melody to the songs (eg: the Panthuvarali song in Rangeela sung by Swarana Latha and Udit Narayan. What a classical piece!!)

The swaras of Sudha Saveri are: Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Da2 Sa; Sa Da2 Pa Ma1 Ri2 Sa. If we played Kausalya Supraja the tune goes like this: Sa Ri Ri (kausalya) Sa Ri Ri (supraja), Sa Ri Sa Ri (Rama poorva), Sa Ri Sa Ri Sa Sa (Sandhya pravarthadhE). The above swaras have meanings only within their respective Shruthi. If you viewed these notes from within the boundaries of a different musical territory, then it might have a different meaning. What if you viewed these notes from the reference shruthi of “Ri2-Da2-Ri2”?! The raagam might change totally. It is like Pandiyarajan and S.V.Sekhar travelling overnight and going to Kerala in Kadhanayakan!! Though Thamizhnadu and Kerala are adjacent states, words might have totally opposite meanings there! If a Thamizh doctor prescribed a sleeping pill to a Malayalee and told him “ee guligai ravilE kazhicho!”, he will be in trouble. Because, “ravilE” means night in Thamizh and morning in Malayalam! See how different the meanings are?!

What A.R.Rahman has done is, he has skillfully “copied” the Sudha Saveri swaras and transliterated it into Hindholam as Ga2 Ma1 Ma1, Ga2 Ma1 Ga2 Ma1 and so on. We don’t know if he purported to copy or if it was a strange co-incidence. But, the fact is that a Coke can got recycled and came back to us as a Pepsi can! Sometimes, Coke cans can get a new sticker on its face (with no shruthi change and stuff!) and can be sold as Goli soda locally. That has happened in the background rhythm guitar score in kuluvaliyE (Muthu) song. The same piece comes in Sister Act. Ilayaraja too has got incriminated many times for such blatant similarity of his songs to other popular songs (en purushan thaan enakku mattum thaan in Gopurangal Saivadhillai was called as a copy of dham maarO dham).

Aandholika is a pleasant janyam of Harikaambodi raagam. Its arohanam and avarohanam are Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Da2 Ma1 Ri2 Sa. Thyagaraja swamy has got a terrific krithi in this raagam, which is mostly sung as a thukkada in Katcheris. The krithi is raaga sudha rasa. I have heard a story long ago. That Padma Subramaniam had a song tuned for her dance performance in this raagam. At that time Ilayaraja was in someway conected with Padma’s troup to earn his daily bread (probably as a “mike” boy or something!). Then, later he became picked up by “Ms. Luck” after he made his debut in Panchu Arunachalam’s film Annakili. He had lot of chances flowing in his way then. Mullum Malarum is a terrific movie. It must be within first 50 films of Ilayaraja. He gave a great musical support to the director, Mahendran, tuning few totally unheard kinds of lilting tunes then. But, he also got his name spoiled in that movie because of “copying” Padma’s Aandolika raagam tune.

The song is raaman aandalum raavaNan aandalum. That is a very crucial song in the movie. Rajni looses one of his arms in the climax of the song in an accident. The song is actually a tappanguthu. But, in the interlude of the song the chorus sings a bit which goes like “samiyai kumbitta namaku nalladhu thaan varumE”. The tune is supposed to be in pure Aandholika (the same tune that Padma used in her Dance performance earlier). Reportedly she complained in some interview about how Ilayaraja had “copied” her tune. We know that music directors like Ilayaraja and Rahman have got very fertile mind and they have proved it by generation of wonderful tunes. The judgement that these eminant people copied other people’s work cannot be passed so easily. It is in the innermost conscience of these personalities that the secret dwells if they are felon or not. Perhaps, it can never be known to the outside world unless they frankly admit like Anand Milind (“yes, we are fans of Ilayaraja, we do use his tunes in our songs”)!

Madhyamaavathi is a grand janya raagam of Karaharapriya. Perhaps it is the greatest of the pentatonic raagas (oudhuva oudhuva raagam). Its arohanam and avarohanam are: Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Pa Ma1 Ri2 Sa. Ilayaraja liked this raagam so much that he has at least tuned 40 to 50 songs in this great raagam. Madhyamavathi is distinct among other pentatonic raagas. It is a very much gamaka oriented raagam. It is like the Thodi of janya raagas. You can just play the notes of the 45 melam (Subhapanthuvarali) in the harmonium and make the raagam evident. Similarly you can just play Sa Ri2 Ma2 Pa Ni3 Sa in the harmonium and make Hamsanadham raagam evident, but, you cannot get Madhyamavathi by just playing the notes in a plain “bland” way. You have to make the notes spicy! Gently make the Rishabham and Nishadham oscillate above their baseline frequency, there comes the unparalled beauty, Ms. Madhyamaavathi!!

Ilayaraja has tuned a great Madhyamavathi in Mullum Malarum (adipEnnE). I think the singer is Jency. Each time I listen to this song it creates an inexplicable feeling in my mind. The song is so romantic, so sexy, so well sung that it directly stimulates some unknown erogenous zones in the psyche. Ilayaraja has reasonably used the gamakas well. This was probably his second Madhyamavathi, the first one being sOlaikkuyilE in Ponnu Ooruku Pudhusu. sOlaikuyilE starts like Pa Pa Ri Sa Ri…. A lofty jump from madhyama sthayi Pa to tharasthayi Rishabam. MaalaikadhirE goes like Sa Sa Ni Sa Ni…..Pa, such a prolonged nishadham. Most of the melody of this raagam resides with the Ri and Ni. The gamakam is absolutely important, period! Look at the beauty of Papanasam Sivan’s opening in Madhyamavathi in “karpagamE kadai kann paarai” - Sa Ri Sa Ri…. Actually the gamakam of Ri encompasses the sadharana gandharam too. It is like RiGa, RiGa…! Ilayaraja’s use of impeccable gamaka adorned Rishabam at the very opening of the song is too classic. It is like Krishnamachari Srikanth sending the first opening ball to the boundary!

Ilayaraja has given few more Madhyamavathi’s in quite pure form. en kalyaaNa vaibOgam in the movie Azhage Unnai Aradhikkiren is one early number. Sridhar’s first venture with Ilayaraja. Vani Jayaram has sung this song. Then, aagaaya gangai in Dharma Yuddham, nee thaanE endhan ponvasantham in Ninaivellam Nithiya, thulli thulli nee padamma (Chirpikul Muthu), thalattu pillai ena thaalaatu (?Achchani), thazham poovE vaasam veesu (Kai Kodukkum Kai), kuyilE kuyilE poonguyilE (Aan Paavam), anandam then sindhum (Man vasanai), azhagiya thirumaganE (Rajarishi), eeramaana rojaavE (Illamai Kaalangal), kavidhai paadu kuyilE (ThendralE Ennai Thodu), malargalil aadum illamai (Kalyaraman), nee kEta naan matEn (movie?) etc. A.R. Rahman has used small bits of Madhyamavathi in the interlude of his song thee thee thithikkum then ([Thiruda Thiruda](http://www.musicindiaonline.com/music/tamil/s/movie_name.5473/! target=)). Some singer called Jadhiraja has sung some fast swaras with pungent electric guitar sending shocks of Madhyamavathi vibrations with his voice! (I heard that Mr.Jadhiraja is none other than Rahman himself!) Madhyamaavathi by earlier music directors include ponnondru kandEn, muththukkaLO kaNgaL, aagaaya pandhalilE, etc. Can we forget the great presentation of Devarajan in Swamy Iyyapan hariharatmajam viswamasrayE sung by Yesudoss. It is a divine feast to listen to this slow song.

Madhyamavathi is supposed to be a Mangalakaramaana raagam. Tradionally when we end the katcheri, it is customary to end the katcheri in one of the three raagas: Madhyamavathi, Suruti, or Sowrashtram. Ilayaraja used Madhyamavathi to end the song in one of his raagamaalika songs! enna samaiyalO in Unnal Mudiyum Thambi. The song starts with Mohanam and ends with Madhyamaavathi. When SPB sings ilaiyai pOdadi, Madhyamavathi starts. Of course, each of the raaga change in that raagamalikai is made by the accompanying nadhaswaram.

If we change the kaisiki nishadham (Ni2) of madhyamavathi in the arohanam to kaakali nishadham (Ni3) then the raaga form changes drastically. It is Brindhavana Saranga. It is a bhashangam because of double Nishadham. Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Ni3 Sa; Sa Ni2 Pa Ma1 Ri2 Sa. Some of Ilayaraja’s song in this raagam are fantastic. poongaatrE poongaatrE (Kunkuma Chimizh), kallukuLLE anbin eeram enna (Unakaaga VazhgirEn) are both enthralling songs. I cannot forget how I used to tune to Coimbatore radio station between 10 to 11, Trichi - 1 to 2 PM, Madras - 4 to 5 in the mid 1980’s to listen to these great songs. These Brindhavana Saranga’s are as captivating as Subulakshmi’s Sriranga Pura Vihara or Balamurali’s kamalaptakula. The later songs that he tuned in this raaga are dheyvangaL kan paarthadhu (Pudhiya Raagam) and indha jilla muzhuka nalla theriyum (Priyanka). Brindhavana Saranga by earlier music directors are kattithanga raajavukku, thottilil thodangidum (nilavE malarE). In the latter song MSV has used double Nishadham in the arohanam itself (like Pa Ni2 Ni3 Sa)! It is one of the best songs that he has ever tuned, sung by Vani Jayaram.

Mullum Malarum has another fantastic song. senthaazham poovil is a kinda try in Bowli raagam (with lot of foreign notes in the interlude). Bowli is one of the early morning raagas. Other early morning raagas are Boopaalam, Revagupti, Malayamaarudham etc. When your cousin is getting married, you are very tired during the night of Janavaasam because you went out with your other cousins and had a “thanni” party and came back to the Kalyana chathiram only at 4 AM to sleep. You have hardly slept for 30 mts, and you hear the irritating Nadhaswaram vidhwan playing “pee pee” to wake up everybody. He is playing one of the above raagams! Boopalam is Thodi janyam: Sa Ri1 Ga2 Pa Da1 Sa; Sa Da1 Pa Ga2 Ri1 Sa. Bowli is Mayamalava Gowlai Janyam with Ga3 instead of Ga2 in Boopalam. I have heard of one good Bowli in the movie called as Kuzhandhai Yesu (kannE vaa, kanmaniyE vaa). I don’t know who is the music director. Recently I heard Ilayaraja’s another (probable) Bowli: kOzhikkoovum nErathilE (movie?). I don’t remember the tune very well. But, the best Bowli came from T.Rajender. salangai ittaaL (Maithili Ennai Kaadhali) was a tremendous success at that time. It is unfortunate that Rajender, a guy with full potency to challenge big time music directors, got lost in the political imbroglio, loosing his place in the cinema. He gave such a wonderful Kaappi raagam in his very first movie (idhu kuzhandhai paadum thaalaatu in Oru Thalai Raagam), superb Gambeera Naatai in Pookalai Parikaadheergal (kaadhal oorvalam ingE). Those are unforgettable tunes.

Madhyamaavathi is closely related Sriraagam (Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Pa Ma1 Ri2 Ga2 Ri2 Sa) and Manirangu (Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Pa Ma1 Ga2 Ri2 Sa). There is one film song in Sriraagam. thoda thoda vaa mella (Dharma Devadhai) has been tuned by Malayalam music director Ravindran. Two years ago, I heard another Sriraagam song (andhi maalai) that has been exactly tuned in the tune of Thyagraja krithi entharo mahaanu bavulu. That song was in a music album. I don’t know who realised it. But do know that it was someway connected with Rahman. As far as I know, there is only one Manirangu song in cinema. Music director: Ilayaraja! Isai rajanE un illam veenai naanE comes in Kanni Rasi (first film directed by Pandiyarajan). Malaysia Vasudevan has sung in two voices (his normal voice for Prabhu, and Chidambaram Jayaraman’s voice for Janakaraj), accompanied by Vani Jayaram. The fact that Ilayaraja used such rare raagas during his carreer is a standing testimony to his classical interests.

Now, coming to the original discussion about shruthi, look what happens to our Madhyamavathi when you start viewing it from different angles. Increase the reference shruthi by two notes, ie., Ri2-Da2-Ri2, then the raaga changes to Hindholam. Increase by 5 notes, ie., Ma1-Sa-Ma1, then the raaga changes to Sudha Saveri, by 7 notes, ie., Pa-Ri2-Pa, the raaga changes to Sudha Dhanyasi, by 10 notes, ie., Ni2-Ma1-Ni2, then you get Mohanam from the same swaras!! Is it not wonderful! It is like the same man being a son, brother, father, and as uncle to different people by virtue of different relationship.

Mohanam is a nice, melodious raagam. Ilayaraja is a real Mohanapriyan. No other music director in India would have given so many Mohanam as him. Among his hundreds of Mohanam hits we have kannan oru kai kuzhandhai (Bhadrakali), geetham sangeetham(Kokkarako), malarE pEsu (Geethanjali) vaan polE vannam (Salangai oli), kanmaniyE kaadhal enbadhu (aaril irundhu arubadhu varai), poovil vandu (Kadhal oviyam), meenkodi theril (Karumbuvil), naan oru ponnoviyam kandEn (Kannil Theriyum Kadhaigal), abc nee vaasi (Oru kaidiyin dairy), naan undhan thaayaga vendum (Ullasa paravaigal), oru raagam paadalodu (Ananda Raagam), nilavu thoongum nEram (Kunkumachimizh), aathodu kaathaada (Engeyo Ketta Kural), oru thanga radhathil (Dharmayudham), kasthoori manE (Pudhumai penn), ninnukori varnam (Agninakshathiram), kaathirundhEn thaniyE (Rasamagan), idhayam oru kovil (Idhaya Kovil), kukku koo koovum (Valli) etc. Some of the recent music directors seem to be handling Mohanam very well. ManamE thotta chinungi in Thotta chinnungi is a great piece of Mohanam. Oh God! what a terrific rendition by Hariharan! He is an asset to Thamizh music industry. In Kaadhal Kottai, Deva has given two amazing Mohanams (vellarikka pinju vellarikka, I forgot the other one).

In katcheris, the shruthi is constantly vibrated either by the thamboora artist or the electronic shruthi. This reminds us the reference shruthi for that concert and we can identify a raagam with respect to that shruthi. But, in film music, where there is no background reminder of the shruthi, how can we identify the raagam correctly? As discussed above, it could be Madhyamavathi, Mohanam, Sudha Saveri, Hindholam, or Sudha Dhanyasi for the same swaras. And now comes the “nuances” or “raagalakshanam” issue! We can still identify by figuring out the kind of treatment that has been given to the swaras.

While you are singing in one particular shruthi, if you suddenly assume a different shruthi and sing the same swaras implying a different raagam, then it is called as shruthi-bedham. It is a highly scientific game that some muscians like T.N.Seshagopalan relish playing on the dais. He could sing Thodi and do a 1/2 kattai shruthi-bedham and make it sound like Kalyani. The maestro has ingeniously tuned a song recently in which he suddenly assumes a different shruthi in the middle of the song. This is in [vandhaal vandhal rajakumaari](http://music.cooltoad.com/music/song.php?id=200343 target=) (Oru Oorila Oru Rajakumaari). In the Piano prelude he clearly indicates the shruthi initially . He starts the song like Ga3 Ma1 Pa, Pa Pa, Pa Da2 Pa, Pa Da2 Pa, Pa Da2 Pa Da2 Pa Ma1 Ga3 Ri2 Ga3 Ma1 Ga3 Ri…..If you were to call this pallavi as a raagam you can call it as Sankarabharanam. It is pukka! In the interlude he follows the same opening shruthi. But, when the charanam starts, he suddenly raises the shruthi by 4 notes and assumes the previous Ga3 as the Pa and develops a wonderful Charukesi from there on. It is ectastic to listen to this song again and again. Charukesi is the 26th melam with Sa Ri2 Ga3 Ma1 Pa Da1 Ni2 Sa. His other Charukesi are: amma nee sumandha (annai oru aalayam), siriya paravai (Andha oru nimidam), aadal kalaiyE (Sri Raghavendrar), thoodhu selvadhaaradi (Singaravelan), chakkarakattiku chakkarakattiku (UllE VeliyE), poovaagi kaayagi (movie?), and maNamaalaiyum manjalum (Vathiyaar veetu pillai).

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

asd 4 Feb 2007 9:23 pm: Biased huh?
anand 5 Feb 2007 4:54 am: mind blowing..
packiaraj 20 Feb 2007 10:21 am: excellent selection from isaignani ilayaraja.
Anonymous 20 Feb 2007 10:28 am: isaignani is always excellent.he is not made but born musician.whenever i listen to his music simply i forgot myself.
Anonymous 20 Feb 2007 10:33 am: please dont compare isaignani with man made a.r.rehman
Kiran 22 Feb 2007 3:33 am: Whatever it is music is music. I know music and i know playing flute. But a lay man doesnt cares technicalities involved in it. (Marghazi poove) is a beautiful song. Though he borrowed it makes sense…. So, feel the song, its lyrics w.r.t to the movie’s environment, it matches!
udayar Rajendra 2 Mar 2007 9:59 am: kannirasi is not the first film by Pandiyarajan, Aan paavam Paandiyarajan’s first film
sundar 4 Mar 2007 11:09 am: Kannirasi was Bhagyaraj’s first movie in which he plays an anti-hero character…. BTW your detailed analysis of shruthi is very good
sRIDHAR 18 Mar 2007 9:35 am: excellent work pl . go on doing some more!1KEE GOING WE NEEDE SUCH GOOD REASEARCH FOR THE MUSIC LOVERS THANKING SOM MUCH FOR U TAKEN EFFORTS SUCEED THIS THANKS11 REGARDS FROM SRI -gERMANY
Murali 4 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: Hi Friends, I too agree with you all but not really. I am big fan of Raja and his songs. I play only Raja’s song in my Keyboard. But raja too copy stuff from Mozard, Bach and Bethoven. Coping is not important but one should variations. In that scenario both AR and Raja does excellent job. If you think I am not right. Just listern to Mozard or Bach Synp and Listern to some Raja songs (like Chituku chella chituku or any songs start fast/allegro ). Let enjoy there creations !!!
R. Srinivasan 4 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: @Anand, A bad comment about ARR…… You fired ARR as if Illayaraja didnt copy any songs…. illyaraja have stolen a piano piece from a frech composer and used it in the mouna ragam movie…. piano piece name “Le Cocou”…. so mate better analyze both sides and give comments… here after dont write rubbish about ARR (One legend)…..
dilip shekar 4 Feb 2007 12:00 pm: uabfgyasdo & srinivasan ,
nice comment my dear (sons)children.
Venkat 28 Apr 2009 3:19 pm: Srinivasan’s comment on IR about “Le Cocou” is incorrect. They are diffrent ragas with not much similarties. Dr. Ramakrishnan’s article is not about knocking one music director over other but it is about dissecting music with primary importance to IR style of music. I am incompetant to comment on the intricacies of the articles but had a great time reading them.
Naveen Kumar 7 Jun 2009 6:47 am: Every musical instrument have some specific way and methods to play it. It may sound similar if they are played as prescribed method. So, My point is, because of same sound of the music we should not come to the conclusion that it is copied. Best example of copy is a song from the recent movie “Kathalin vilunthen” - “Unakenna naan” which is litrally copied from “Rihana - Unfaithfull”. But Raja & Rahaman’s composition may not look like that. Sometimes it may sound similar but if you feel the music you can get the diffrence.In “Margali poove” it is the usage of the tune it is not copied, As in “theepidika” from “Arinthul Ariyamalum”. So you guys don’t spoil the name of the legends. Don’t listen to music the rather feel the music then, you may know the talant of these lengends.
Bhaskaran 25 Jun 2009 9:06 am: Hi all, There is no musician in world without inspiration. We should Realize this.Even mozart n beethoven should hav got inspired sum where and if u clearly notice in mozart’s music…in many place he himself got inspired in his music and used a repeated peices many places… In same way Ilayaraja,Rehman, gets inspiration with some with music.. Without this no musician could come up..But there is huge difference between copying and inspiring…Comparing to others theirs inspiration level is low. But Ilayaraja Purely, greatly, gives all of music upto his traditional way…And the arrangement of instruments too same…Purely tamil cultured music…Thats the only Reason he his king of south…King of Music…King of Creativity…Musicians may realize how he gives importance to songs, bg’s going back songs…Re recordings….Similarity will be ther in all kind of music…If u ask Tamil traditional musicians to compose in purely western style…So he starts lisenting western to get sum idea…Without that how can it Happen. So obviously inspiration starts over ther….
simran 12 Feb 2010 7:15 am: It seems all composers borrow. Puccini borrowed from earlier composers, Lloyd Webber borrowed from him and later worked with AR who borrowed from other earlier Indian composers! It’s just one long chain of borrowing!
kk 17 Nov 2010 5:50 pm: i think ur mad…both are legends…dont compare with each other…they have their own syle of composition…for every song basic structure is there…that not copy… fool can u make a sentence without vowels…know ur knowledge..befor u comment..and one more thing..in the world no man is fool to accept ur concept…
Vignesh 2 Jun 2011 4:56 pm: Superb!! I’m totally amazed!! blown out!! im really iimpressed with ar rahman’s variety!! i must confess that i’m a gr8 fan of ARR!! semma depth of field!! good work!! :) :)
Ravi kumar 16 Oct 2011 8:49 am: Hi Friend, This is Ravi. I read your blog. You have done a wonderful job. But I have a small suggestion. I saw the song malargalil aadum was listed under Madhyamavathi. Actually this composition has a great mystery behind it. The song is actually in Mohanam. Please read my blog to understand it better. http://ravikumarv.wordpress.com/2011/10/16/magic-of-raja-a-lil-bit-of-this-and-lil-bit-of-that/
arun 8 Feb 2011 6:59 pm: “That Mozart’s work continued to influence Beethoven is an uncontroversial claim. To give one example, the role played by Mozart’s 40th Symphony in the composition of Beethoven’s Fifth can be documented from Beethoven’s sketchbooks, where Beethoven copied out a sequence from Mozart’s work that he adapted into his own symphony”……….this is from wikipedia. “copying” is a derogatory word and taboo to us lesser mortals. “real” creators like them never “copy” they try to OWN and POSSES their predecessors’, their role models’ works. they get addicted, obsessed, get jealousy, feel inferior (all artists would agree with these traumas). the troubled soul vents the pent up emotions by composing a piece of work which blatantly reflects the defeat. it is so beautiful to read our genius’ minds while listening to these so called “copied” songs. answer me this…abc nee vaasi or endha poovilum vaasam or any other “copied” pallavies might escape the vigilance of “music illiterates” but not that of the music critics. raja or rahman know this for sure. still they allow these songs for public listening expecting negative criticisms. actually we must salute them for their courage in accepting that “there is always someone above me and i am still learning”. (again these attributes will fit only to real music creators not to those music merchants). nadi moolam, rishi moolam adhodu “unmayana kalaignarin” isai moolamum parkamal irukkalame. nalla isaiy padaippugale aridhagivitta soozhalil, semmayana isai kalanjiyathai aiyappattodu aruthu parpadhai kuraippomaga. aruthu parthal dhan enna? pon muttai nichayam irukkum anal vathu dhan marithu pogum. Avar Vazhumbodhe vaazhthuvomaga. let us have positive outlook towards those who really deserve it, let us see the bigger picture just like the author of the article.
A.r.rahman 27 Sep 2011 11:34 am: Dae ennaya copy adikiraen nu soneenga.dae neenga ennatha da kilichutaenga.nan oscar vangitaen. Neenga ippadi vetti paechu than laiku…
S balakrishnan 19 May 2012 3:06 am: A.R. Rahman music is coffee from the vending machine and Ilayaraja music is pure Thanjavur filter kaapi
Prabhu S 11 Oct 2012 10:39 am: Hello Anand, Thanks for posting the superb article. For music lovers like me who are not trained in the classical mould, this article is a curtain raiser and teaches us some very basic things about classical music. We should really appreciate the author of this post, Mr.Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan, and no doubt, he has done a lot of research on the classical background of film songs, especially Ilayaraja’s songs. Great work.
vijai ananth 21 Oct 2012 6:44 pm: S.balakrishna, un filter coffee thanjavurkku mattum thaan laaiku, vending machine ulagatthirke siranthathu….filter kaapiye neeye vacchikko…..
Karthik 20 Mar 2015 2:40 pm: Hi, I thought Muthukkalo Kangal & Pon Ondru Kanden were Brindavana Saaranga.
ex-ARR fan 27 Feb 2016 3:25 am: In the INDIAN(tamil flim) akudangu nuu edapotta music ditto copied from love of common people

Classical Ilayaraja 12

Mon, 15 Jan 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 12th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

Thamizh film actress Kushboo has been deified to the status of a Goddess and a temple has been built for her in Trichi! Often I hear news like the deification of Jayalalitha, M.G.R., and other related “chota” news like a man in rural Thamizhnadu seeing God M.G.R in his cow’s eye! These are all instances that narrate the conspicuous births of Gods, or rather, the conspicuous deification of ordinary human folks. Given the evidence that these farcical news items do happen in the gullible Thamizhnadu, one has the right to make conjectures that Jesus Christ could have been a very very ordinary man, just like Kushboo. He could have had good human qualities and could have helped his neighbours to buy kerosene from ration shop and old ladies to cross busy roads like Bhagyaraj in Inru Poi Nalai Vaa! His unfortunate, pathetic death at an young age at the hands of local villains could have created a sympathy wave. And now, in this 21st century it will be castigated as an outright act of profanity, if someone dares to question the divinity status of the messiah.

In any religion, Gods seem to make their genesis in a very subtle way. Particularly, in Hinduism, the births of Gods and the appearance of temples in a region are so insidiuous. The onset invariably starts with a small stone or a rock under a neem tree turning holy (it is heaven’s secret, how these stones are selected!). Sandal paste and “kunkum” appear on the stone shortly and a group of people start worshipping the stone. A cascade of events follow and a figurine appears there to replace the stone. The figurine might take any shape in the world, a huge “Phallus” like Lord Shiva, an elephant headed form like Lord Ganesha, a cow headed form like “Thumburu”, a fierce looking lady like “Mariatha”… Soon, a nomenclature comes into vogue to denote this newly born “God”. It could be anything, a highly calloquial one like “vedi uppu beerangisami” or a beautiful Sanskrit word imported from the Indus valley! As an appendage to the name, a story too, comes into vogue, to denote the relationship of this new “God” to the older Gods, like “Lord Shiva’s uncle’s son”. Look at this place after 100 years…! No kidding, a grand temple has come into being there! Loud speakers are in eternal function, broadcasting divine songs by Seergazhi Govindarajan, L.R.Easwari, Veeramani! You may find some of our imbecile brotheren doing “anga pradakshanam” with their tongue bloody and impaled with a holy needle! Oh, mother Nature! When is this alarming increase in the population of Hindu gods going to stop (small “g” intentional)!

Carnatic raagas are like Hindu Gods. Their birth in this world is so subtle. A tune can be born from the harmonium of Ilayaraja just in a matter of few minutes. But, raagas? Raagas encompass all the tunes in the world. A tune could be created by Ilayaraja. But, raagas? Do raagas have creators? Raagas creep into “being” from amidst the masses. No single person creates a raaga. Can any person in this world raise his hand and claim patency to the creation of Lord Shiva or Vishnu? The creation of gods is the result of a community effort! Similarly raagas are the unintentional creative result of the musical community. The creation of a raaga is not bound by any time frame. It might take ages for the raagas to take form. The form of a raagam is not static. It keeps on changing with ages, like the present day Lord Ganesha sitting before the computer screen with sunglasses and dirty jeans! Remember seeing this form in your neighbour’s kolu during Dasara festival? Really?!

Thodi is one of the greatest of the raagas. It is the 8th melakartha raagam. We know that there are 72 melaraagas in carnatic music. These 72 melakartha raagas are divided into groups of six, according to the numerical order. Each of this group is called as a chakram. Thus we have a total of 12 chakrams. The first 6 chakrams (comprising 36 raagas) use suddha madhyamam and the later 6 chakrams (comprising 36 raagas) use the prathi madhyamam. Within each of the chakrams, all the 6 raagas will have the same poorvaanga swaras (ie., Sa Ri Ga Ma). The difference is only in the utharaanaga swaras (ie., Pa Da Ni Sa). Each chakram has a got a name to denote it. The 2nd chakram is called as the Nethra chakram. Thodi is the 2nd raagam in the Nethra chakram.

Has Ilayaraja ever tried his hands on this great raagam? Yes! Just in one song alone so far. Was he successful? Perhaps not! The challenge that Lakshmi Parvathi poses to Chandra Babu Naidu is nothing when compared to the challenge that Thodi poses to the cinema music directors. If Ilayaraja tuned a song in the Thodi scale (Sa Ri1 Ga2 Ma1 Pa Da1 Ni2 Sa), then it will sound like Sindhu Bhairavi! Because, just playing the notes of Thodi in the harmonium will only manifest the raagalakshanam of Sindhu Bhairavi (even though Sindhu Bhairavi has Ri2 in its arohanam, using Ri1 plainly without gamakam in the arohanam will be perfectly Sindhu Bhairavish). Thodi and Sindhu Bhairavi are so closely related to each other, yet so different. The drastic difference is because of gamakam. But for Sa and Pa, all the other swaras of Thodi have aesthetically beautiful, terrific gamakam. So, to get Thodi raagam out of Thodi scale, you’ve got to shake those swaras (Ri,Ga,Ma,Da,Ni), like the way a Richter 8.0 earth quake shakes California once in a while! California residents may stay at home despite such shakes, but the cinema rasikas would simply leave the theatre at once, to “drink” beedi or cigarette, if the swaras started shaking in a cinema song!

Ilayaraja’s attempt came in the movie Varusham Padhinaaru. The song is gangai karai mannanadi. It is pure Thodi. Within the constraints of tuning a cinema song, he has tried his best to give a proper Thodi, with all the gamakams. K.J.Yesudoss has sung that song. In the pallavi and charanam the “heavy” Thodi identity is quite clear. But, in the interlude music, the raaga degenerates to a “lighter” status, Sindhu Bhairavi. In his Saramathi raagam song, paadariyEn padippariyEn (Sindhu Bhairavi movie), when Chitra sings “sonnadhu thappaa thappaa” he has introduced an unwarranted Thodi sangathi there. Why did he do that? Also, he had erroneously used Da Pa Ma (like Marga Hindholam), in Saramathi. When the movie was released, Ananda Vikatan made a big issue about these gramatical mistakes in that song, and even interviewed vocalist Dr.S.Ramanathan regarding this matter! One of my friends said that he heard Ceylon Radio identifying the raagam of akkam pakkam parada (Unnal Mudiyum Thambi), as Thodi! What a joke! Sindhu Bhairavi raagam is like potato curry. My wife can cook it, your wife can cook it, all wives can cook it! Ilayaraja has cooked it many times, from maNi Osai kEttu (Payanangal Mudivadhillai) to maNiyE maNikkuyilE (Nadodi Thendral). akkam pakkam is one such Sindhu Bhairavi cooking! Let us not praise our wife as excellent for this potato curry, which doesn’t need any skill to cook!

Thodi is unique among the 6 Nethra chakra raagas. Even though these raagas share the same Sa Ri Ga Ma Pa, look at the way the gamakam of Ri,Ga,Ma has evolved so specially for Thodi! Denuka is the immediate next raagam to Thodi (the 9th melam). In his Denuka krithi theliyalEdhu raamaa, Thyagaraja swamy has preferred to use these swaras plainly without much gamakam, like in Sindhu Bhairavi raagam! How did these adjacent raagas evolve so differently from each other? Can we question the Ganesh getting an elephant face, and the Kumeresh getting a beautiful human face, in the differential evolution of the sibling gods?! I know of a song in which Ilayaraja has used the Denuka scale. The song is en sOga kadhaiya kELu (Thooral Ninnu Pochu). He predominantly uses Ni3 in this song (like in Denuka) and occasionally Ni2 (like in Thodi). The next raaga to Denuka (the 10th raagam) is Natakapriya. Recently I happened to listen to one superb Natakapriya song tuned by Ilayaraja! It came as a pleasant surprise in the movie Moga Mull. The song is nenjE gurunaadhanin! It is a lovely song! The situation is similar to the one in Sindhu Bhairavi, where distraught hero Shivakumar, begs for alcohol and sings the song thaNNi thotti thEdi.

In Moga Mull, the hero Rajam is a music student. He gets a chance to perform in the house occasion of a local big shot. He refuses that chance. Later, his guru (Nedumudi Venu) falls sick and needs lot of money for hospitalisation. So, the hero becomes a victim of circumstance and is forced to go to that big shot for monitary help. The villain makes the hero sing in his house when there is no occasion. All his friends form a crowd and sit before the hero. While he sings, the insensitive audience talks aloud, giggles, and humiliates the hero in all possible ways. The song is nenjE gurunadhanin in the raagam Natakapriya. Arun mozhi has sung this song. Fantastic job! I have heard a classic krithi “geetha vadhya” in this raagam. If I remember correct, the Ri,Ga,Ma had been handled like in Thodi (with gamakam) in that krithi. Ilayaraja has used plain swaras in this song. But, even then it is very classical and the raaga identity is quite clear. Oh, what a pathetic situation it is, to be in a financially needy state, and to unwillingly sell one’s music skill to a shameless crowd that is absolutely deaf to music! That scene only reminded me of the nowadays very popular marriage reception katcheris! Amidst the total chaotic environment of maamis (talking about their jewelry), maamas (talking about their gas trouble) and kids (playing with water gun), the musician has to sing! Often the musicians eyes will be tightly shut up, feigning full engrossment in his music! If not for the eye closure, who will come to save the musician from seeing the terrible audience!

To get the prathi madhyama raagam of any sudhdha madhyama raagam, just add 36 to the order of the raagam! The prathi madhyamam of Thodi (8th) is the 44th melakartha raagam. It is Bhavapriya. Ilayaraja has tuned a song in this scale too. That is kandu pudichchEn (Guru Sishyan) song. The upper half of this raagam will be like Shanmukhapriya, and the lower half like Subhapanthuvarali. Reportedly, some big shot (Sudha Raghunathan or somebody) told about this song in the TV (Doordarshan). It seems that they wondered how Ilayaraja could use this raagam (normally implying sad mood) to suit a situation in which Prabhu humours Rajni about his new, clandestine love affair with Gowthami! Can we dare call this song as set in the raagam Bhavapriya? I don’t know. But, it is definitely an appreciable thing to notice him venturing into unchartered areas in scale selection, say like Bhavapriya.

Those mothers living in squalor in the Nungambakam railway station might not have any idea about “naalanaavuku moonu samacharam” and might populate the station with their innumerable underweight kids! That is bad for India! As a mother, even Thodi doesn’t seem to have any idea about family planning! But, that has turned out to be good to the musical heritage of India! Oh boy, how many kids (janya raagas) has it given birth to! Most of the janya raagas of Thodi are hardcore classic raagas. The trinity seem to have enjoyed very much, composing in Thodi and its janya raagas. One of its prime janyam is Dhanyasi. Sa Ga Ma Pa Ni Sa; Sa Ni Da Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa. Probably these raagas can never be made light and presented to the common rasika! Ilayaraja used one of the Thyagaraja krithi in Dhanyasi in the movie Moga Mull. Again, the situation is similar to Sindhu Bhairavi, where Shivakumar goes to a katcheri and takes over the singing of the musician on the dais. Ilayaraja used the Thyagaraja krithi “lochana” In the raagam Dharbar to indicate the kind of musical talent that Shivakumar has (despite loosing his sobriety). In Moga Mull, a drunken musician gets on the stage and sings with a lot of abhaswaram. The hero gets on the stage and then sings sangeetha gnanamu bhakthi vinaa in Dhanyasi. K.J.Yesudoss has sung that song in the movie. In that situation there is a strong lecture by the hero’s guru that many present day musicians take alcohol etc! Does not a musician (or any public figure) has every right to do whatever he wants in his personal life? Let him drink McDonalds, smoke 555, and have a couple of women in bikini (as cinema villains often do) around him! As long as his hedonistic pursuits do not affect his public performance, why should we care? Lest, alcohol companies might sue us for causing a drastic decline in their sales!

Sudha Dhanyasi is another janyam of Thodi raagam. Sa Ga Ma Pa Ni Sa; Sa Ni Pa Ma Ga Sa. You can also (more appropriately) call it as a janyam of Nadabhairavi. Ilayaraja has been very generous in using this scale. MSV made an indelible mark in this raagam earlier by presenting neeyE unakku enRum nigaraanavan in Bale Pandiya. That is really fantastic! He has wonderfully used the Ga and Ni with gamakam in the song. Ilayaraja’s first Sudha Dhanyasi is perhaps siru ponmani in Kallukul Eeram. Later he gave raagavanE (Ilamai Kaalangal), pudhiya poovidhu (Thendrale Ennai Thodu) poojaikEththa poovidhu (Needhaana Andha Kuyil), vizhiyil vizhundhu (Alaigal Oivadhillai), theem thanana (???), manasu mayangum (Sippikul Muthu), maasi maasam (Dharmadurai), punjai undu nanjai undu (Unnal Mudiyum Thambi), kotti kidakudhu (Theertha Karaiyinile), kaadhal vaanilE (Rasayya), unnai edhir parthEn (Vanaja Girija). In many of these songs he uses other swaras like Ri2 etc., and hence cannot be called as pure form. In punjai undu, he has not used any foreign notes. Then is it classical raagam? No! K.Balachandar (a boot licker to Ilayaraja at that time, so that he could sell the movie by publicizing Ilayaraja’s name), made a big argument in the movie that even “punjai undu nanjai undu” was a pure Sudha Dhanyasi. Dear sir, to call something as classical, you should present it in a real classical form! Just going up and down the scale wouldn’t make the raaga form appear in that tune! Use the gamakam, use the nuances of the raagam, then even Semmangudi will call it as Sudha Dhanyasi!

If one changed the kaisiki nishadham (Ni2) of Sudha Dhanyasi to kaakali nishadham (Ni3), then is there any raagam like that? If so, what is it called as? Ilayaraja has given a couple of songs in this type of scale. One of them came in the movie Poonthotta Kavalkaran. Radhika gets pregnant and then the song goes in the background! I have read in my school biology class (with lot of curiosity!) that a sperm and an ovum “join” to form a baby! Look at the way the poet says about this scientific phenomenon in his poetic language…. sindhiya veNmaNi sippiyil muththaachu!! What a nice euphemistic way of saying a vulgur thing! Gangai Amaran proved himself as a poet in that song! Ilayaraja’s tune is so wonderful in that song. It is so melodious. Vijayakanth specifically said about this song in one of his TV interviews! Another song that I know in this scale is o vasantha raja in Neengal Kettavai. Since Ilayaraja changed the Ni2 of Sudha Dhanyasi to Ni3 and made a new raagam out of it, can he proclaim himself as the creator of this new raagam?

Perhaps Balamurali Krishna was very much pleased with his wife’s filter coffee early in the morning every day. He has created a raagam called as Abhayambika! Perhaps Kunnakudi expected Jayalalitha to give medical college admission to his last son (like MGR did for his older son). He has proudly joined the sycophant family of ministers and created a raagam called as Jayalalitha. If these conceited musicians called themselves as the creators of those raagas, then Ilayaraja too, could…!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

Archana 15 Jan 2007 12:22 pm: Anand, GREAT blog! fantastic! Really cant believe that I have taken so long to discover your blog! keep up the fantastic work! Warm Regards, Archana
sundar 4 Mar 2007 11:37 am: My wife can cook it, your wife can cook it, all wives can cook it! Ilayaraja has cooked it many times, from maNi Osai kEttu (Payanangal Mudivadhillai) to maNiyE maNikkuyilE (Nadodi Thendral). akkam pakkam is one such Sindhu Bhairavi cooking! Let us not praise our wife as excellent for this potato curry, which doesn’t need any skill to cook! what an easy way explain both raga and cooking
Madurai Arun 26 Jul 2010 12:57 pm: Awe3some…Wt a man Raja… The Keyboard is there in his Head not in Head… By Madurai Arun
Maverick 14 May 2011 1:05 am: Suddhadhanyasi with N3 is Udayaravichandrika, Dikshitar has composed “Sri Guruguha Murthe” in this raga!
A.Sivakumar 1 Dec 2012 2:56 pm: Great Blog… A Person not recognised by World(but not even single way less qulified than beethovan and Mozart …They too have 50 Composition only…But Raja Has morethan 5000 Compositin with he himself orchetrize the same …) is really living in NET becaule like you firends…Great Keep it up Isaial Inaivom Ilaiyarajavai pugzhalvom
Projekt Ilaiyaraaja 204/365 - En Soga Kadhaiya Kelu | Sylvianism 20 Aug 2013 10:29 am (pingback): […] song is pure brilliance with Malaysia Vasudevan, Krishnamurthy and Chorus making merry. S.Anand in this article says that the song is based on the raaga, Dhenuka. And […]

Classical Ilayaraja 11

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 11th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

V.G.Pannerdass has got an experimental animal in his V.G.P Golden Beach near Madras! That is his “goorka”. He pays that watchman only to stand near the gate with an expressionless face. Whatever the passersby do, he would stand there with the same old expressionless face! Let Kamal Hassan do all the “seshtai” that he does in the last scene of Moonram Pirai, the VGP goorka’s mask like face would show neither happiness nor sadness! He’d neither cry nor laugh. The VGP management is so proud of this guy that it is even ready to bet a hefty prize money if that would motivate somebody to make this guy cry or laugh. I cannot help wondering at VGP’s morbid taste in having this kind of a person at their gate.

Now, can we consider the usage of raagas to make this person change his emotions? If Ilayaraja goes before this person and sings his Valli song (enna enna kanavu) or Payanangal Mudivadhillai song (vaigaraiyil) in Subhapanthuvarali raagam, would it make his affect sad? It perhaps would, because some of the raagas indeed have a powerful negative effect on one’s affect, causing him to go to the lows! Let SPB go before this person and sing his Mayuri song (idhu oru mananaatiya medai) in the raagam Brindavana Saranga, or L.Vaidyanathan sing his veeNaiyadi nee enakku (Ezhavadu Manidhan) in Kalyani, would it make his affect happy? It perhaps would, because some raagas indeed have a very powerful positive effect on one’s affect, causing him to go to the highs! (This is what music therapy basically aims at, right?). Now, the question is, are there any raagas that can really make this person laugh or at least to open his pursed lips and give a smile ?!

The human species is very conceited that only it can laugh! It has concluded that the sense of humour is an essential human quality. Maybe, during the innumerable years of evolution, it is the only species that has somehow successfully learnt to expressively manifest its inner humourous feelings. Just because the animals do not widely open their mouth and laugh (as many of us do often, much to the disgust of our neighbours!), the old ancestral members of our species seem to have concluded that the animals do not have any sense of humour. I at least know of one another species that can express its humour well! Buy a pocket of “kadalamittai” and start ascending the stairs of Trichi Malaikotai to have Lord Ganesha’s darshan. Those garrulous monkeys ‘gumbal’ there will stealthly follow you and at one oppurtune moment “rag” you and snatch away your kadalamittai with a swift agile attack! While they recede away from you (or rather you recede away from them) the victims report noticing a kinda derisive laughter by the monkeys! Anyway, if raagas can cause sadness and crying, can it also cause a person to laugh!

Music directors often face this challenge, when directors tell them a comical situation in their movie and ask for a tune. M.S.Viswanathan has done a fantastic job in the movie Bale Pandiya. The song is neeyE enakku enRum. MSV tuned that song in chaste Sudha Danyasi. The situation of that song is a very comical one, Sivaji Ganesan and first class actor M.R.Radha vying with each other in their jest. The lyrics too is quite comical. But, the question is, does the Sudha Danyasi raagam of the song have an element of humour in it! Probably not.

Ilayaraja too has used pure classical raagas to suit humourous situations. In Thambiku Endha Ooru, Madhavi is a city girl. Hero Rajini is a country brute! Madhavi happens to come to Rajini’s village once. And now, even a small “paapa” with a rubber nipple in its mouth will tell the rest of the story: Rajini will sing a song critisizing Madhavi, Madhavi will get irritated, then she will fight with Rajini and vice versa, and when the villain comes, both of them will start loving each other and finally, the extras in police dress will come and arrest the villain….! Can you try to guess what raagam Ilayaraja has used for the comical song! Arabhi!

Arabhi is a Sankarabharanam janyam. Its arohanam and avarohanam are Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Da2 Sa; Sa Ni3 Da2 Pa Ma Ga3 Ri2 Sa. It is a very pleasant raagam. It is closely related (sanchara-wise) to Devakandhari. There are no cinema songs in Devakandhari. But, in the pre-Ilayaraja period we have got one Arabhi song. That is Erikkarai mElE. I guess it has been tuned by the then giant K.V.Mahadevan. T.M.S starts the song in his “ganeer” voice in the madhyama sthayi dhaivatham. Ilayaraja’s first Arabhi song is “aasai kiLiyE arai kilO puLiyE..”

Malaysia Vasudevan has sung this song. He is one of the best singers of our time, who has been appropriately used only by Ilayaraja. Malaysia does not seem to have got any proper training in classical music. His voice is like a resume with record of BA (history) from Madras University and 2 months of computer training in NIIT! If you give it to a proper bodyshopper it will come to California. Otherwise it will just go to teach 7th standard history text in Madras Corporation school! (Thou shall not take offence, dear resume!) Like Rahman uses the “thagara dappa” voice of Suresh Peters wonderfully and sells it, Ilayaraja has used Malaysia’s unpolished voice excellently in many of his highly classical songs. aasai kiLiyE is one such instance….The song starts like this Ma Pa Da Sa, Da Sa Da Pa, Pa Pa Da Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa Ri, Ri Ma Pa Da Da Pa Da Sa….It is a fantastic song, giving all the raaga-lakshanam of Aarabi in a very pure form. Even though the avarohanam of Aarabi just lists all the swaras of Sankarabaranam plainly, there is a specific way by which you got to use those swaras to make it sound Aarabi. The temporal duration (karvai) of Ma is usually protracted while the gandaram is just touched upon very rapidly. Thus Ma Ga Ri Sa is sung like Ma….GaRi Sa. Also, we can practically omit the usage of nishadam and the raagam would still be unblemished. Ilayaraja has not used Ni in this song. The lyrics of this song is funny.

aasai kiLiyE arai kilO puLiyE
azhugina thakkaaLiyE
mEyura kOzhi ellaam aaguradhu kariyE
adiyE en arumai thavakkaLaiyE

If the hero taunts the heroine by calling her as “spoiled tomato” then it is understandable. When the hero calls her as “half kg of tamarind”, what does it mean? But, that is how the song goes…. Now, lately Ilayaraja has given two more Aarabi songs. One song goes like mannavanE mannavanE manasukkEththa thennavanE (Thandhu Vitten Ennai). I think it is a Vijayakanth movie song. The song has been sung by SPB and Janaki. It is a very melodious song. He has used Ni in this song. The last Aarabi that he has given comes in the movie Pudhupatti Ponnuthayee. The song is madhurai vaazhum meenakshiyE. This is also an unbelievably classic song sung by K.J.Yesudoss and Janaki. One can very easily learn Aarabi with the help of these cinema songs! But, does Arabi have an element of humour? Probably not.

Carnatic music is like Choolaimedu 24 hours polyclinic in Madras. You go there with just symptoms of common cold. But the Doctor there (who has not yet cleared the subjects that he failed in final MBBS) has lots of surprises for you. He says that you are very week and almost coerces you to have the supposedly invigorating 5% glucose drip (which hardly has a total of 25 gm of glucose in it!). Carnatic music has got lot more surprises to give you than this Doc! There is a raagam which has got the same arohanam and avarohanam as Aarabi (Sa Ri Ma Pa Da Sa; Sa Da Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa; Since we can sing Aarabi without using Ni, we can say so) The raagam is Sama, another janyam of Sankarabaranam. Even though Aarabi and Sama are swara-wise identical, they are totally two different raagas sanchara wise. The difference comes in the way we deal with the gandaram. In Aarabi, the Ga is just touched upon while we go from Ma to Ri. In Sama, we can be little more liberal (time-wise) with Ga. Also, there are certain special prayogams in Sama like Ma Pa Da Ma. So, these minute details make a drastic difference in these raagas.

MSV is the only one who has beautifully used this wonderful raagam, Sama in cinema. He has given two Samas. One is in the movie Sirai. The story is a revolutionary plot charecterizing the pathos of Lakshmi, an innocent rape victim. She is the wife of a Brahmin priest, Prasanna. After the rape the priest finds her repulsive, and she decides to go and live with the rapist (Rajesh)! In the first few scenes there is a song to portray the kind of love the priest and his wife have for each other. The song is naan paadi kondE iruppEn in the raagam Sama. Oh, boy! What a song! What a classic Sama piece! Vani Jayaram has sung this song. The heroine says:

saahithyam naanaaga sangeetham neeyaaga
naal thOrum isai archchanai
en paadal nee kEtka un kaNgal enai paarkka
naanE un varadhakshinai

How beautifully the poet (Kannadasan?) has written about their love. Later, after the rape, the hypocrisy of the hero’s love gets fully exposed. Very rarely, we get to see such classic song, classically acted and classically picturised (director: R.C.Shakthi). The second Sama that MSV has given is mounaththil viLaiyaadum manasaakshiyE (Nool Veli) This song has been sung by Dr. M. Balamurali Krishna. It is a great song. These are all great contributions of MSV to Thamizh cinema music.

Recently, in the movie Sathi Leelavathi there is a very humourous song. The song has been sung by Kamal Hassan himself. This maarugO maarugO is in the raagam Kaanada. Kaanada is a major gana raagam. It is probably now less sung in the katcheris than about a few decades ago (the popularity of a raagam seems to go through a cyclical change through years!) Kaanada is a janyam of Karaharapriya. Its arohanam and avarohanam are Sa Ri2 Ga2 Ma1 Pa Ma1 Da2 Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Pa Ma1 Ga2 Ma1 Ri2 Sa. The key prayogam that gives Kaanada its identity is Pa Ma Ga Ma Ri Sa. Ilayaraja has followed the grammer of this raagam sincerely in the pallavi and charanam. But the interlude music is not very good. Because, he used this raagam for a humourous situation, does it mean that it has an element of humour in it! Probably not.

Earlier, he used Kaanada in a very majestic way in the movie Sindhu Bhairavi. The song is poomaalai vaangi vandhaan. Yesudoss! With the drone of the Thamboora, and the usage of very minimal instruments, it is a fantastic song. Rahman has few Kaanada’s to his credit too. First, pudhu veLLai mazhai in the movie Roja. There is another number kisu kisu nammakul kidaiyaadhu (Manidha Manidha). There is a liberal Ni3 in this song. Deva scored a Kaanada song too (thennamara thoppukullE kuyilE - Michael Raj) Earlier, how can we forget the old gem mullai malar mElE by the music directors of yesteryears. Dharbari Kaanada is closely related to Kaanada. While Kaanada is the janyam of the 22nd melam (Karaharapriya), Dharbari Kaanada is a janyam of the 20th melam (Nadabhairavi). Thus we use sudha daivatham (Da1) instead of Da2 (sathuchrathi daivatham) in Darbari Kaanada. Ilayaraja has a few songs in this raagam. The best example is aagaaya vennilaavE in the movie Arangetra Velai. Uma Ramanan and Jayachandran (or Yesudoss?). Uma Ramanan is another unfortunate singer (like Malaysia). Only Ilayaraja has exploited her marvellous voice to the maximum capacity. Recently he has used her in Paatu Paadava (nil nil nil; an half boiled Vasantha) and in Pudhupatti Ponnuthayee (oor urangum nErathilE; a superb Hindholam). Perhaps his first Darbari Kaanada is isai mEdaiyil (Illamai Kalangal) sung by SPB and Janaki. There is another one in the movie Mounam Sammadham (kalyaana thEnnila) by Yesudoss.

A couple of years ago, cinematographer Ashok Kumar directed a Hindi movie called as Kamaagni. Reportedly he had sexploited the heroine from top to bottom as the story was some kind of abstract Freudian theme! (P.C.Sriram did the same to Ishwariya in his movie Meera. Is there any association between camera-men turned into directors and hard-core sexploitation?) My brother tells me that there is a very good Darbari Kaanada song in that movie. And, it seems Ilayaraja has done a very rich re-recording in that movie, mostly in Darbari Kaanada!

There is a song in the movie Enga Ooru Paatukaaran in which (I presume) that our village hero “pasu nesan” Ramarajan milks his cow (the meaning of the song goes like that). I don’t know if that scene was supposed to be comic in that movie, but since Ramarajan would have mostly come in his “touser”, probably it was a comedy scene! Can you imagine what raagam Illagaraja has used to tune this song azhagE nee pErazhagi? Kunthalavarali! Look at the selection of raagam! Kunthalavarali is a Karaharapriya janyam. Sa Ma1 Pa Da2 Ni2 Da2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Da2 Pa Ma1 Sa. He has used this raagam very beautifully in this song sung by SPB. Particularly the thara sthayi Sa Ma prayogas are very good (veerangalum dheerangalum…) Maatai paal karakaradhuku Kunthalavarali kEkudha! I don’t know if there are any more kunthalavarali songs in cinema music.

Man is essentially a visual animal. He gets most of the information from the external world as a tremendous fund of visual input. The visual information interacts with his intellect and can cause all different kinds of emotions. Just look at the “heart-wrecking” scene of an old thaatha accidently walking on a banana skin and falling on the ground! It might be a real humourous scene! Just look at a self-assumed hero (trying to show film in front of a ladies hostel with his 2 stroke Kawasaki Bajaj!) skid and fall on the ground! It might be a real humourous scene. Strangely, just auditory input alone doesn’t seem to have the capacity to evoke man’s sense of humour! Sure that music can cause sadness and happiness. But, humour?! Recently, Music Television showed Beavis and Butt-head farting in public, with a fantastic “background” score! That music indeed seemed to be very humourous. But, if I had put off the TV and let my room-mates hear that “music” alone, I doubt if they would have at the least made a smile!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

sivakumar 18 May 2007 1:10 pm: hai i like all ilayaraja voice songs
Guru 10 Mar 2011 5:04 am: Hi, I am an avid follower of classical raja’s blogs and love to claim that I am a fanatic of classical IR. Please provide your mail id to talk further. Guru

Top Tamil songs

Fri, 05 Jan 2007 12:00:00 +0000

Since I like Tamil songs and statistics so much, I did some analysis on the ~1,400 Tamil songs I'd listened to in 2006.

The trends are around the length of a typical film song are interesting. For example:

Songs have gotten longer over time. On average, a song in the 60s was 4 minutes. A song in the 2000s is 5 minutes. Each decade adds about 14 seconds to the length of a song.

But some of the old movies have pretty long songs. Thiruvilaiyadal and Vanjikkottai Vaaliban have among the longest songs on average, for example.

As a corollary, newer music directors make longer songs. While KV Mahadevan's songs lasted 4 minutes, Ilayaraja's songs lasted 4.5 minutes, and AR Rahman's songs last 5 minutes. Today, Ramesh Vinayagam's compositions are 5.5 minutes.

However, Deva seems to make longer songs than usual for a 1990s director (5.5 minutes), while Devi Sri Prasad makes shorter songs for a 200os director (4.3 minutes).

Since I rated the songs, I could also analyse my preferences. I like older songs a bit more.

My top movies list for instance, has only one movie from the 2000s, 2 from the 90s, 5 from the 80s, 1 from the 60s and 1 from the 50s.

My all-time favourite movie (for songs) is Vaidhegi Kaathirundhaal. I didn't need the analysis to tell me that, though.

My all-time favourite music director is G Ramanathan, thanks to Uthama Puthiran, Ambikapathy, Madurai Veeran, etc. AM Raja follows, and then the great Ilayaraja. It's interesting that AR Rahman falls below Harris Jayaraj and Deva. He also falls below MS Viswanathan, but that's not surprising.

For quite a while, I was convinced I liked shorter songs. But surprisingly, it turns out that my preference is quite independent of the length of the song! Anyway, all time favourites short songs include:

Indhiraiyo	Kaadhalan	1:02
Muthu Mazhaiye	Mazhai	1:21
Yamunai Aatrile	Dhalapathi	1:22
Anbana Thaayai	Mahanadhi	1:34
En Azhagenna (mp3)	Minsara Kanavu	1:47
Manamagale	Devar Magan	2:13
Poojaikkaaga	Payanangal Mudivadhillai	2:18
Suttum Vizhi	Kandukonden Kandukonden	2:18
Brindavanamum	Missiamma	2:48
Theerthakaraiyinile	Varumaiyin Niram Sigappu	2:49

P.S.: It's interesting that three of them have Bharathiyar songs in them.

All of this analysis was possible because I recently dumped WinAmp and moved to MediaMonkey, which lets you write your own scripts.

Try this: search for a song and listen online.

Comments

hermes 5 Jan 2007 3:50 pm: do u know any sites tht allows u to download carnatic numbers
hermes 5 Jan 2007 4:09 pm: let me know if the below link is of some mileage to you in your music research
hermes 5 Jan 2007 4:12 pm: http://www.tamilnation.org/culture/music/index.htm . am sorry here is the link
S Anand 5 Jan 2007 4:33 pm: Thanks for the link, Hermes. I’m afraid I’m not into carnatic songs… my interest stops at listening to film songs.
Sathya 6 Jan 2007 4:34 pm: I was a little surprised that you rated G.Ramanathan and AM Raja ahead of IllayaRaja. But of course taste vary. My fav illayaraja number is “Poomalaye engum iru thol serka vaa” from Pagal Nilavu and one of the underrated song “Sangathil padaatha kavithai” from Auto Raja.
S Anand 6 Jan 2007 6:16 pm: Actually, I rated the songs and not the directors. I guess it just so happens that the AM Raja and G Ramanathan songs I have are better, on average, than the huge Ilayaraja collection I have. The entire analysis is completely biased by what songs I have, of course.
Anand Srini 8 Jan 2007 6:57 pm: Is there a correlation between the length of a song and its popularity ? Its popularity is measured on the scale of repeated broadcast on FM channels and private use in night clubs.
SNambiar 9 Jan 2007 2:17 am: The statistics would have been more accurate if you consider the length of the composition viz-a-viz the length og the actual song. ar rahmans songs generally tend to have loads of music interludes bewteen actual singing. The ratings have been provided by you is it? Wish there had been a statistic indicating number of times a song has been played over the years. That way when a particular number has been played most can be tracked. Perhaps the period could have something to do with what you have been upto, check if there is any correlation between particular categories in your blog post which you seem to favour during the same time … Ok now am going over board :)
S Anand 15 Jan 2007 8:11 pm: Anand, I didn’t have any data on popularity I’m afraid. The only thing I have is the number of times I’ve heard the song, and on that, there’s a definite correlation.
S Anand 15 Jan 2007 8:15 pm: Sachin, yes, the ratings are mine. I considered using the ratings from raaga.com or musicindiaonline, but I find these are not too good. (They don’t consider fewer votes as a disadvantage). I do track the number of times the song has been played over time, but it’s just on my computer :-( and since I have only 1 year worth of data, for just 1 person, it’s nowhere near enough. Hmm… as for the correlation with blog posts… gosh that would be some analysis!
Neelan 24 Jan 2007 3:46 am: wow..AR Rahman’s songs’ ratings are quite low than I’d expected :(
Adiya 2 Mar 2007 2:41 pm: Same Pinch.. even i have a playlist which has short songs.. superb..
Ashish 7 Mar 2007 6:31 am: Hi Anand, I dropped by at your website from Desi Pundit search engine link. It is really interesting what you do with your scripting knowledge applying it in daily situations. I am newly converted MediaMonkey fan but I don’t know how to write JavaScripts. Would you mind sharing your favorite MediaMonkey scripts which you have picked up or written your self? Thanks a lot. And I am loving your statistical analysis of Calvin/Hobbes, Movies, Songs, everything :)
wazim 27 Oct 2008 7:45 am: thats crap man..Rahman is the BEST EVER…
swaraj 6 Feb 2009 11:35 am: What jobless idiot. The time spent on doing this could be spent on something useful. Just listen to music and Rahman has give lot of good music also. Illayaraja is all time best and MSV is an icon.
Balu 11 May 2009 6:50 pm: My friend gave me your website link to download songs..I was just going through your other posts and you are crazy, man(In a positive sense of course!!) ..I too am really statistics kind of guy have did little of what you have did like organizing and reorganizing the songs according to different category..finally came up with year the movie released as the criteria to group it ..But anyways love your posts and statistics though it may not match my taste exactly ..I personally Yuvan ahead of Ilayaraja and Rehman even though i live 8Os music a lot..
P Kannan 4 May 2009 3:20 pm: SA, Good work. It is your personal favourites. I have not listened to all the songs. This is a good start. You probably need to come up with a unbiased criteria. Forget about naysayers. There will always be plenty. There has to be intellectual discussions; and this is a start. Work to earn a living is ok but this is passion. I am glad that you have it. P.
Kannan 25 Jun 2009 6:31 pm: Be honest on Assesing Musica Directors! A.R is the best of all! Dont under estimate him just because he is a muslim! He is the legend! ACCEPT IT!
Rangan 8 Oct 2009 2:39 pm: What about MGR Classic songs from movies like Anbe Vaa, Padakotti, Adimai Pen etc etc. All songs from the above movies are Mega Blockbuster songs. Cine industry people are having thought that when taking account of songs, first will come MGR songs and then only from other actors songs.
Guhaprasath 14 May 2010 3:14 am: I should say sir, that it is an Impressive analysis…. and done meticulously well… Such passion in music… Please Keep up the good job… Thank you.
Magesh 5 Jul 2010 8:07 am: Dear Anand, Your ratings were acceptable. Good analysis. I do listen all songs from MGR songs to Yuvan Shankar Raja what i understand is Raja is all time great. however Rehman and Yuvan are good composers. All other composers can be listened at once or few times but only one legend songs can be listened always is nothing but Raja.
nithin 3 Oct 2010 2:23 pm: Ar rahman Superb………….
siva 10 Dec 2010 3:19 am: This analysis is limited to anand. I think u interlectually reflected on your taste of music. Rahman fans has no rights to comment on your passion. its a bit suprise that you actually sat down and spent time doing this. but again please recheck you variables and you might come up with diffrent results. also wish u good luck with music and no disrespect for your tast. diffrent approach. I kinda like it.
Satish Babu 3 Jan 2011 6:35 pm: Just watch any music and does it ever strike you, do you realise only on music director’s song gets repeated always, now tell me what else evidence do you need to tell Illayaraja is the best.
srk 4 Dec 2011 4:49 pm: mattew, just listen rahmans enna solla pogirai from kandukonden kandukonden, its better than rajas musiq,if you carefully listen the song you can hear the magics,only if you carefully hear……………….!!!
D. Chandramouli 15 Dec 2011 10:27 am: One of my favorites is “Andha Sivakami Maganidam Seidhi Solladi” from movie Pattinathil Bootham, set to music by Govardhan(?) and soulfully sung by P. Suseela. I urge the readers to listen to that song closing the eyes - it’s an out of the world experience. Of course, I also rate G. Ramanathan as the best - all his songs were carnatic raga based, sweet to the ears. Uthamaputhiran, Ambigapathy etc were classics. The second in rank is of course MSV-Ramamurthy combination (not just MSV), followed by KVM (Kungumam, Padagotti and umpteen others). Certain songs by AM Raja are wonderful - particularly, listen to the background start up music for the song “Oho Andha Baby” from Thenilavu. What a happy and romantic feeling the song creates! Only in Ilaya Raja songs, we can get that “mann vasanai”. Currently, ARR rocks with mesmerizing tunes.
Matthew 12 Nov 2011 8:10 am: Illayaraja s tons of times better than rahman..no one has ever used flute n tabla lik maestro used..so stop comparing rahman wit raja
Raj 12 Nov 2011 8:20 am: Rahman s d best one
Vishnu 9 Mar 2012 2:59 pm: does every one has to have a website?.. Let us move on. The cini music is an evolution like everything is in the world. SO the current directors have learned a lot from earliar ones and mix them with music from all over the world. So A.R is no better than sudhrson or any one else in that era. And mr Kannan where does muslim comes in to picture here. People like you creates bin laddens. mlet us stick to music here.
guru 3 Jun 2018 5:50 am: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaZAUDIeVKg தமிழ் புதிய பாடல் தொகுப்பு - பார்த்ததில் பிடித்தது -படைத்தவர்களுக்கு நன்றி அருமையாக இயக்கி பாடியுள்ளார் - இதை விமர்சியுங்கள்

Classical Ilayaraja 10

Wed, 03 Jan 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 10th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

The mind is a wondrous subset of the terrific biological entity, the brain. Literally, the heart is often alluded to as the site of thinking. In old Thamizh cinemas, the heroine would invariably say to the villain at some point (like the inevitable rape scene!) “naasakkaara, unakku idhaiyamE illaiyaa?” while the unmindful villain would be busy disrobing her with a terrible “ha ha ha” laughter! Why does the heroine have to say this kind of a scientifically preposterous statement, while it was the villain’s brain that decided to rape her, and not the poor “heart”! Does the evil mind of the villain exist in his brain? If so, where is it in the brain? Or, is the mind just the product of the functioning of the brain? A disease process affecting the frontal lobe of the brain might make an individual loose all his social inhibition and pee in the public, or to go to Bourbon street in New Orleans, or to Mardigraz in Galveston! Damaging the visual cortex of a villain might make him blind, but he might still try to follow the heroine with the help of her bangle noise! Damaging his temporal lobe might render him hearing impaired, but he might still try to get to the heroine with the help of “koondal” scent cues (refer: Thiruvilayadal!). As a last effort you may want to damage his parietal lobe, but then he would still see the heroine, even though he might not know what to do to the heroine! So, where the heaven is the so called MIND?!

The intellectual power of the mind is amazing. More than 2000 years ago, Eratosthenes sits in his ill-built mud house and thinks in the deepest crevice of his neural network “what will be the circumference of the earth”. He does a simple calculation and concludes “about 22,000 miles”! Somewhere amidst the tangle of their neural network the Indians think abstractly about the non-existant numeral and make their magnum opus contribution of “nothing” to the field of mathematics! Just give Einstein a pencil and a paper and a chair and a table. He will fire a couple of neurons in his brain and say a radical theory that the matter and energy are one and the same and that they are interchangeable. As though he was the incarnation of the God himself, he would start theorizing the rules and regulations that govern the movement and functioning of various celestial bodies that are millions of light years away from his chair in New Jersey! His brain might be now floating in a jar of formaldehyde in Missouri city, but where the heaven was his MIND?!

Orchestral music is one of the greatest contribution of the minds of the westerners. Indian classical music, be it carnatic or hindustani, has always encouraged the imagination of the mind to pour out extempore, like a spontaneous volcanoic eruption on the stage. This is evidenced by the weightage that has been given to originality and spontaneous creativity on stage during alapanai (raagam elaboration), sangadhis (singing the same line in different tunes), niraval (singing the critical line of a krithi in different tunes, with lot of emotional appeal), kalapana swaram and lastly in thani avardhanam for the percussionists. On the other hand the orchestral music of the westernists is a well planned one. There might be hundreds of musicians in the orchestra. Each of them play the notes that is given to them. Unlike the Indian classical music, it needs a lot of rehersal and they have several practice sessions before going on the stage. There is creativity involved in western music too, but it is not spontaneous. The composer creates the tune sitting in a serene atmosphere, and it is brought to the public by the orchestra, with a complete suppression of any effort for individual creativity.

One of the greatest achievement of Ilayaraja is that he appropriately used the best of the western and eastern classicism. To wield a huge orchestra is no joke. In many of his carnatic songs he has shown an uncanny skill in organising the orchestral music with a classical splendour.

Vasantha is a fantastic raagam. It is a popular janyam of the unpopular melam Suryakaantham (17th). Its arohanam and avarohanam are Sa Ma1 Ga3 Ma1 Da2 Ni3 Sa; Sa Ni3 Da2 Ma1 Ga3 Ri1 Sa. While traditionally it is believed that Boopalam is the raagam suitable for the dawn, Vasantha is the raagam suitable for the dusk. So, no wonder Ilayaraja used this raagam for a duet which talks about the rain pouring during the dusk! andhi mazhai pozhigiradhu is a great song in the movie Rajapaarvai. Kamalhasan sings this song with Madhavi. It is one of those early songs that showed the full fervency of Ilayaraja’s mind for creativity. The classical orchestral grandeur of this song was unbelievable at that time. I distinctly remember hearing this song for the first time in “Oliyum Oliyum” in Madras Doordarshan. Those days we were living in the Telephone quarters in Kilpauk, Madras. Since we did not have a TV, we used to go to our neighbour’s house. They had a merciless “hundiyal” right at the door, which demanded 25 paise for each program! Well, getting to see songs like andhi mazhai for just 25 paise was definitely worth the money!

Ilayaraja starts the song with a prelude of “pop pop pop poboppo” by the chorus. The sudhdha madhyamam in Vasantha has served as the starting point for many classical krithis. Ilayaraja too starts his “pop pop” in the madyamam like “Ma Ma Ma Ma Ga Ma Da”. Classically, the transition from Ma to Da is not a straight one. There is a subtle Ni in between. That is, when the musicians say Da they go all the way to Ni and then drop down to the daivatham. Ilayaraja starts the pallavi “andhi mazhai” like Ma Ma Ma, Ga Ma Da Ma Ga, Ga Ma Da Ma Ga Ma Ga Ri, Ma Ga Ga Ri Ri Sa. It is a beautiful start. All the hidden melody in the swaras of Vasantha are extracted in the pallavi itself. Even in the charanam his mind seems to be bent upon extracting all the melody in the Ga Ma Da transition. He starts the charanam like Ga Ma Da Ma, Ga Ma Da Ma, and the tune lingers there for a while!

This song also marked the early classics of Vairamuthu. His lyrics became a controversy too, in this song. He writes:

andhi mazhai pozhigiradhu
ovvoru thuLiyilum un mugam therigiradhu
indhiran thOttathu mundhiriyE
manmadha naattukku mandhiriyE

Look, the hero who sings this song is a blind man in the movie! How can he see the heroine’s face in each of those beautiful rain drops?! Perhaps that is what defines a poet’s world. Physical defects get nullified in their world of fantasy! But, surely Vairamuthu got into trouble when he called the heroine as “the cashew nut of Lord Indira’s garden”! Basically he means to say that the heroine is like a kind of sex bomb to the hero! She is the bible that the hero reads in the night! That is understandable. But what does this cashewnut stuff mean? Lord Indira is not known for romantic deeds like Manmadhan! Just for matching the alliteration of the words he made a senseless statement. (Recently Vaali got into trouble when he said inji iduppazhagaa in Thevar Magan. Sure that ginger has got all degrees of sharp bends in its structure, but what has it got to do with the hero’s hip!) In Demolition Man, Sandra Bullock may feel very much disgusted about what she calls as “biological transfer of fluids”. But look how Vairamuthu characterises the feelings love creates during the youthful period of fantasy. He says “dreams torture”, “eyelids weigh heavily”, “it is like suturing a thorn inside the eye” and so on…

Ilayaraja made T.V.Gopalakrishnan sing in the second interlude of this song. A short piece of Vasantha. (Earlier he had made him sing a short piece of Keeravani in idhu oru nilaa kaalam in Tick Tick Tick). There are few classical people who have tried the orchestral expedition of carnatic music. I remember the recordings of Y.M.Kamasastri often played in the radio long time ago. Invariably he would pick up a rare vivadhi raagam for his exploration and have his orchestra play it. Albeit high technical quality, those recordings were not very much enjoyable. I would dare say that Ilayaraja was the first guy who could appropriately use the orchestral music in a very “enjoyable” way. Later he got so much used to composing a tune for his orchestra that he started doing everything in his mind. That is an unbeleivable state of knowledge. When the song goes like Ma Ma Ma Ga Ma Da Ma Ga, the background violin may be going like Da Ni Sa Ga Ri Sa in the upper octave. The chorus might be traversing in the Da Ni of the lower octave. The guitar chords might be vibrating in the F major area! If you could figure out that all these individual musical events would unify in a perfect harmony to give a superb Vasantha melody, just by imagining in your mind, then is it not a great task?! Where the heaven is this enigmatic MIND?

Ilayaraja has given three more Vasantha songs. maan kaNdEn maan kaNdEn in Rajarishi is a equally classical song . It has been sung by K.J. Yesudoss and Vani Jayaram. The song goes like Sa Sa Ni Sa Ni Da Ni, Sa Sa Ni Sa Ni Da Ni, Sa Sa Ni Ri…Sa. The second interlude is especially good. Pulamaipuththan has written this song. In the charanam he writes “kaatrukum ull moochu vaangum”! That is, when the thalaivan and thalaivi embrace each other during love, they would do it so tightly that even the wind that got caught between their bodies would feel breathless! This kind of personifying the pancha boothams and writing poetry like “fire itself would feel very hot” “wind itself would feel breathless” was started by Thiruvaalar Vairamuthu! Pulaimaipiththan too, seems to have changed his style to suit the modern trend. There is a short piece of Vasantha in the raagamalika song in Unnal Mudiyum Thambi. enna samaiyalO starts with Mohanam. Then it is followed by Vasantha (raagam vasantha, naan rusithu parka rasam thaaa..), Kalyani and lastly Madhyamavathi (ilayai podadi). Recently he has tried Vasantha in a half boiled way in Paatu Paadava. The song starts like nil nil nil. It is a very different tune. But unfortunately, these good songs seem to have got lost before the incredible power of Rahman, like the local “super 501 bar” soap in Thamizhnadu got lost to the “national” washing powder Nirma!

Hamsanandhi is one of the popular janyams of the unpopular 53rd melam Gamanachramam (the prathimadhyamam of Suryakaantham). The other popular janyam of Gamanachramam is Poorvi Kalyani. I don’t know if there are any cinema songs in Poorvi Kalyani. But there are a lot of songs in Hamsanandhi. Ilayaraja has used this raagam both for happy and sad occasions. Probably his first song in this raagam came in Rajni’s Thanga Magan. raaththiriyil pooththirukkum is a great song. The orchestral music is lilting. The song has been sung by the evergreen pair S.P.B and Janaki. Look at the classic “briha” (rapid vocal journey between multiple swaras in a split second) involving Ni Sa Ri Sa Ri when they sing “rathiriyil”! Pulamaipiththan has written this song too. One of his imagination in this song is ultimate! He says in the pallavi “pagalum urangidum rathiriyil..” Is it not a great idea to qualify the night as the time in which “even the day sleeps”! There is one superb Hamsanandhi in Salangai Oli. vEdham aNuvilum oru naadham is the last song in (the climax) of the movie. It is a crucial song because Kamal dies during this song. The recording scale seems to be very high, S.P.B starting in the thara sthayi gandaram. The other Hamsanandhi songs are vaanam niram maarum (Dhaavani Kanavugal), Eraadha maiyil mElE (Mudhal Mariyadhai), Or poo maalai (Iniya Uravu Poothadhu), raaga dheebam Etrum nEram (Payanangal Mudivadhilai). Needless to say there is a great masterpiece by an earlier music director (kaalaiyum neeyE by A.M.Raja).

Hamsanandi is the panchama varjaya raagam of Gamanachramam (ie., having all the swaras except Pa). Cinema music directors tend to use a lot of Ma1 in Hamsanandhi. The introduction of sudden Ma1 gives a great change to the tune. In kaalayum neeyE, A.M.Raja introduces a beautiful Ma1 when he sings ‘katrum neeyE’. Ilayaraja does the same treatment to the raagam when the charanam goes like “vazhai ilai neerthelithu” in raaththiriyil. This kind of use of double madhyamam makes a great change to the tune! Recently he has also given a song in Gamanachramam. That song comes in the movie Vadhiyar Veetu Pillai (Sathyaraj). The song is hEy oru poonjOlai. It is a great song. One raagam before the order of Gamanachramam in the melakartha scale (ie., 52nd) is the raagam Ramapriya. Ilayaraja has given a marvelous Ramapriya in the movie Moga Mull. The song is kamalam paadha kamalam, sung by K.J.Yesudoss. It is like a mini-katcheri in cinema! No wonder he gave such a pure Ramapriya because the hero is a carnatic vocalist in the movie. It is so unfortunate that such kind of “gems” go unnoticed because of the failure of the movie.

Now they say that Ilayaraja makes a tune in just a matter of few minutes. He writes the tune not only for the song, but for the entire orchestra in just a matter of few minutes! He doesn’t seem to follow the primitive way of playing his tunes in the harmonium and seeing how it sounds. He seems to hear the tune in his “mind”. It is amazing how these minds in the creative industry could be used in such an intelligent and time efficient manner. The creation of good tunes by Ilayaraja’s mind could have been only a secondary act to fulfill its primary intent of aggrandizement by demanding 6 lakhs for each movie. Poor Ramanujam’s mind might not have even got a penny for all those giant leaps in mathematics that it made. The reality is that it is the benefaction by these great minds in the intellectual and scientific fronts that keep the society functioning between yugas.

Coming back to the age old question “where the heaven is this MIND”? There are some people who believe that the mind doesn’t exist in the brain. Maybe it is an extracranial entity. May be it surrounds the head like an electro magnetic field surrounding a magnet. Perhaps the “once upon a time” unrealistic halo around the head of Lord Buddha in my state board history book only referred to his mind! Then, P.V.Narasimha Rao, T.N.Seshan, Cho. Ramaswamy and their other (bald) kind would have a bigger halo, as more mind is likely radiate through their unprotected head!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

jyothimahesh 29 Dec 2008 3:15 am: Its fantastic t oview this article I want to know the concept of phrasing thats helps to make fine tune for a telugu song.
ks narayanan 11 Mar 2009 5:38 am: Exceelent write up , which I wish to appreciate very much.But some nasty interludes could ve been avoided like ref to truck drivers misdemeanours. I ve not been able to access ur write up,if any , On Ilayaraja’s usage of the enchanting Raagas Keeravani, Charukesi,Abher, Varali. Pl forward to my ID, if possible.
Kannan Krishnan 23 Jul 2009 2:35 am: “the cashew nut of Lord Indira’s garden”! Mundhiri means grapes….otherwise “Kodi mundhiri” to be specific. Cashew nut also mundhiri…but “Mundhiri kottai”. You are a grape of Indiran’s garden! You are so sweet like grapes that is created by Indiaran.
Sudha 10 Dec 2009 2:14 pm: Am thrilled to read such a insightful comments and comparison of carnatic raagas with movies. I simply loved the way the metaphor for mind ! halo is given. Great show!…
Subhashini Balasubramanian 27 Sep 2010 1:59 am: Very Interesting and informative blog. I can literally listen to the songs in my mind while reading through. Great Work!
doyoureallycare 17 Apr 2011 4:59 pm: Nice read. For starters originality is overrated. If anythin any great artist should be happy that his creation finally manages to transcend the boundaries of language class etc. LDVinci is not going to turn in his grave because some 21st century artist ripped his work off or drew inspiration from it. A large part of the world would never have known about Monalisa if not for the millions of tarnished reproductions. Art should transcend boundaries of class, language heck even the artist himself. An artist wanting his creation to stay the way it is , is similar to a parent looking at a new born and saying I wont feed this child of mine, for I would prefer that the child stay pure and the way it is right now for ever. Drawing parallels, if an artist so desires that his patrons be made purely out of a classy/all-knowing crowd , he should display it to a set of handpicked patrons and then destroy it instead of letting some lackey keep records…..
chnadrasekhar 30 Aug 2011 11:28 am: a very nice article on our maestro ilayaraja sir. would you please forward about the songs composed by ilayaraja sir , in KEERAVANI raga in both tamil and telugu , and also please mention about the orchestraisation of these songs. if possible please forward those to my ID. thank you

Classical Ilayaraja 9

Tue, 02 Jan 2007 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 9th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

There was a great furore in the Indian parliment a couple of years ago. Since the daily scene there is pretty much so, does this furore need any special mention? Yes. This furore was a meaningful one! It happened when the Indian government signed the GATT agreement. No wonder, the stupid “swadeshi” oriented parties like the Bharathiya Janata party opposed the selling of India to the “videshi” through GATT. But as an aftermath, signing the GATT agreement had a terrible effect on the interest of India in certain areas. For example, the medical value of neem oil has been well known in India for centuries. It seems some of the western pharmaceutical companies re-discovered the medical value of neem oil and started proceeding to claim patent for the product! In that case, any Indian company which tries to “manufacture” neem oil and tries to market it has to pay money to these western companies! Is it not funny and outrageous at the same time? Patenting is a powerful tool to protect ownership. It seems that it will be better if we patented both of our meaningful and meaningless traditional techniques to protect our interests. You may not know what will be re-discovered (and patent claimed) in the western hemisphere in days to come! Maybe, some scientist here will discover that giving unboiled rice with its hard covering (husk) to new born babies will result in the immediate death of those babies within few hours and secure patent for this finding! Conisder how this will affect the interest of our Indian mothers in the far south, who have been using this traditional technique to “close the chapter” of their unwelcomed, stigmatic female children! Poor mommas!

Saint Thyagaraja was one poor man who totally did not know anything about patenting or copyrighting one’s invention or literary work! He probably did not even know that his krithis were worth anything! If he had known that his krithis were going to draw international attention in the subsequent centuries, would he have copyrighted his works? Nay! He was such a naive sadhu, the word meaning in its strictest sense. He was a perfect example of a brahman, getting up early in the morning, much before “sandhya poorva pravarthathE”, and doing all the routine daily religious chores like the thrikaala sandhyavandhanam regularly. A brahman is supposed to eat only “moonu kavalam choru” (the amount of metabolic fuel necessary to keep the body and mind functioning), and he should not succumb to the pleasure of eating. I can see that Saint Thyagaraja didn’t, from the way he looks so thin, like a freshly fleeced goat, in his portraits. A brahman should only indulge in priestly and teaching duties. He should have no malice for others. He should only think of “lokha kshemam”. Thyagaraja had all these qualities. He was such a sharp contrast to those brahmin scoundrels like Selvi Jayalalitha, Subramaniam Swamy etc in the political scene now, who are the incarnation of corruption, greed and evil. Thyagaraja obtained his food by doing “unchivrithi” daily, ie., going around the temple, singing bhajans etc and accepting the rice that people had to offer as a matter of voluntary donation. He was a Telugu brought up in Thiruvaiyaru in Thanjavoor jilla. He probably knew Thamizh well. But he chose to write his compositions in his mother tongue Telugu. Valmiki, the creator of “Rama” character, would not have anticipated that his fictitious “hero” was going to have such a profound influence on people to be born later in the time window, like Thyagaraja (and of course, BJP, for political reasons!). Thyagaraja was literally in love with Rama, like Meera was with Krishna. He had such a powerful theoritical understanding and practical mastery over carnatic music that he could compose in any raagam. He chose to appeal to his Lord Rama through “bhava” margam, ie., tackling the God, through emotional appeals. This was in sharp contrast to his contemporaries like Muthuswamy Dikshitar, who used “bhakthi” margam. His compositions were never a verbal diarrhoea! Just a few lines, thats all. He never tried to project his knowledge in his krithis. He was so simple and such a wonderful vagheyakara, that nature would take another millenium to ordain such a man be born again in this world!

Thyagabrahmam’s compositions have often been ridiculed in the cinema arena. Nobody has the right to change anything in another persons belongings, even though the person might be dead. Thyagaraja’s compositions are his belongings. He used them to reach heavenly abode. He left his compositions for the world to cherish and enjoy, as they were written and sung by him. Nobody can tamper with his treasure, which are ours now. We have to protect them as he had it! K.V. Mahadevan opened the gateway to the free musical society where anybody could do anything to anbody’s compositions! What kind of arrogance was that, in changing the Thyagaraja form of Dhorakuna in the movie Sankarabaranam without his consent? Having been shown the way of ridiculing Thyarajaja, Ilayaraja too embarked on that task. That was his technically first innovative adventure of presenting a raagam in the light form and then in the classical form. He knowingly insulted the uncopyrighted work of the greatest saint composer the world has ever given birth to.

That song came in the movie Sindhu Bhairavi. The song is paadariyEn padippariyEn. The heroine Suhasini has terrific interest in carnatic music. She is one of those proponants of the so called thamizhisai. She feels that one has to sing krithis in local language so that the local mass also understands the krithis. She busts into one of J.K.B’s (Shivakumar) katcheri and sings this song. She starts the song like an ordinary folk song with a simple rhythm and finally ends the song in a classic Thyagaraja krithi. Throughout the song the grammer of the raagam is maintained, with a light music type of rendition in the beginning and then culminating in carnatic type of ending. She starts the song all alone. Later the accompaniests of J.K.B start admiring the tune and then accompany her.

The raagam of that song is Saramathi. It is a major janyam of the 20th mela raagam, Nadabhairavi. Its arohanam and avarohanam are Sa Ri2 Ga2 Ma1 Pa Da1 Ni2 Sa and Sa Ni2 Da1 Ma1 Ga2 Sa. Saramathi evokes a gloomy mood. There is a fantastic Thyaraja keerthanai in this raagam. That is mOkshamu galadha. Whenever some VIP puts down his head (may I translate ‘mandaya poataan’ like this!) B grade and C grade TV artists appear in the screen and play mOkshamu galadha with a pretentious sad face (feeling very happy inside regarding the unexpected death of the VIP and hence the sudden TV chance)! Ilayaraja’s selection of this raagam for that situation is very appropriate. Because a major proportion of cinema songs are set in Nadabhairavi scale. What you need to do is to avoid Ga Ri Sa and Da Pa Ma prayogam, thats all! When you end the song in a keerthanai, give a little gamaka touch here and there to make it classical (after all, strictly following the swara grammer, using specific prayogams, and appropriate gamaka soaked swaras are the essential ingredients of classicism).

Ilayaraja starts that song like: Ri Ri Ri Ri, Ri Ri Ri Ri, Ri Ga Sa Sa, Ri Ri Ri Ri. Then for EdariyEn EzhuthariyEn Ezhuthuvagai naanariyEn, he goes a little further like: Ri Ri Ri Ri, Ri Ri Ri Ri, Ri Ga Ma Ga, Sa Sa Sa Sa. Thus he starts following the grammer of Saramathi perfectly right from the start, but with a light music like technical approach initially. There is lot of “thamizhisai” preaching by thiruvaalar Vairamuthu in that song. He says

paadariyEn padippariyEn paLLikkoodam dhaanariyEn
EdariyEn ezhuththariyEn Ezhuththuvagai naanariyEn
Ettula Ezhudhavilla Ezhudhi vachchu pazhakkamilla
elakkaNam padikkavilla thalakkanamum ennaku illa

In the charanam he refers to the katcheri rasikas as ignoramus crowd who nodd their heads without understanding anything (thalaya aatum puriyaadha kootam). Then he goes ahead and suggests a remedy to this deplorable state.

chErikum sEra vENum adhukkum paattu padi
enniyE paaru eththanai pEru
thangamE neeyum Thamizh paattum paadu
sonnadhu thappaa thappaa? sonnadhu thappaadhu appa!

Though the obvious matter of controversy in this is the language, there is much more in the issue. Nobody can deny the fact that the enjoyment of music becomes supreme if we can also understand the sahithyam. But is it not also equally true that music and emotional feelings transcend petty barriers like language etc.. When you see a hidden sadness in the portrait of Mona Lisa, it is that sadness that matters. You have to look at that piece of art as it is! You cannot try to find a replacement to that Leonardo Da Vince’s monumental work by having a thamizhan draw an equivalent with a thamizhachchi’s face with a sad look! When Thyagaraja’s reckless brother Jalpesan throws away his pooja idol (Rama vigraham), and when Thyagaraja sings a keerthanai in that situation of utter frustration, mental turmoil and agitation of not finding his favourite idol, what matters there is the emotion that is packed in the sahityam, and not the language of the sahityam!

I heard recently that many people in the Hindi belt above have actually started listening to A. R. Rahman’s original Thamizh version of songs rather than the dubbed Hindi version. Would not Vairamuthu be extremely happy to see his “mukkaala mukkaabula” Thamizh version being such a popular song even in northern India? What would his reaction be if all his songs were translated and in due course the original writer of the songs, ie., he, forgotten by the people. I think that the mature way of dealing with this issue is to agree to learn the translated meaning of a krithi and then continue to sing the krithi in the language the composer made it. In this way we can get involved with the emotional framework of a krithi and enjoy it thoroughly. If the slum dwelling population of Thamizhnadu can understand “choli kE peechE kya hai” and enjoy the untranslated version of the song with a “kick”, then, they can also understand “Thyagaraja’s Telugu krithis kE peechE kya hai”. People only have to come out of their narrow minded caccoon that they have built for themselves.

Ilayaraja had to end this “padariyEn” song in some classical krithi to boost the character of Suhasini in the movie. He could have ended it in Thayagaraja’s “mokshamu galadha” or in some other original Saramathi krithi. But instead, look what he did! He chose Thyagaraja’s marimari ninnE which had been originally composed in Kamboji raagam. He changed the raagam of that krithi to Saramathi and annexed it to his “padariyEn”! Can anyone be more disrespectful to the innocuous, innocent and pious athma of the dead saint? Ilayaraja is a present composer. He should tune his songs to fit the previously written ones. He has no right to tailor the previously written krithis to suit his thalam, and ganam. After shooting the film “Veedu” director Balumahendra used some portion of Ilayaraja’s “How To Name It” as background score to the film (anyway, the music director was Ilayaraja). But, there were reports that Ilayaraja got furious at Balumahendra for not getting his consent for using his music album. When he is so sensitive to the way his musical works are used by his own friends like Balumahendra, how could he ruthlessly lay his hands on the Thyagabrahmam’s krithi? He writes in one of his own songs (idhayam oru kOvil in the movie Idhaya Kovil):

naadha thiyaagaraajarum ooNai urukki
uyiril kalandhu iyatrinaarammaa
avar paadalil jeevan adhuvE avaraanaar
en paadalin jeevan edhuvO adhu neeyE

So he knows about the greatness of Thyagaraja and his compositions. Yet he has commited the disgraceful deed in Sindhu Bhairavi.

Saramathi is technically called as sampoorna oudhava raagam, ie., sampoornam in the arohanam (having all the seven swaras of its parent raagam, Nadabhairavi), and oudhavam in the avarohanam (five swaras). There is a raagam that has the same avarohanam as Saramathi, and the same avarohana swaras in arohanam too. That is Hindholam. Sa Ga2 Ma1 Da1 Ni2 Sa; Sa Ni2 Da1 Ma1 Ga2 Sa. It is a great “light” raagam. Ilayaraja has used it several times in his music. Subu’s raaga based database has a good list of the songs in this raagam. As far as I know his first Hindholam came in the movie Ilamai Kolam. The song is sreedEvi en vaazhvil sung by K.J.Yesudoss. It is a very slow tempo song. One of his another early Hindholam came in Alaigal Oivadhillai. The song is dharisanam kidaikkaadha. He has himself sung that song. Oh, it is terrible! While su-swara rendition of even a simple tune can make the listening experience magical, abha-swara rendition of even a complex tune can give a real harrowing experience! The later has happened in the above song. His unconditioned fledgling vocal cords have worked very hard like a powerful gravitational force pulling his voice down when he desperately tries to reach the upper shadjam in one instance. But the tune is good though. His other songs are Om namachchivaaya (Salangai Oli), naanaaga naan illai (Thoongadhe Thambi Thoongadhe), poththi vachcha malligai mottu (Mann Vasanai), unnaal mudiyum thambi thambi (Unnal Mudiyum Thambi), naan thEdum sevvandhi poovidhu (Dharmapathini), kannaa unai thEdugirEn vaa (Unakkagave Vazhgiren), O janani en suram nee (Pudhiya Raagam), viLakku vaippOm viLakku vaippOm (Athma). naan thEdum sevvandhi poovidhu is a terrific piece with a wonderful rhythm (very novel at that time). It is a good westernised Hindholam. A. R. Rahman has given one very pure classical Hindholam too. The song comes in May Madham (maargazhi poovE maargazhi poovE). It is very good. I was told that it was sung by some Houston based new singer.

If you changed the Ni in Hindholam from Ni2 to Ni3 then we get Chandrakauns raagam. Ilayaraja has got a couple of songs in this raagam too. His first Chandrakauns came in Kaadhal Oviyam (veLLichchalangaigaL). It is a fantastic song. Great job by S. P. B. What a great change does this small alteration in the location of Ni in Hindholam makes to the mood quality! The tail piece of this song is in Sriranjani raagam. His second Chandrakauns came in Thai Mookaambigai (isaiyarasi). My brother tells me that it was called by a different raagam in one TV program in Doordarshan. Anyway it should be very close to Chandrakauns. The best of his Chandrakauns is azhagu malaraada abinayangaL soozha in Vaidehi Kaathirundhaal. Oh, what a song! Vaali has done a great job writing the status of an unconsumated young celibate widow. In his short story “siluvai” master writer Jayakanthan daringly writes about the cruelty of being a celibate just in the last line of the story narrating a nun’s short bus travel. Vaali has written about the same terrible celibacy from a young widow’s point of view. In Varusham Padhinaaru there is another Chandrakauns karaiyaadha manamum undo. Lately we got two more idhunaaL varume in Chembaruthi, and unnai ninachu urugum in Rasaiyya. A. R. Rahman has also tried Chandrakauns in his Bombay. The Hindi version goes like “ruk jao, ruk jao”. I don’t know the Thamizh version.

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

jayendran 8 Jan 2007 9:03 am: darisanam kidaikkadha Om namashivaya ragavane ramana Oru jeevan azhaithathu Naan thedum sevvanthi Sridevi ennai paarthu Kannamma kadhal enum Anandha then katru Velli salangaigal konda Kanna unai theudgiren vaa Oh Janani Vilakku veppom vilakku veppom Pothi vecha malligai mottu Nanaga naan illai Azhagu Malar aada Unnal mudiyum thambi
venkat 2 Jan 2007 12:00 pm: ILAYAYARAJA’S HOW TO NAME IT & NOTHING BUT WIND, HOW TO DOWN LOAD THIS FREE. PLS ANYBONY CAN TELL ME?
Ajit 13 Mar 2012 5:22 pm: Hello, Thanks for these fascinating write-ups. I was listening to Sreedevi en Vaazhvil. While the song is largely in HindoLam (Malkauns), there are portions where I thought it branches out quite beautifully into Chandrakauns by switching to the Shuddha Nishaad, as opposed to the Komal Nishad. In fact, I think this happens at the end of every stanza. Would you agree?
Narasimhan 11 Jan 2011 6:17 am: L S Ramakrishnan, You disrepcted Thyagaraja more than Ilayaraja or anybody could by calling Rama a fictional hero.
shantha S Raju 1 Mar 2020 12:13 pm: Very neat presentation and informative.

Classical Ilayaraja 8

Fri, 29 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 8th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

South Indian classical music has got an excellent treasure of superb names. Most of the raaga names seem to be Sanskrit derivatives. Even though there are some Thamizh equivalent names for raagas such as Sankarabharanam, nobody uses them. Ki.Veeramani is probably very sad about this. Maybe, Vairamuthu has some plans like translating all the raaga names into Thamizh as he tried translating Thyagaraja’s ’nee dhayaradha’ in Sindhu Bhairavi movie as un dhayavillaiyaa (if only Ki.Veeramani was ready to fund the project, from the 5 lakh rupees that he got for perpetrating the deeds of thandhai Ee.Vae.Ra. Periyar, from Selvi Jayalalitha). Alternatively, Ki.Veeramani may get somewhat sensible and appreciate the high-level idiocy in trying to translate the proper nouns in raaga names. And he may rather to encourage a lower level of idiocy by goading his clan to replace all the Sanskrit sounding sounds like ‘ksha’, ‘jha’ etc in all the raagas to their Thamizh equivalents and then accept the raaga names. Then, Shanmukhapriya would be called as Dhanmukapriya (as Vibhishanan in Valmiki Ramayanam became Vibidanan in Kamba Ramayanam)!

Some raagas seem to follow the first, middle and last name system! The only difference is, you don’t give a space between the first and last name. For example, Kalyani has a first name (which is commonly omited), and that is, ‘mesa’. This mesa helps in identifying the number and position that it occupies in the melakartha scale. While there is no dearth of names, for some unknown reason, there is lot of repetition in naming the raagas. Thus you have Mohanakalyani, Amirkalyani, Yamunakalyani and so on. In this case, the above said raagas are all ‘DNA’ testified offsprings of Kalyani. But there are some other unrelated raagas that have common last names. For example, the Ranjani group of raagas. We have Ranjani, Janaranjani, Mararanjani, Megaranjani, Sivaranjani, Karnaranjani and so on. Of these, Mararanjani is the 25th mela raagam. Ranjani, Janaranjani, Sivaranjani, Karnaranjani are janyams of the 59th, 29th, 22nd and 22nd melams respectively. See, how unrelated they are!

Unlike the Ranjani group, some of the Bhairavi raagams are indeed genitically related. In this group we have Nadabhairavi, Bhairavi, Sindhu Bhairavi, Ananda Bhairavi, Salakabhairavi and so on. Of course, there are other few Bhairavis like Ahir Bhairavi (the Hindustani equivalent of Chakravaagam) which are not related to the above said Bhairavi group.

Nadabhairavi is the 20th melakartha raagam. While it is such an important raaga in the western music (the C minor scale), its importance is completely undermined in our music. The fecundity of Nadabhairavi has been fully exploited in carnatic music to get innumerable janya raagams which are commonly sung, while the parent raagam has become totally ignored. There are not very many keerthanais in Nadabhairavi. But in cinema music this C minor scale is the supreme king. Probably one third of all the cinema songs are set in Nadabhairavi scale. Ilayaraja has scored countless songs in this scale. None of them is classical. So, even though one might know thousands of these songs, he might not be able to identify the Nadabhairavi raagam when sung in the classical sadas! Some examples for the songs in this scale would be kannE kalaimaanE (Moonram Pirai), kalyaaNa maalai (Pudhu Pudhu Arthangal), engirundhO iLamkuyilin (Brahma), raakku muththu raakku (Yejamaan), ennulE ennulE (Valli - what a song!), then thenpaandi seemaiyilE (Nayagan) etc…. A.R.Rahman’s chandralEkhaa (Thiruda Thiruda) is another fantastic example of the C minor scale. In many of these songs, the music directors tend to present a hybrid by incorporating Da2, and Ni3 usages. Ilayaraja, who is known for his very minimal deviation from the chosen scale, also seems to enjoy presenting an (expected) vagary of occasional Da2 and Ni3 usage in these songs.

Bhairavi is a major ‘gana’ raagam. It is a sarwaswara bashangam. Thus the aroganam is that of Karaharapriya and the avarohanam - Nadabhairavi! Hence you could call it as the janyam of either Karaharapriya or Nadabhairavi. However, since it is more closely related to Karaharapriya (sanchara-wise), it might be appropriate to call it a janyam of Karaharapriya, with a reduced daivatham in the avarohanam (from Da2 to Da1). The movements of Bhairavi have got a very powerful quality to evoke a gloomy mood. It is much worse than Subhapanthuvarali (the raaga which is oft used in the cinema for sad situations - a very ’light’ one when compared to Bhairavi).

For a guy who daringly ventures into the bermuda triangle of classical music, that is, the rare vivadhi raagas such as Kanakangi, Bhaavani etc, it is a kind of surprise why Ilayaraja so far did not bother to touch upon the greatest of all the janya raagas, Bhairavi, in at least one of his songs. Even in his classical music albums like the ‘how to name it’, I don’t remember there is any Bhairavi piece. On the contrast, MSV has tried Bhairavi twice (as far as I know) in cine-music. Both of them are excellent. They are ‘oru puram parthal midhilayin mydhili’ (the second charanam in the song adhisaiya raagam in the movie Aboorva Raagam. MSV says that the rest of the song is set in some vague raagam called as mahathi); The second Bhairavi that MSV gave was thiruppaarkadalil paLLikondaayE (Swamy Iyyappan). What a lovely song! What an unbelievable classical presentation of the essence of Bhairavi! What a marvelous rendition by K.J.Yesudoss! You have to enjoy this song atom by atom (anu anuvai rasikanum!) There is no doubt that the ultimate classicism in carnatic music lies with few raagas like Bhairavi, Thodi, Sankarabharanam, Begada, Karaharapriya and Kalyani etc. The ascendency in the scale of knowledge and performance of even the classical musicians would be evaluated by the critics according to the mastery and proficiency that they show in handling these raagas. Such is the weightage that a raagam like Bhairavi deems from the purely classical people. Ilayaraja miserably failed in this aspect.

There was a wonderful opportunity recently for him to handle Bhairavi. That is, in the movie Moga Mull. The author of that book Thi.Janakiraman, writes pages about this great raagam. In the novel, he actually writes few paragraphs of just Bhairavi swaras alone, and about the beauty of those swaras. This he writes in the context when the hero Babu and his friend Rajam sit in the Kumbakonam public park and listen to the Bhairavi raagam broadcasted in the park radio. Since so much emphasis was given to this raagam in the story, I was lead to believe that the director Gnana might have told Ilayaraja and got a superb Bhairavi song. But, alas! There was just a small piece of re-recording in Bhairavi alone, that too, Bhairavi varnam, when Babu’s music master Ranganna teaches music to his disciples. Thats all.

Mukhari and Husseni are raagas very closely related to Bhairavi. Though it is generally said that Mukhari is the apt raagam for gloomy mood, perhaps Bhairavi suits more to such a situation than the former. Cinema musicians have preferred to use Sivaranjani or Subhapanthuvarali for sad situations than Bhairavi or Mukhari, probably because of the terrific gamakam involved in these raagas. Too much of gamakam and cinema music don’t go together! However, MSV has taken a shot at Mukhari too, in two songs: vaadaa malarE thamizh thEnE (Ambikapathy), pOgaadhE pOgaadhE (Veera Pandiya Kattabomman). I have not heard both these songs. But have heard people say that they are very good Mukharis.

Ananda Bhairavi is a fantastic raagam. It is a sharp contrast to Bhairavi. As the name indicates, Ananda Bhairavi does not have a sad quality like Bhairavi. It brings ‘aanandam’ to the listener. It is traditionally used in real ‘mangalakaramana’ situations. During the celebration of marriage occasion, when the bride and the groom sit in a swing and play ‘oonjal’, there is a kalyana sampradhaya song. That is ‘ponnoonjal aadinaalae’! The raagam is Ananda Bhairavi! You should have listened to that song, to appreciate how pleasant it is, particularly when a group of ‘maamis’ sing this song in an early morning muhoortha schedule! It will even make the father of of the bride who is performing a ‘dowri’ kalyanam, lacrimate due to aanandam, forgetting all the sufferings he had to go through to perform the marriage.

Ilayaraja has given two Ananda Bhairavis so far. The first one came in Rajni’s Raghavendra. The situation is: Manorama sings this song humouring Lakshmi, who develops an affair with the Raghavendra (future swamy). That song starts like: parthalae theriyadho naeku, adiyae sarasu… The second Ananda Bhairavi that Ilayaraja gave came in Sridhar’s Iniya Uravu Poothadhu. The situation is: the heroine (Nadhia) or somebody gets pregnant and the ’thozhiyar’ crowd sings this song (during valaikapu?). The song starts like chittu pOlE mottu pOlE piLLai vara pOraan kattil mElE. Both those Ananda Bhairavis were good ones. Look, he has used the raagam to suit happy occasion in both the instances! Mangalakaramana situations!

Ananda Bhairavi is one unique raagam in carnatic music. It defies the general grammer that regulate the structure of all raagas! We know that there are 12 (normally) definable swaras in an octave (from lower to upper Sa). They are Sa, Ri1, Ri2 (Ga1), Ri3 (Ga2), Ga3, Ma1, Ma2, Pa, Da1, Da2 (Ni1), Da3 (Ni2) and Ni3. If you count in terms of the number of individual swaras considering each of them seperately (like Ri1, Ri2, Ri3, Ga1, Ga2, Ga3 and so on), then you would say that there are 16 swaras in an octave. Of these 12 swaras, we use almost all the swaras in Ananda Bhairavi. The ’namkevastha’ arohanam and avarohanam of this raagam is Sa Ga2 Ri2 Ga2 Ma Pa Da2 Pa Sa; Sa Ni2 Da2 Pa Ma1 Ga2 Ri2 Sa. But there is much much more than this arohanam and avarohanam. You have Ga3, Da1 and Ni3 proyogams in this raagam. You can use Pa Ni2 Sa prayogam. With so much of bashangam, it looks as if it is very ungrammatical. Yet, it follows perfect grammer of its own, that define its raaga-lakshanam. Ga3 and Da1 is mostly used in making Ga3 Ma1 Pa Da1 Pa sancharam. Ni3 is used in making Da2 Ni3 Sa Ga2 Ri2 Ga2 Sa sancharam. In short Ananda Bhairavi typifies the purely aesthetic hallmark achievement of carnatic music.

Recently, Thamizh cinema music has got two more Ananda Bhairavi additions, from the now very famous Deva and Rahman. Deva’s one is konja naaL poru thalaivaa in the movie Aasai. Hariharan has sung this song. It is a great piece. Superb job by Hariharan. Look at the way the gamakam of gandaram is used in this song. Katcheri type of gamakam in a cinema song! Yet, it seems that this song has become a big hit! A welcomable change in Thamizh cinema music! In this song the lyricist (Vaali?) says ’thEnaara paalaara paanja en kaNNukuLLa’ to indicate what a visual delight the heroine’s beauty is! Look how he is crossing the gustatory (taste) and visual sensory modalities! How can honey flowing into the eye give any pleasant sensation? Perhaps we should not look at a poetic usage from the scientific stand point of view! Then he says ‘dhEsiya kodi pOlE poththi vachchEn nenjukkuLLE’! What an atypical analogy to indicate the preciousness of the heroine to the hero!

Rahman’s Ananda Bhairavi is the song mettu pOdu in the movie Duet. Prabhu and Ramesh Aravind sing this in a light music concert. It is a fantastic song. Rahman has used this raagam in a very intelligent manner. The song starts like Sa Sa Sa Ri2, Sa Sa Sa Ri2, Ri2 Ma1 Ga3 Sa, Ri2 Ma1 Ga3 Sa, Sa Sa Ri2 Sa. Look at the way he uses Ga3 in the begining of the song itself! Classically when you sing Ananda Bhairavi, when you descend like Pa Ma1 Ga3, there is a caveat right at the Ga3 “don’t go any further down”! But Rahman goes further down to Sa from Ga3! In this poor grammatically ungrammatic raagam, what can you say about this usage? When you listen to the song it is so illusory and sounds perfectly Ananda Bhairavish! Intelligent musicians can re-define raaga lakshana! Perhaps this is one instance. I don’t know if classicists will agree with the way the raagam has been used in this song. Vairamuthu’s lyrics is just wonderful in this song. He advises the janatha to achieve success like the tender roots of a germinating seed inside a hard rock (paaraikkul vErai pOlE vetri koLga)! What a powerful analogy to boost one’s confidence to achieve success! Maybe, I could add ‘dinosaurai pOlE tholvi adayaadheer’ (don’t attain failure like the dinosaurs)! One of the theories for the extinction of the dinosaur family is that the females could not bear the weight of the males during mating! What a stupid reason for such a mammoth species to perish and become extinct! Shame, Shame, Shame…!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

Anonymous 8 Jan 2007 9:05 am: Kalamaadu onnu karavai maadu moonu- Magalir mattum is also ananda bairavi
ramesh viswanathan 29 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: Hello Sir, This was an excellent piece of information about carnatic raagams. I would like to know more about 1. Abheri. 2. Shanmukhapriya. 3. Devagandiri. 4. karnataka Devagandiri 5. reethigowla. there are many more, if you let me know something on the similarl lines will be thankful to you. Rgds Ramesh
A.R.VISHNU VARDHAN 29 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: Hai every body, Any one can send me all songs of MOGA MULL.
dayanandhan 19 Sep 2008 7:38 am: informative post.. hats off..
one clarification:
the song vaadaa malarey thamizh theney from ambikapathy and pogaadhey pogaadhey from VP -Kattabomman are the compostions of Isai Maedhai G Ramanathan.. and not MSV..
pls clarify..
Sai Magesh 18 Mar 2009 9:49 am: Thanks Anand. Nice piece of information. I don’t know carnatic music but I listen. I was listening to “Paluke Bangaramayena” from yesterday and the songs from duet and aasai were coming to my mind. I came here and confirmed that they are of same raaga.
augustine 2 Mar 2010 5:42 am: well done and keep it up your wonderful task in music world

Classical Ilayaraja 7

Wed, 27 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 7th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

Kanakangi is the first melakartha raagam. It is also called as Kanakaambari (what a wonderful name!). While man’s aesthetic sense gave birth to raagas like Mohanam, Sudha Saveri etc, his increasing scientific knowledge about the structure of music over a period of many centuries gave birth to raagas such as Kanakangi. In the days of yore, when man began exploring the music world, there was no Kanakangi. All he knew were those tunes or raagas that were immediately appealing to his mind. No wonder, simple pentatonic raagas like Mohanam made their genesis during that early period of man’s irresistable pursuit for melody. Later, as is usual, science took over the aesthetic sense. The dominance of MOOD, which often served the purpose of being the mighty commander of raaga creation, was pulled down by the even mightier science. That the central theorm governing the whole of music was only simple mathematics became evident. The tip of the iceberg eventually lead to the unearthing of the whole of the rest! String instruments like the veenai and gottu vadyam etc., helped the ‘music thirsty’ thathas of yesteryears apply some good logic and figure out the progenitor raagas of the already existing raagas and narrow it down to the 72 melakartha system. It became a relatively simple task like filling in the unknown elements in the periodic table once you knew the general structure of the atom in various elments! The first melakartha became christened as Kanakangi.

There are not many keerthanais in Kanakangi. There is a Thyagaraja keerthanai on lord Ganesha (who seems to have decided to rock the whole hindu community by resurrecting from his idolhood to drink vitamin D fortified milk!) in Kanakangi. Thats all. I know of no other Kanakangi keerthanais. There are few short pieces like the one in M.Subulakshmi’s cassette in all the melakartha raagas. If you want to listen to pure Kanakangi in cinema go to KB’s Sindhu Bhairavi movie. Ilayaraja scored a marvellous Kanakangi in that movie. The situation is: Sivakumar (called as JKB in that movie) is a famous vocal musician. His wife Sulakshana is a carnatic music ag-gnani. Hence, to quench his music thirst at home too, Sivakumar falls in love with Suhasini, who is a great gnani in carnatic music! This dual love creates problems in his public performance. He tries to forget Suhasini, but not able to do so. He is haunted by her thoughts all the time. In that situation he sings a song mOgam ennum theeyil en manam vendhu vendhu urugum. It is this song that gave the first and last Kanakangi to Thamizh cinema music.

Kanakangi is a difficult raagam to handle properly. The reason is that it has got vivadhi swarams at two levels. Sa Ri1 Ga1 and Pa Da1 Ni1. The transition from one note to its immediate adjacent note is discernable by human ear. But when you get such transitions consecutively like in Sa Ri1 Ga1 and Pa Da1 Ni1, it becomes jarring to the mind! Often, to score background music to eerie situations, cine-musicians press immediately adjacent keys in the harmonium in a row, say, Sa Ri1 Ga1 Ga2 Ga3 Ma1; or if the music director doesn’t have any knowledge about musical grammer or a taste for melody, he may even press all the above said keys together to startle the audience by his unpleasant music, than by the situation per se! So, that’s the only use for raagas like Kanakangi in cinema! But, Ilayaraja made a fantastic song out of this raaga. The tonal quality of that song appropriately suits that situation. He has handled that raaga in a very intelligent way. Nowhere in that song does he travels the entire octave. Because if you travel like that, it will be very jarring and unmelodious. He has divided the raaga into bits, delivering sancharas around Sa Ri Ga first, and then going over to Pa Da Ni later, carefully avoiding the sancharas of both the vivadhi levels in the same stretch! Only at the very end, while he goes to the climactic thara sthayi panchamam, he travels from madhyama sthayi panchamam in a single stretch, covering all the notes in between. K.J.Yesudoss has sung that in a wonderful manner. Nobody else could have sung that song as he did, because it needs lot of ‘akara’ practice. One should be a carnatic musician himself and be well versed with such vivadhi sancharas to do justice to the raagam.

Kanakangi is one example that proves the old saying ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’. The concept of a raagam and mood is only in the mind of the beholder! Because, look what happens to Kanakangi, when you change the reference shruthi from Sa-Pa-Sa to Ri-Da-Ri. This jarring, inharmonious vivadhi raaga becomes Panthuvarali, a superb meloncholy! The same vivadhi swaras exist in Panthuvarali too, but because of the change in reference shruthi the quality of the mood changes! Similarly, if you knock off the Ri and Da in Kanakangi, you get Sudha Saveri, a superb melody! These are all wonders in our perceptual system, the beholder’s mind!

Ilayaraja has got many songs in Sudha Saveri, a very melodious, ‘desiya’ raagam (Sa Ri2 Ma1 Pa Da2 Sa). His first Sudha Saveri probably came in Bharithiraja’s Kizhake Pogum Rail. kOvil maNi Osai thannai has been sung by Jayachandran and Janaki. His other Sudha Saveri are maanaada kodi in Mudhal Vasantham, kaadhal mayakkam (AVMin Pudhumai Penn), raadhaa raadhaa (Meendum Kokila), maNamagaLE maNamagaLE (Thevar Magan). In maNamagaLE, he has given a sad quality to Sudha Saveri. The shanai interlude evokes a gloomy mood. Ilayaraja’s latest Sudha Saveri came in Prathap Pothan’s recent movie (Aathma). That song has been sung by T.N.Seshagopalan. The song is innaruL tharum annapooraNi. Even this song has wonderful shanai interlude. T.N.Seshagopalan has done a good job in this song (his first song with Ilayaraja). However, the best of TNS’s voice has not been brought out. Perhaps just ordinary cinema vocalists would have been enough for this song! I am sure Ilayaraja has got a lot more numbers in Sudha Saveri. Only thing is my senescent mememory seems to be failing!

Rasikapriya is the last melakartha raagam. Hence, Sa Ri3 Ga3 Ma2 Pa Da3 Ni3 Sa. I don’t know of any keerthanai in Rasikapriya. Ilayaraja has tried this raaga in his early days. It seems like a daring venture at that time. The first and last Rasikapriya in cinema came in Kovil Pura. The three songs in that movie became very famous even before the movie was released. The movie starred ‘Oru Thalai Raagam’ Shanker as the hero and Saritha as the heroine. But, alas! Despite the wonderful songs, the movie was a big flop. The Rasikapriya song was sangeethamE en jeevanE. I vaguely remember the tune of that song. It has been sung by Janaki. It starts like Pa Da Ni Sa; Sa Ri Sa Ni Sa and so on. The tune in the charanam is fantastic. Unlike the first melakartha, the last melakartha sounds melodious to me. Ilayaraja himself had told in one of his early interviews that he expected national award for this song. But, he did not get it.

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

joey 28 Dec 2006 10:07 pm: happy new year mate. was going thru ur movies wishlist. something that stood out was that you have not seen a few classic charlie chaplin movies eg. gold rush, great dictator, modern times. is it by choice or accident?
S Anand 29 Dec 2006 7:07 pm: Entirely accident. Had seen it when I was a kid, but I’m not counting that, of course…
Natarajan R 13 Oct 2008 2:33 pm: The song ‘Koyil mani oosai’ has been sung by Shri Malasia Vasudevan and Smt S Janaki, and not by Jayachandran. However the article with songs by Raja sir on ‘Sudha Saveri’ is worth reading and wonderful hearing (songs). Thank you
MBJ Pancras 16 Sep 2012 5:53 pm: The Musical Magic Of His Genius (This verse was written as a tribute to the soul blessed with musical genius, and the person of the soul is Maestro Ilaiyaraja, one of the greatest composers of soulful music , born in India, on the event of the release of the movie ‘Thou art my Golden Spring.’ It was the advent of the dawn with the lullaby, Sung by the children of Nature with impeccable notes, The chirruping stretching its magical flute thro’ little birds, The leaves rustled thro’ soft breeze making melodies, The screeches ‘neath the logs ‘midst the woods turned notes, Waters amidst Nature with ebbs and tides chiming ‘cross the horizon, Roars and grunts played thro’ wind pipes fantasizing, Thunders and lightning stood meditating in serene atmosphere, Tiny species, a wonder of Nature, forbid their sleep, And stood awake in wonder listening to those melodies. Violins spoke the breath of his music with all reverence, Each of their strings penetrated the souls spell-bound, The magic of the flutes was his mellifluous notes sailed ‘cross, Cellos played with his thoughts chimed thro’ rains and mists, Pianos waded with the watery waves of his music soothing every soul, Guitars jingled ‘midst chirping and chimes speaking his mind, Rhythmic percussions with their muffled orchestral magic, Each of their beats proclaimed the way of his breathing, A lyre in its solo orchestral utterance was seen reading his mind, Trumpets blew with their notes of majesty, stood in bow at him, It was a synchronizing symphony married to the breath of folks, The blend of serenity and silence was seen in the showers of his songs. It was the day that Nature awaited with all expectations, And it was the day that the Emperor of Music stood with crown, The crown decked with genius and the magic of panacea. His golden era was musically proclaimed with its sacred numbers, Each of his moments with ineffable depiction of melody was a rebirth. It was an anecdote telling the new generation of his magical composition, The composition of wind and music in their perfect and ideal notations. He has transformed wind to music, giving life to each sound, And every atom has learnt his mellifluous notes and is still in chimes. The moon is seen lying beside the breath of his music, The sun with its radiance has stepped itself down into gentleness, Stars are with their twinkling eyes seen with standing ovation, The waters abroad, the inlands, all stood in awe and wonder, For his genius has awakened the souls sleeping to rise sprightly. Old trees sang their nostalgic experiences with his musical journey, Young plants hummed his inborn and innate genius, The ovation was not for his person, but for his genius And for the soul who transforms wind unto the music of soul. It was the day celebrated for his genius that transforms melancholy to joy, And it was on the day which leads his musical journey with his novel creation Which proclaimed his impeccable traits thro’ ‘Thou art my Golden spring.’ The magic of his music reigned in ‘Thou art my Golden Spring’ Whose father and mother is a man of making stories of romance, And the maker of stories honoured the sage of music, Whose saga has no ending till the last soul is transformed into eternity. My heart is lifted when his soulful notes pierce my inward eye, And it’s my living tribute rendered unto the genius in him, And my verse hath soul and life drenched in the rain of his soulful notes. Begun at 8.33 p.m. and ended at 9.18 p.m. (The programme was telecast by TV Channel on 16th September 2012)

Classical Ilayaraja 6

Sun, 24 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 6th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

In carnatic music, while we have three kinds of rishabham, gandharam, daivatham, and nishadham each, the madhyamams are only two kind. They are the suddha and prathi madhyamam. If only the madhyamams had life, they are certain to demand reservation for the reason that the other more populous swarams like the rishabhams are dominating the music scene, not giving enough space for the madhyamams to come up in life! However, any species that is less in population become precious in due course. That is the general law of the nature. That is true for the madhyamams too. They are wonderful precious swarams.

The prathi madhyamam is the second madhyamam. In the perceptual scale the distance between any two adjacent notes in the harmonium is the same, irrespective of whether the notes are in the manthra sthayi, madhyama sthayi or the thara sthayi. (This is in contrast to the physical scale, where the frequency difference between any two adjacent notes in the harmonium keeps on increasing as you go to the right). In other words, the perceived tonal difference between any two swarams is the same. Thus the transition between Sa and Ri1, Ri1 and Ri2, Ri2 and Ri3, Ri3 and Ga3, Ga3 and Ma1, Ma1 and Ma2, Ma2 and Pa, Pa and Da1, Da1 and Da2, Da2 and Da3, Da3 and Ni3, and Ni3 and Sa will all be perceived as the same by our mind. However when you sing with the Sa-Pa-Sa shruthi vibrating from the thamboora, the ‘aadhara’ swarams for the shruthi, ie., the shadjam and the panchamam will have a pulling effect on their immediate adjacent swarams. It is this phenomenon that gives the beauty to the prathi madhyamam. It is for the same reason that the gap between Ri2 and Ga2 appears wide while that between Ma2 and Pa appears so narrow, giving an illusion that these notes are extremely close to each other.

The beauty of the prathi madhyamam can be well appreciated in raagas like Hamsanadham. There has been quite a good discussion about this raagam for a while in rec.music.indian.classical (rmic). It will become hackneyed to recapitulate it once again. Just to present the gist of the material: Originally a Neethimathi janyam and hence using Sa Ri2 Ma2 Pa Da3 Ni3 Sa (and the converse as avarohanam), it later became reduced to a pentatonic raagam when singers practically preferred to eschew the usage of shatsruthi daivatham (Da3). Thus, the Hamsanadham that we hear nowadays seem to be a janyam of Kalyani, instead of the 60th melakartha Neethimathi.

Ilayaraja was the only music director who tried Hamsanadham in cinema. His first Hamsanadham came in Sridhar’s ‘Harry Met Sally’ kind of movie, Thenrale Ennai Thodu. It was a typical ‘Mills and Boons’ plot, the heroine first fighting with the hero and later developing love, while the hero first develops love and later fighting with the heroine. ‘Moadhal/oodal/kaadhal’ sequence finally culminating in love signal from both the sides! Ah Ha! This type of plots seem to be like a never ending amudhasurabhi, giving the cinema directors innumerable situations, song sequences, and help them make lot of money. Rarely, such plots give us songs like thenRal vandhu ennai thodum in superb Hamsanadham. Sridhar who was almost dead at that time could make a comeback in the cinema world, because of the richness of the songs in that movie. Also, he introduced Veenai S.Balachandar’s sister’s grand-daughter Jayashree (who is also a cousin of the actress Sukanya) as the heroine in that movie.

Ilayaraja starts his first Hamsanadham like Ma Pa Ma Pa Ri Ma Ri Ni Sa…. An excellant start! An ingenious start considering from the scientific aspect of music, because this is the first and the last song that I have heard with a start in prathi madhyamam. When you are bred in a society wherein there are certain established styles, you would automatically imbibe them and then start manifesting them. Saint Thyagaraja starts the pallavi of his ‘pantu reethi kolu’ (Hamsanadham) in panchamam. In this raagam, anybody would be tempted to make a start in Pa or Sa. If somebody started in Ma2, then it is an abnormal behaviour. If he doesn’t deviate from the classical style even a teeny-weeny bit, and is able to sell it to the public and make a mega hit song, then it only means that he is brilliant! Ilayaraja did it! He has shown this kind of non-traditional start of his songs (from the point of view of the trinity’s approach to raagas) in many songs. Another example would be the kakali nishadha start in jananI jananI’ and ammaavenRazhaikkaatha in Kalyani.

The background rhythm in thenRal vanthu is a fantastic monotonous tabla beat, not exhibiting change for every line in the song. This is in sharp contrast to the newer Rahman style, wherein there is lot of high tech scientific manipulations of the rhythm, with a change for each line of the song. As usual, our cinema kavigner (Vaali?), has made lot of ‘paethals’ in lyrics in such a wonderful raaga based song.

Thendral vandhu ennai thodum
aaha saththam inri mutham idum
pagalae poi vidu; iravae pai kodu
nilavae, panneerai thoovi oaivedu!

Look at the audacity of the poet, asking the ’night’ to give a mat, moon to sprinkle scented water, so that the hero and heroine could indulge in carnal love! Literally, he is trying to drive the ‘daytime’ away so that night time could come!

The second Hamsanadham that Ilayaraja gave was Om namahaa in Maniratnam’s Geetanjali. It was a good one too. The third number came in his brother Gangai Amaran’s Ooru Vittu Ooru Vanthu. The song was sorgamE enRaalum. Our village hero ’touser payyan’ Ramarajan and Gowthami go to some foreign country and become nostalgic about Tamizhnadu and then sing that song. That song was one first-class example of how to popularize carnatic music. From the pallavi ‘hei thanthana thanthana thantha’ to the very end of the song, it is absolutely classical. In such a short piece, he has brought out the full essence of Hamsanadham. Of course there are few slips, like the usage of Da2 when he sings ’namnaadu poalaguma’, and the use of Ma1 when he sings ‘paaka oru vazhi illayae’ in charanam. He could have avoided these, and rendered a ultra pure Hamsanadham. But, what to say, cinema music directors seem to have all the right in the world to do anthing to any raagam!

He has daringly ventured to test his vocal skills in that song with S.Janaki. There are real fast sancharas covering one entire octave in such short span of time. Somehow he has done a good job! Perhaps, he thought that Ramarajan does not deserve any better voice than his! The lyrics of that song is also funny. I think he himself (or Gangai Amaran) has written that song. It goes on to narrate how village life in Tamizhnadu is much superior to that in other foreign countries.

Maadugalai meika, adhu maeyuradha paarka
mandhaiveli angu illayae hei!

In the short story collection of Fredrick Forsyth’s ‘No come backs’ the hero happens to go to Tamizhnadu. He takes note with disgust, how people urinate in public places, defecate in streets, in Tamizhnadu. Ilayaraja could have written that in his song.

Avasarama onnuku vandha sattunu
oru oarama onnuku adikka
nalla roadu illayae….

If the DMK succeeded in getting a seperate country ‘Thamizhnadu’, as they demanded the centre in early 1960s (beleive me, they had the arrogance and foolishness to do that, while Thamizhnadu didn’t even have basic necessities like water of its own!), it would definitely make this song as the national anthem! Perhaps, LTTE Prabhakaran has already made a note of this song as the national anthem for his Thamizh Eazham!

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

Arch 27 Dec 2006 9:32 am: The songs that u have stated are lovely. To jus quote some bloody songs , “Loose penne” and “chumma oru thali kattu da” in the recent times, i feel Illayaraja should have given a thot bot suiicide ..Whadya say!!
ragu 2 Feb 2010 1:42 pm: mani ratnam film is right,, but that om namaha song is from the movie idhayathai thirudathey,.
Ananth 7 Feb 2010 7:19 am: Vidyasagar has used Hamsanadam too in Anbe Sivam, in the song - Poovasam.
rs ramaswamy 6 Jun 2022 10:54 pm: Very interesting series. I could read upto part-6 but then ’the related posts’ broke. I will have to hunt for the remaining nine parts soon. I am learning a lot from what i have read so far. Thank you. May I suggest that you provide an index page for the series and place the link to the index in every part ?

Classical Ilayaraja 5

Fri, 22 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the 5th of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

In cinema music, starting from the period of Ilayaraja, the lyricists got into a pact of servitude with the music directors. They were dictated by the mighty music directors. Since the selling of audio cassette and the success of the movie were only depended upon ‘how catchy’ the tunes were, and not on the quality of the lyrics, it became the unquestioned ‘rajyam’ of the music directors like Ilayaraja. He would come early in the morning to the Prasath recording theatre. Probably by that time the lyricist would be waiting there already. Maybe they even routinely prostrated before him as he entered into the theatre like the God incarnate himself! Then he would fill the theatre with his tunes in the ’thanthana thaana thathana thaana thaana nanana’ form. The lyricist had to get this into his intellect and rack his brain to get words that would replace the ’thaana thathana’ junk! What a pity! If Subramania Bharathiar had been alive he would’ve shed blood tears at the sordid state of Thamizh in cinema! Ilayaraja was definitely one important reasons for this abyssmal degenerancy in the state of ‘kanni’ Thamizh! (Maybe the LTTE/DMK/DK combo have Ilayaraja in their murder hit list for causing this change to their beloved Thamizh!).

There is one guy who repeatedly proved that he could stand upto the pressure of Ilayaraja. He gave new form to cinema songs. After the period of Kannadasan (even though Vaali and the lot were giving some good meaningful songs), on an average, Vairamuthu gave much much better cinema songs. Some of his cinema songs even had splashes of supreme ‘kavithuvam’. The song in which he made his debut was a feast both in music and lyrics.

That song came in the movie Nizhalgal. The situation is that, hero Rajasekhar (a ganja case in that movie) returns back to his home in an elated mood. It was not shown whether he has a puff of ganja before that song! If you were the music director, what tune (to our discussion, what raaga) would you want to score in this situation? The points that director Bharatiraja gives you regarding this situation is: ’evening time/hero/ganja case/very happy/sings.’ Thats all. Isn’t your mind fully blank about what raagam to choose? Okay, if you were the lyricist (that too, making your entry into the cine-world in this song), what would you write? Ilayaraja chose to use the all time pleasantry of Kedaram in this situation! Vairamuthu decided to write pon maalai pozhudhu.

Kedaram is a fantastic raagam. It is one of the innumerable janyams of the 29th melakartha Sankarabharanam. It has got a small U turn in its arohanam (vakram!). Sa Ma Ga Ma Pa Ni Sa. Avarohanam is Sa Ni Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa. Though this looks simple, there is a specific phrase in its avarohanam to make the raaga identity clear. That is, Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa is not just the same when you sing, you have to sing/play like Pa Ma Ga…. Ri Sa Ga Ri Sa. The temporal duration (kaarvai) of gandaram is more. This is what gives beauty to this raagam. Before Ilayaraja used, I know of only one song which is in Kedaram. That is, raamasaami thoodhan naanadaa in Sampoorna Ramayanam. Lord Anjeneya sings this song to Ravanan!

Ilayaraja’s use of Kedaram is splendid. He uses the key phrase of Kedaram in the opening of that song itself like ‘Sa Ni Pa, Pa Ma Ga, Ga Ri Sa, Sa Ni Pa’ travelling from madhyama sthayi upper shadjam to manthra sthayi panchamam in a single stretch. At the time when the movie was released, I was amused by the chirping of birds in the prelude. How could they catch many birds and bring it to the recording theatre and make them chirp according to their will and wish and record it? Now that I’m a little older, and know that you can make birds chirp, lions roar, kuyils ‘koovufy’, just by pressing a single button even in your $ 30 casio, I’m more amused by the use of Kedaram in the song. The use of accordion in the first interlude ‘Sa Ni Pa Ni Pa Sa Ni Sa Ni Pa, Ga Ma Pa’ is excellant. In the second interlude he suddenly introduces a meloncholy with a solo violin piece well within the scope of kedaram. I don’t know why he did it. Why that sudden sadness in the tune?

The intellectual, poem writing part of Vairamuthu’s neuro-circuitry reached the boundaries of imagination in that song. He writes:

Idhu oru pon maalai pozhudhu
vaana magal naanugiraal
vaeru udai poonugiraal

Oh God! What a ‘karpanai’! He personifies the evening sky as a girl and says: she is changing clothes from evening to night, and blushes out of shyness because everybody is seeing her! Can anybody refer to redness in sky during dusk any better than this? There might be light scattering and such kind of hi-tech physical events that might cause this phenomenon! But, look, what the poet has to say about this from his point of view! In the charanam, he goes a step further and starts characterising the normal events occuring during dusk in a poetic way. He says:

Aayiram nirangal jaalamidum
raathiri vaasalil kolamidum
vaanam iravukku paalamidum
paadum paravaigal thalamidum
poomarangal saamarangal…

Proper translation would be: Birds would sing and clap welcoming the night; evening sky would establish the bridge for the coming of the night; all the trees would sway hither and thither and produce gentle breeze welcoming the night; the appearance of thousands of colourful lights all over the world would be magical; it would be like a ‘kolam’ in the gates of night!

The second Kedaram from the theatre of Ilayaraja came in Kamal’s Michael Madana Kaamarajan. sundhari neeyum is a fantastic song. It is not as pure as pon maalai, but it is a good Kedaram. Though, it was MSV who discovered Kamal’s singing capabilities (nyayiru oLi mazhaiyil thingaL kuLikka vandhaan; was it Kamal’s first song?), it was Ilayaraja who gave him chance to sing repeatedly in his movies. In fact, in one non-Kamal movie he made him sing for some other hero (ponmaanE theduthE, en veeNai paaduthE: O Maane Maane). Kamal and Janaki have done a wonderful job in sundhari neeyum. Ilayaraja has given the required weightage to manthra sthayi Pa Ni Sa sancharas in this song too. In the charanam, during ‘kannana kannae en sontham allo’ he uses, Sa Ga Pa Ga Pa Ni, Pa Ni Sa Pa Ni Ri which is definitely unbecoming of kedaram. But, I guess we have to forgive this, because this is cinema music and not a katcheri! The second interlude flute pieces are exceptionally good.

A.R.Rahman’s ennavaLE ennavaLE in Kaadhalan is very frequently alluded by some as Kedaram. Reportedly ’thatha’ Suppudu also commented about this song in some interview as ‘Kedarathuku sedharam’, meaning damage to Kedaram. Personally, I am not able to place this song under any raagam. It starts like Sa Sa Ni Pa Ma Pa Pa Ni Pa Ma Ga, Sa Sa Ga Ma Pa Ga Ma Pa…later it deviates with liberal usage of chatusrathi daivatham, chatusrathi rishabam, with one flash of shatsruthi rishabam too (kaadalinaal varum avasthai enru kandu kondaen). But it is a very good song, establishing A.R.Rahman’s typical marks throughout the song. Unnikrishnan has done a good job. But unfortunately, Vairamuthu has made lot of ‘paethals’ in that song. Time and again, Thamizh ‘pudhu kavignars’ have written (to emphasise the dramatic impact of love on the lovers) ‘after seeing you, and falling in love, I’ve even forgotten my name’! Vairamuthu has gone a step ahead and tries to characterize why the hero lost his speech (literally) after seeing the heroine:

Vaai mozhiyum enthan thai mozhiyum
vasappada villayadi.
Vayitturkum thondaikum naduvinil oru
uruvam illatha urundayum uruludhadi.

Poets frequently indulge in abstract thinking trying to define inexplicable ideas. In another song he says, ‘pookal pookum osaigal kaadhil ketpadhilai’ (engE en jeevanE in Kamal’s Uyarntha Ullam), when he writes about the onset of love. That is, as the sounds of flower blooming cannot be heard, the onset of love is indiscernable! That is a good abstraction. But in the above said song he has grossly failed in his abstraction, trying to explain the effect of love on an individual. In the charanam of this song his ‘paethals’ continue: Unthan koondalil meen pidipaen, Un viral sodduku edupaen… and so on. Luckily he did not go to say ‘Oh, my love, when you shout from the toilet, I will bring the tissue paper’!

Nalinakanthi is another Sankarabaranam janyam. Structurally, it is closely related to Kedaram. It has got a sharper U turn (vakram!) in its arohanam. Sa Ga Ri Ma Pa Ni Sa. The avarohanam is Sa Ni Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa. So kedaram differs from Nalinaganthi in only in the arohanam. Of course, you can sing the avarohanam of Nalinakanthi as it is, while in Kedaram, you have to add some special dealings of the swaras. Ilayaraja has one good Nalinakanthi in Kamal’s Kalaignan. It came as a surprise in that movie because all the other songs were ‘kuppai’. endhan nenjil neengaadha has been sung by Yesudoss and Janaki. Ilayaraja captures the essence of the raaga in the start of the song: Sa Ga Ri Ma Ga Ri Sa Ni Sa Ga Ri Ma GA…There is no deviation in that song at all. In the second interlude there is a short thara sthayi swara alapana too. He should have avoided that alapana, and that person too, in that song! (I think it is he who has rendered that short piece!). It seems like he has used gottu vadyam in that song.

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

raj 21 Jan 2007 9:49 pm: u’r posts not ony praise vairamuthu butoffends other lyricists..
abuubakkar 22 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: egshdte lu v xmhjs xnsmd
jimmy 22 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: Great analysis. Thought only I was crazy about these sort of analysis and good to know there is company. Learnt a lot from here. Thanks

Classical Ilayaraja 4

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the fourth of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan is a very popular carnatic violinist. He is one of the successful rebels in the field. His katcheris are a mixture of classical and commercial blend. In his classical concert he will play kallum muLLum kaalukku meththai (Iyyappa song) and in the end say ‘samiyae saranam Iyyappa’ in his violin. If you go to his house he will say ‘vaanga saar vaanga, enna sappidaringa? Kaappiya, teaya?’ in madhyama sthayi in his violin. If you say tea then he will turn inside and signal his wife in the kitchen ‘adiyae… saarukku oru cup tea konda’ in thara sthayi, of course, in his violin! He doesn’t talk much, you know…. Only his violin….!

Kunnakudi produced one family movie. It was a true family movie in the sense that he produced that movie, his son-in-law Mr. Ramakrishnan directed that movie (hope it is correct), and maybe, a couple of his other relatives were employed as the light-boys in the production of that movie. Unfortunately,the movie became an example of a perfect family movie in another sense too, that is, only Kunnakudi’s family saw that movie! I was one poor soul who got to see that movie Thodi Raagam by the quirk of wicked fate! The hero was T.N.Seshagopalan. His lovely heroine was Nalini! Kunnakudi had tried to make some typical cinema story like, Seshagopalan, a famed musician pledging Thodi raagam to the villain, and finally redeeming it in the last scene. I forgot if there was any heroic stunt sequences in the last scene, when Seshagopalan redeems his Thodi back by befelling a dozen villains in a single punch with his fist! In this materialistic world who can escape ‘sabalam’? Seshagopalan probably thought that the movie would be a big hit like Shakunthala starring G.N.Balasubramaniam and M.Subulakshmi, and that he could become super hero like Rajini and make lot of money!

Anyway, coming to the point, there was a good song in that movie in the raagam Kalyani. It was vaa vaa thalaivaa vaa. As I vaguely remember, it was a good Kalyani. But, because of the dismal fate of that movie, that song did not become a hit. Even if the film had been a success, I doubt whether the song would have been received favourably by the common rasika. Because, the song is like a mini-katcheri! It is unlikely that a duet in which the hero and heroine exchange their love in a katcheri format will be liked by the common audience of the present day cinema world. So, you have no other go other than cinematizing a raaga so that it is appealing. You may have to compromise in loosing some purity of the raagam.

Considering this tight situation that music directors face in handling a raagam in cinema, I really wonder how Ilayaraja could give the same Kalyani as in Kunnakudi’s vaa vaa thalaivaa without even an iota of compromise in the purity, and yet be very appealing to the common rasika. Oh God! How many Kalyanis he has to his credit! The single most common melakartha raagam that he used was Kalyani. He should have scored at least 25 songs in Kalyani. This 65th melakartha raagam, is neither too much gamaka oriented nor very light. It is this quality of Kalyani that made him use it left and right! You don’t have to employ violent shakes of the swaras to show the colour of Kalyani! Simple swara phrases would suffice, to establish the raaga identity. Since not much of gamaka is needed, you wouldn’t be violating the so called cinema melody.

Probably his first Kalyani came in Uthiri Pookal. It was a fantastic movie, directed by the avant garde director Mahendran. Aswini and Vijayan are husband and wife. Vijayan is hero cum villain. Aswini’s younger sister (I forgot who it was) is a jolly type teen female. She is the one who sings that Kalyani song naan paada varuvaayO in that movie. She sits in a small sand crest in the middle of a river and sings that song. S.Janaki had done a real good job making all sorts of ‘konashtai’ in that song! This female is later raped by Vijayan, and that becomes the key knot in that movie. Uthiri pookal was a much talked about movie. After that, how many Kalyanis followed like train of programmed events from the recording theatre of Ilayaraja!

jananI jananI in the movie Thai Mookaambigai was a terrific hit song. It was an excellant classical piece sung by Ilayaraja, Deepan Chakravarthy & Co. (He had the arrogance to push better singers to the back row, you know!). That song was rich in lyrics too. He has taken extra care to pronounce Sanskrit words in that song like ‘shakthi peetamum nee, sarva mokshamum nee’ as Sanskrit sounding. Good job! Look at the ‘dhamathoondu’ version of Adi Sankarachariyar’s advaitha philosophy in that song. ‘Janani janani, Jagam nee agam nee’. He said the same thing, right?

Then came his superb Kalyani in director Maniratnam’s first movie Pagal Nilavu. That is vaidEgi raaman kai sErum nEram. S.Janaki again. Radhika dances for this song. The rhythm in this song is wonderful. A blend of guitar and mridangam. He gave some of his Kalyanis in lighter form like those in the songs thEvan thandha veeNai (Unnai Naan Sandhithen) and veLLai puraa onRu Engudhu (Pudhu Kavidhai) etc. thEvan thandha veeNai has one speciality to it. It was a song written by Kaviarasu Kannadasan and it was posthumously used in the cinema. Look at Kannadasan’s opening lines in that song: thEvan thandha veeNai, adhil dhEvi seydha gaanam, thEdum kaigaL theeNdinaal adhil raagam inRi pOgumO? Yes, anybody could have a veenai, but to get a raagam out of it only some fingers can do it!

In the movie Sindhu Bhairavi he tried to do some technical innovation in Kalyani raagam. That is, in the song kalaivaaNiyE, it was widely publicised by K.Balachandar & Co, (who were literally at the mercy of Ilayaraja for the success of the movie), that that song was composed in aarohanam alone. Okay, what if a song is set in aarohanam alone, does the rasika get a special kind of melody? It was just an ordinary song. But a good piece of Kalyani. The song in Uyarnda Ullam, vandhaaL mahaalakshmiyE was a fantastic Kalyani. The situation for that song was funny. Kamal Hassan, a derilict, who loses all his money sings that song in praise of Ambika’s entry into his house (of course, she sets him right and stands a great support to him). S.P.Balu had made all sorts of ‘konashtai’ in that song. This is one good example for how to popularize classical music. It is pure 24 carat Kalyani. In Soorasamharam he has given another form of 24 carat Kalyani (naan enbadhu nee allavO). He introduced his troup’s flautist Arunmozhi as singer in that song. In the charanam, when they sing paadinEn paN padinEn, it is beatiful combination of swaras Ni Ri Ga Ma Pa. It is simply superb. A similar song is malayoram mayilae in the movie Oruvar Vazhum Aalayam. Almost each of the lines in this song, he renders in two sangathis, like for example vilayaattai solli thandhadhaaru first in Pa Pa Pa Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa Sa Ga Ri GA Sa. Then later, the same line is given in Pa Pa Pa Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa Sa Ri Ga Ma Pa Ma Ga Ri SA. Great Kalyani! I think his latest Kalyani is ammaavenRazhaikkaatha uyirillaiyE (Rajni’s Mannan). In Thalapadhi also there is one good Kalyani: yamunai aatrilE… Some north indian singer (Mithali) sang that song.

Amir Kalyani is a janyam of Kalyani. Though it is Amir Kalyani, it is ‘garib’ in its scope. Not much, you see…! The key phrase in it is Ma2 Pa Da Ma1 using both the madhyamams. Viswanathan/Ramamurthy made an indelible mark in this in their ’ennuyir thozhi’ in karnan. Then, V.S.Narasimhan established his classical heritage (I heard his father is some carnatic big shot) in the song manasukkuL ukkaanrdhu maMiyadiththaay in Kalyana Agadhigal. At last came Ilayaraja’s Amir Kalyani, in veeNai Endhum vaaNiyE (Vietnam Colony). I heard that Bombay Jayashree has sung this song. It is a good Amir Kalyani. Let us see if Bombay Jayashree attains eminance like Unnikrishnan in cinema music. More ‘dabbu’ in cinema, man!

Saranga is another Kalyani janyam. A beautiful, vakra raagam, again with double madhyamam. (Why Kalyani has many double madhyama janyams?) MSV has scored an excellant Saranga in konjum nEram ennai maranthen. TMS voice is honey in this song. Ilayaraja gave one pure Saranga in kanniyar paarvai thanai in the movie Parvathi Ennai Paradi. It is the title song. When the title song was in such pure Saranga, I was lead to beleive that the subsequent songs might be in classical raagas too. But, alas, a big disappointment! You can never try to speculate what you will get from Ilayaraja at all. He has composed a fantastic song in one of Vijayakanth’s latest movie with Kasthuri. That song is kunkumam manjalukku inRu thaan nalla naaL. In that song he has used all the swaras in Kalyani other than daivatam. I don’t know whether any such raagam exists with Sa Ri2 Ga3 Ma2 Pa Ni3 Sa aarohanam and avarohanam. If so what is its nomenclature?

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

Anonymous 8 Jan 2007 9:17 am: To me that song sounds like kedharam … not sure though
radha 28 Sep 2011 12:47 pm: In Janani song if his diction sounded perfect… that is because he learnt sanskrit. So, theres nothing to wonder about his pronunciation.
krishna 9 Apr 2014 4:48 pm: devan thandha veenai is just a beautiful song with such a wonderful lyrics

Classical Ilayaraja 3

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the third of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

Subhapanthuvarali is a ‘bayangara soga’ raagam. If you hear it you will cry; I will cry; ‘saraa log’ will cry. Given the conditional event of Rajiv Gandhi or Indira Gandhi’s death occuring, Subhapanthuvarali played on the radio or TV by some ’thenga moodi’ bhagavathar during the days of mourning will make even those music insensitive Indira Congress leaders shed at least ‘crocodile tears’! Can you imagine this raagam being used in the cinema for a sexy scene like that in ‘Hot Shots’ in which the hero Charlie Sheen fries eggs on the heroine’s umbilicus as though it was a bunzen burner?! Yes, there is a song in Subhapanthuvarali for a situation like the above said, in the movie Getti Melam. That was the first movie in which director Visu joined Ilayaraja, starring Karthik and Sasikala. Visu had tried some sexploitation in that song sequence by bringing Sasikala in swimsuit for few minutes, Karthik grazing over her all the time! The song is dhagamae undanathe, thindaaduthe manamae. That was pure Subhapanthuvarali. Maybe it evoked sexy mood. Maybe not! Neither the movie nor the song was a big hit. Perhaps the failure was only due to the ineptitude of the raaga selection. Visu never joined with Ilayaraja after that!

Ilayaraja has used Subhapanthuvarali umpteen number of times for sad situations. His first Subhapanthuvarali came in vaigaraiyil vaigai karaiyil in Payanangal Mudivadhillai. S.P.B had done a wonderful job in that. The song was a big hit as were the other numbers in that movie. Ilayaraja and director R.Sundarajan reportedly had a physical fight about who was the main reason for the movie’s hit! Childish fellows! After sometime, R.Sundarajan became a pal with Ilayaraja once again, reconciling to the fact that Ilayaraja was indispensable at that period of time when he was at his peak. Some of his other Subhapanthuvarali are madhavan azhakiraan in Rajni’s Raghavendra, one song in Valli (enna enna kanavu kandayo). In Paadu Nilaave he used Subhapanthuvarali for one situation in which the hero and heroine enter into some sort of music competetion. That song is vaa veliyae intha kootai vittu. Mano and Chitra. Mano had shown his vocal gymnastic skills in the thara sthayi sancharas in that song.

Subhapanthuvarali is the 45th melakartha raagam. One raaga before that, (i.e. 44th) we have Bavapriya raagam. Ilayaraja has composed one song in this scale. That is kandupudichchEn kandupudichchEn in Guru Sishyan. One of my friend said that some carnatic big shot (Sudha Raghunathan or someone) told in an interview in MTV that it was a good Bavapriya and that Ilayaraja had used this ‘soga raagam’ in that funny situation in which Prabhu humours Rajini about his new love affair with Gowthami. I would simply say that it was a good song in Bavapriya scale. Thats all! Similarly there is a good song in the suddha madhyama raaga scale of Subhapanthuvarali, that is, Dhenuka. It is the song in Thooral Ninnu Pochu: en sOga kathaiya kELu. Let us simply call this as set in Dhenuka scale (with few slips) and not as Dhenuka raagam.

The sixth raaga from Subhapanthuvarali, i.e. 51st mela raagam, is Panthuvarali. Ilayaraja has conspicuously not produced any good number in Panthuvarali.The only one that I know is the re-recording in Raja Paarvai in which blind Kamal plays violin with the troup. I forgot the situation for that in the movie. Sa Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa Sa Ri Ni Sa… that is how the recording goes. Though it is usually quoted as good Panthuvarali, I did not like it very much. He had tried some fusion in that. Nothing can beat MSV’s ezhu swarangalukul in Panthuvarali. It is like listening to a katcheri. Vani Jayaram’s performance was terrific. Did she get national award for that song? Perhaps, it is because of this song that she always says that MSV is the best music director who gave carnatic music in pure form, forgetting about Ilayaraja’s inRaikku yEn indha (Vaidhegi Kaathirundhaal) and other innumerable etceteras. Maybe, Ilayaraja stopped giving her chance to sing in his movies only because she praised MSV all the time!

Ilayaraja was very prolific in the sudha madhyama counterpart of Panthuvarali, that is Mayamalavagowlai. Since Mayamalavagowlai is relatively very flexible, you can distinctly show the colour of the raaga just by traversing its notes alone. Not much of gamakam is needed. You can use this for all kinds of situation like sadness, happiness etc. Ilayaraja has completely exploited this raagam to the point of its fullest use, so that no other music director can bring out any better than him from this raaga. His first song in this scale probably came in Ponnu Ooruku Pudhusu (enna paattu paada enna thaaLam pOda!). His other Mayamalavagowlai are manjaL nilavukku inRu (Mudhal Iravu), andhi varum nEram (Mundhanai Mudichu), madhurai mari kozhundhu (Enga Ooru Paattukaaran), uyirE uyirE urugaadhE (Oruvar Vaazhum Aalayam), illam kaadhal veeNai (Vellai Pura Onru), raama naamam oru vEdhamE (Sri Raghavendra), maasaru ponnE varuga (Thevar Magan), en thayenum koyilai (Aranmanai Kili), kottu kali kottu (Chinnavar), poova eduththu vachchu (Amman Koil Kizhakaalae). There are so many songs, that quoting all would be cumbersome. Some of them have actually been tuned in tappanguthu situations. In Bharathiraja’s Ennuyir Thozhan, there is a song machchi en mannaru. It is a pukka Mayamalavagowlai (even though it is tappanguthu). That song has the following lyrics:

Machchi en mannaru mansukkula bejaru,
Touch pannaru, takkara poanaru,
Daavu oru daavu naan kaatum naerum…
Sammunu sammunu vaasam sallunu sallunu veesum…

Though I’ve not seen this movie, from the lyrics I guess that the song situation should be like this: The poor pettai rowdy hero buys a new autorickshaw and shows it to his lady love and sings a song! In the charanam of that song look what the heroine asks the hero to buy for her! Not jewelry! Not house or ‘bahuth keemthi property’! Not new silk dresses! Just two tickets for matinee show to a Rajini’s movie so that they both can go! Thats all! Also, in the charanam the hero says to the heroine ‘kaavEri aaraattam odaathE nee mE… koovam thaan naamE..’ Funny! Isn’t it? It is as though these people are just talking in Madras language in that song. Good depiction of poor class life. Even though the thamizh kaavalargal purists might say that this song is a kuppai, I liked the lyrics very much. How else can you write for a situation in which ‘pettai rowdi’ sings a song? In kottu kali kottu (Chinnavar), he has extracted heavy vocal support from SPB and Chitra, making them go up and down the scale in beautiful array of swaras. You should have listened to it to appreciate it. One of his Mayamalavagowlai closely resembles one of MSV’s song. It is enge naan kanbaen in A.S.Prakasam’s Sadhanai. It is just like kallellaam maaNikka kallaagumaa (Aalayamani). He should have definitely got the idea for that song from MSV’s above said song. Some MSV fans might call this as blatant plagiarism! Is it? I don’t know.

Considering the panchama varjaya raagam of Mayamalavagowlai, he was the only one who ever used it so far! That is the Lalitha raagam. It seems to be a recent attraction to him. The first Lalitha came in Unnal Mudiyum Thambi, when Kamal sings a duet with L.A.K.Malam, as the heroine Seetha calls herself (as shit!) derogatively in that movie! idhazhil kadhai ezhudhum is a great Lalitha. Ilayaraja should have definitely got the idea for this tune from Muthuswamy Dikshitar’s heranmayim lakshmim. To me, the movements of both the song and keerthanai seem similar. But Dikshitar ingeniously starts the keerthanai in suddha daivatam. The continuity of the tune that Ilayaraja has maintained in idhazhil kadhai ezhudhum, the step by step progression from one swara to another, the development of superb sangathis, each and every bit in that tune is simply excellant. This song is like a milestone in Thamizh cine-music. Gangai Amaran’s lyrics is unusually wonderful, matching his another brother paavalar Varadharajan’s maNNil indha kaadhal (Keladi Kanmani). He proved himself a poet in this song! Subsequently, following the hit of his first Lalitha, Ilayaraja tried another shot of ‘half-boiled Lalitha’ in iLam kuyilE kuyil tharum isaiyE (Priyanka). The start of this song is like Ma Ma Ma Da Sa Ni Da Ma Ma Da Ma Da Sa Ni Ma Da Ga Ma Ri Ga Sa. A beautiful start indeed! But the tune gets spoiled in the charanam. I am told that there is another of his Lalitha trials in Veera too. I understand that it is like a small virutham (thirumagal un) sung by Arun Mozhi. I have not heard it so far.

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

R.V. EASWAR 20 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: Dear Mr Ramakrishnan, I read with interest your learned article on some of the ragaas used by Ilayaraja. It was erudite and gave much insights to laymen like me in appreciating ragaa-based film songs. However, I do not think it is fair to compare one music director with another - each one was in a different era and there were very little common factors that can be used for comparison purposes. Actually, my humble opinion is to forget all comparisons and just enjoy the music, whoever has tuned the song. I look forward to more such articles. Yours sincerely, r.v.easwar (of MSV-Ilayaraja era)
venkateshan.S 20 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: You hail from srirangam and you have a scanty respect for bhagavathas which is very disheartening.
DS Hari 7 Jun 2009 3:37 am: What about using lalitha is Sengamalam Sirikkithu in Dhavani Kanavugal..massive use of violin in the second interlude..PLEASE COMMENT.
narayanraj 13 Sep 2009 5:30 pm: excellent blog with lot of informations and tasty coomments,satire etc., madhura mari kozhundhu and kottu kali kottu are nadanama kriya .ok . narayanraj

Classical Ilayaraja 2

Tue, 19 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the second of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

There are very few instances in which the identity of a rare raaga in a cinema song is so well handled and shown (to the extent that) we could even use these songs as good a reference as keerthanas for those respective raagas. To quote a few, K.V.Mahadevan’s paattum naanE (Thiruvilayaadal) in the raagam Gowrimanohari, M.K.Thiagaraja Bhagavathar’s soppana vaazhvil magizhndhu in the raagam Vijayanaagari. These are uncommonly sung raagas. It is true that there are excellant keerthanais like gurulekha (Gowrimanohari) in these raagas. But to a common rasika, it could be gone ahead and suggested paattum naanE to understand Gowrimanohari, because KVM has handled it in splendid form. The way T.M.S starts the song in thara sthayi rishabham with his perfect voice and renders it, it is like eating a ’nila pournami’ feast in the banks of kaveri. That song has become an absolute reference for Gowrimanohari. The question is: Has Ilayaraja any such ‘reference’ songs to his credit? Yes. Many!

Bhaavani is the 41st melakartha raaga. It is the 2nd raaga to the right from Jalavarali! It has the following arohanam and avarohanam: Sa Ri1 Ga1 Ma2 Pa Da2 Ni3 Sa, and Sa Ni3 Da2 Pa Ma2 Ga1 Ri1 Sa. I have never heard any keerthanai in this raaga. How did Ilayaraja get the sudden idea of scoring a tune in this complex vivaadi raaga? Would it be a hit with all its vivaadi swaras? Did he or Kamalhaasan have any apprehension? If they had had, maybe we would’t have got this wonderful song paarththa vizhi paarththa padi in Guna. It is a perfect song suiting the situation in which Kamal (a nut case) sees the heroine in a temple and falls in instant love with her. That heroine, Roshni (or something) was a delight to see in that movie. The song starts like this Sa Pa Pa Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa Da Sa Ri Ga… Before the song there is a virutham like piece sung by the chorus. He has handled the beauty of the vivaadhi swaras in that raaga very very nicely. When you hear the words ‘charanam charanam’ set in the swaras, Sa Sa Ga Ri Sa it sends a thrill in your perceptual apparatus. Since the uttaranga swaras of this raaga consist of chatusruthi daivatham and kaakali nishadam, it has a quality like that of Kalyani (with a pradhi madhyamam). In the interlude of this song the chorus traverse in the melodious regions of the raaga (Pa Da Ni Sa). Unfortunately I don’t remember the words. Maybe the lyrics is good too. Yesudoss has done a fantastic job. Even though the recording scale of this song is only around ‘oru kattai’, how is that it sounds as though he is reaching big heights when he sings the same pallavi in the thara sthayi? It sounds so pleasant to hear! This song is a very good good referance for Bhaavani raagam.

Guna has another fantastic ’light’ song kaNmaNi anbOdu. Maybe, neo-rasikas will go ahead and call this song as Sankarabaranam!

Are there any cinema songs in raagam Hemavathi? It was a good surprise recently when I came to know that Ilayaraja has ventured into this raagam also for first time (maybe, in thamizh film song history). That song is in the movie Pudhupatti Ponnuthayee starring Radhika. manam pOla maangalyam is a good example of Hemavathi. S.Janaki (the best vocal support he ever got) has sung this song. This movie is like some modern Thillana Mohanaambaal. Some big shot has given accompaniment in nadhaswaram in this song. He has started the pallavi in thara sthayi gandaaram. Ga Ri Sa Sa Ni Sa NI Sa Ni Da… That is how the song goes. It is really good and pure!

Considering the sudha madhyamam of Hemavathi, the raaga giant ‘Karaharapriya’, Ilayaraja has few pure numbers in it. Of course nothing can beat M.S.Viswanathan’s maadhavi pon mayilaal. Probably Ilayaraja first tried Karaharapriya in pure form in poo malarndhida in the movie Tik Tik Tik. The interlude violin pieces and K.J.Yesudoss’s swara alapana in that song are fantastic. For such a good tune, the lyrics was very bad. I distinctly remember how the triple x filled words in the charanam like ‘padukayil…’ got more famous than the tune in our school! Ilayaraja should have paid more attention to the lyrics at least when his tunes were purely carnatic. Mmmmm…. Who cared? It was all money for him! His other pure karnatic Karaharapriya are aanandham pongida pongida (Sirai Paravai), thaanaa vandha sandhanamE (Ooru Vittu Ooru Vandhu). In aanandham pongida pongida, the upper sancharas are excellant, like Ga Ga Ri Sa Ri Ga Ma Ga… Again,the song has been sung by Yesudoss. His voice is superb for this kind of songs. thaanaa vandha sandhanamE came as a pleasant surprise in his brother Gangai Amaran directed movie. This song was not a big hit. Probably all the attention went to sorgamE enRaalum in the same movie in raagam Hamsanadam (but for few slips). In ’thaana’ (SPB), he has handled some wonderful nuances of Karaharapriya, like Ga Ri Ni Da Ni… There are few more of his semi-classical tries in Karaharapriya, like maappillaikku (Netrikann) etc. Even his first song, machchana parthingala is in the Karaharapriya scale. He liked this scale a lot. Maybe, neo-rasikas would call all of them as pure Karaharapriya.

Probably the purest of his Karaharapriya came in Unnaal Mudiyum Thambi. The situation is Kamal and Gemini fight over something. The quarrel gets very intense. At this point Gemini’s dumb son (Kamal’s brother), takes his nadhaswaram and starts playing loudly, to stop his kin from quarreling further. You know what raaga Ilayaraja selected for this situation? Karaharapriya! That scene was a musical feast in that movie. The raaga was appropriately used. K.J.Yesudoss gave a charming vocal support to Ilayaraja (singing for both Kamal and Gemini). It was like a duet between Yesudoss and the the nadhaswaram! K.Balachander used this situation to show how music was a common enjoyment in Gemini’s house and how it could abate the heat of the quarell between the son and the father.

Talking about the panchama varjaya raagam of Karahapriya, that is, Sriranjani, probably Ilayaraja was the best music director to use this wonderful raaga. His first Sriranjani came as a tail bit in veLLi chalangaigaL (Kaadhal Oviyam). It was a very fast bit sang by the chorus ’thannanthanimaiyil iru vizhi’. Even though veLLi chalangaigaL was tuned in Chandrakounse raagam, I don’t know what made him give the tail bit to Sriranjani (a very strange guy, you know!) The second Sriranjani attempt came in naadhavinOdhangal in Salangai Oli. Even in this song he tuned the pallavi alone in Sriranjani, with charanam in Hamsaanandi. This is what I dislike in cinema music directors. Why can’t they adhere to a single raaga? Why do they have to change from pallavi to charanam? Ilayaraja was the one who did best justice to carnatic music among modern music directors. But even he fell a prey to such deviations (from purist point of view) like changing the raaga for each line in few songs. His best Sriranjani came in naadham ezhundhadhadi in Gopura Vaasalile. Again, Yesudoss! It was really fantastic. Karthik had given a comic act in that song. Probably that song toppled M.S.V’s best Sriranjani naadham enum kOvililE. Dit it? I would say yes.

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

sujatha 28 Feb 2007 8:55 am: is there any hidden meaning in the song panivizhum malarvanam
Anil Goud 19 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: Pls send me some old Illayarajs songs to my mail id. i like very much of Illayaraja songs i am requesting u that pls send old songs of Illayaraja songs. form Anil GOud
Ramkumar 12 Nov 2008 1:29 am: Can i get the raaga based songs of Raja sir? i am bajan singer and would like to get the some of the rare raagas composed by raja sir
Jimmy 15 Mar 2009 8:15 am: Poo Malaradhita to me so special and love that song. Best of Raja in Karaharapriya. There was an MSV song in Karaharpriya - “I will sing for you” - its the same arrangement as Poo Malardhita in the same raga- Does anyone know where I can get a copy of this song. Given that I almost listen to Poo Maladhita at least once a week - I want the potential source of inspiration for this song. thanks in advance.
Jimmy 15 Mar 2009 8:16 am: I will sing for you … was from a movie called Manidhanum deivamahalam - Sivaji in guest role - probably one of the worst movies of all times - with the dopey AVM Rajan in it.
Nagarajan Anantharaman 30 Jan 2010 6:10 pm: I guess “Ponmagal Vanthal” in “Sorgam” is Karaharapriya
Bala 11 Nov 2011 11:36 am: “i will sing for you” is a song from ‘Manidharil Manickam’ and not ‘Manidahnu Deivamagalam’
nish 14 Mar 2012 1:11 pm: on wat raga s d song nee partha paarvai ? s it nata bhairavi?
Keshav 24 Apr 2012 9:47 pm: Isnt ‘Pavani’ the name of the raga. I am not disputing that some people say names of ragas little different. However, when names determine the Melakarta identity per Katapayadi sankhya system, ‘Bhaavani’ would mean the ragam is Melakarta (34/44 based on whether you pronounce that as Ba or Bha). Just curious. Or is that insignificant?
Sakthi 11 Dec 2015 7:13 pm: Sorry, Mr.Lakshmi Narayanan, naadham enum kOvililE still stands best

Classical Ilayaraja

Sun, 17 Dec 2006 12:00:00 +0000

This is the first of 15 articles titled Classical Ilayaraja appeared on Usenet in the 90s.
I’ve added links to the songs, so you can listen as you read.
You could also try my Tamil song search.

Recently, I watched the movie Chembaruthi on video. One of those unethical, “kuppai” screen printed video cassette, you know, that gives you a vision like that of a “soda-butti” watching TV without his spectacles! Ilayaraja has done a fantastic job in that movie. Though I had heared all those songs many times while I was in India, watching that movie created a reminiscent train of thoughts in my mind, about Ilayaraja, his music, the dramatic change he brought about in Thamizh cinema. I thought that it would be worthwhile to discuss his music, particularly the CLASSICAL aspect! I am aware that it is not possible to write about all his carnatic oriented songs, about how he has handled those raagas, how he has deviated from the classical style etc. But it would definitely be interesting to pour out our ideas once in a while in a random order of the raagas covered by him.

In Chembaruthi there are six songs, out of which 4 are carnatic based. All the songs were “sooper hits”. To a guy who knows carnatic music, the raagas are explicit, and to a non-classical rasika, they are just great tunes! This was one of his specialities, to give the raaga in almost good shape and also make a good cinema tune out of it. And of course, the rhythm should give scope for good dance movements so that the hero and heroine could share their love by dancing! Maybe, many of his tunes have to be branded as semi-classical or light music (even though the raaga form might be pure) only because of this rhythm factor.

Chalakku Chalakku Selai is one good number in Chakravaagam. There is no impurity in the tune (like any anniya swaram). He has confined to classical 16th, Sa Ri1 Ga3 Ma1 Pa Da2 Ni2 Sa. Of course, not to mention, that the lyrics are very bad, fighting to degrade the song from semi-classical to light music. In the charanam the heroine says kalyaaNam aagaama paay pOda vENaam, ennaala aagaadhu aamaam. You know, some good heroines with morality do say such deterrant, anti pre-marital sex things to the always advancing heroes!

Ilayaraja has only few Chakravaagams in his account. In the janya raagas of Chakravaagam, he has excellent numbers. Like, Malayamaarutham…. Sa Ri1 Ga3 Pa Da2 Ni2 Sa, Sa Ni2 Da2 Pa Ga3 Ri1 Sa. His first malayamarutham came as a pleasant surprise in Sridhar’s movie (for whom he always had a soft corner) Thenralae ennai thodu. I distinctly remember how the ‘Ananda Vikatan’ magazine wrote in glowing terms about kannmani nee vara kathirunthen song in Malayamaarutham. Yesudoss and Uma Ramanan had done a wonderful job in that song. Ga Pa Da Sa Ni Da Pa Da Pa Ga, Ga Pa Ga Sa Sa Ri. What a wonderful start! The sharp rishabam gave a beautiful colour to this song. Maybe Ilayaraja’s first Malayamaarutham was poojaikkaaga vaazhum in Kaadhal Oviyam. That was a good song too. Deepan Chakravarthi had struggled to keep in pace with that tune (like some violinists get into trouble with Seshagopalan’s pace!). Then came thenRal vandhu muthamittathu in Malayamaarutham in Oru Odai Nadhiyaagiradhu (another Sridhar’s movie). Gosh! That was a fast song too. Krishnachandar and S.P.Shailaja tried their best, but probably spoiled it. Particularly, S.P.Shailaja has sung like the shrill sound you hear when you apply the breaks on a car that you bought for $500! There are two other songs in which he has deleted both Ni and Ma in Chakravaagam. I don’t think that such a raaga exists in carnatic music with any known name. Those two songs are amudhE thamizhae (Kovil Pura), and nila kuyilae (Magudi). They are simply excellent. One should be an artist and play those songs to know their quality. amudhE thamizhae starts like Sa Ri Ga, Sa Ri Ga, Sa Ri Ga Pa Ga Ri Sa, Sa Ri Sa Da Sa… Pulamai Pithan’s lyrics glorified that song. In the charanam he says, if you listen to and speak Thamizh, oon mezhugai urugum, athil ulagam karainthu pogum, such is the beauty of this language! One cannot write any better, about the greatness of Thamizh language. (Those people like Thamizh Vendhan & co, who have no other job other than inundating the S.C.T with meaningless news about Thamizh Ezham, now, have a point!).

I vaguely remember a song “naan irrukka bayam etharkku” (Kuva Kuva Vaathukkal?) At that time, when I had primitive carnatic music knowledge, I had diagnosed that song as “Valaji” (Rishabam deleted in Malayamarutham, Sa Ga Pa Da Ni Sa, Sa Ni Da Pa Ga Sa, you can say that it is a janyam of Chakravaagam too, even though theorists might say ‘janyam of Harikambodi’). Maybe, that song is indeed Valaji. Ilayaraja has few songs in Revathi, another 16 Janyam. Perhaps the best onces are sangitha jaathi mullai (Kaadhal Oviyam) and kanavu onru thonruthe (Oru Odai Nadhiyaagiradhu). But I personally feel that MSV’s melodious use of Revathi is unparalleled in the song manthira punnagai (Manal Kayiru).

So much about Chakravaagam and its janyams and Ilayaraja. In Chembaruthi, two of the 4 carnatic songs, are in Sindhu Bhairavi raagam. They are kaadhalilE ezhumbura alaigaLai and “kadalile thanimaiyil”. Ilayaraja himself has sung the former (thso, thso rendition) and Nagoor Hanifa the latter. Both these songs are excellent Sindhu Bhairavi’s. One in three of all cinema songs are in Sindhu Bhairavi scale (one of the commonest cinema melodies, like the 20th mela Natabhairavi). Ilayaraja has innumerable songs in Sindhu Bhairavi, a variegated population from valai osai kalakala ena to shenbagame shenbagame etc. One cannot list all of them. But, probably MSV’s Unnakenna Mele Ninrai (Simla Special) is the best of Sindhu Bhairavi. In kaadhalilE ezhumbura the lyrics is unusually good. Probably, Muthulingam or whoever was the lyricist, had a strong tea before writing that song! That song goes to tell the pathetic life of fishermen. The lyrisict says in pallavi kadal thaneer karikudu kaaranam irukkudu, meenavar vidugira viyarvaikal kadalile kalakudu… (Sea water is saline because of fishermen’s sweat). Good idea, ain’t it?

Lastly,there is one song in Kaappi raaam in Chembaruthi: chembaruththi poovu (after decades, Banumathi Ramakrishna sang a tail piece of this song). His other Kaappi are ada maappiLLai (Siva), hei paadal onru (priya). As far as I know Ilayaraja is the only one who used Kaappi in cinema. All of them are good. He starts ada maappiLLai like, Ma Ga3 Ga3 Ma Pa, Pa Ma Ga3 Ma Ni2 Pa Ga2 Ri Sa Ni3 Sa Sa. Wonderful start! To start Kaappi in madhyamam and use its key phrase ‘Ga3 Ma Ni2 Pa Ga2 Ri Sa Ni3’ at the very beginning is an excellent approach to the tune. This is one of the instance in which his classical ‘vidwat’ was manifest. Even in chembaruthi poovu he uses the bashangam of Kaappi, in the very beginning, like, ‘Pa NI2 Ma Pa Ni3 Sa’. Why did he choose to score tune in Kaappi for both these above situations in which the bride and the groom are humoured by the ’thozhan’ and ’thozhiyar’ on the occasion of their betrothal. Is their any definite pattern that he follows in scoring tunes for situation? Maybe.

Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan,
Internal Medicine Department,
Brackenridge Hospital,
Austin, Tx 78701.

Comments

A .somaskanda 11 Dec 2006 8:37 pm: I loved your erudite commentaries on IR’s music.I wonder if you could identify for me the raga in the popular tamil bhajan by Swami Haridas,“prabho ganapathey”, popularised again by o.s.arun in one of his recent bhajan album.thank you.
S Anand 17 Dec 2006 6:28 pm: This article is not mine, I’m afraid. It’s by Ramki (Lakshminarayanan Srirangam Ramakrishnan), written in the 90s, and is the first in a series of 15. I plan to put in links to the rest over the next few days. Sorry about the bhajan – I know little of carnatic music.
Siva 18 Dec 2006 1:03 pm: I love only Hip Hops and Hard Rocks, I never listerned to old tamil songs. After reading this article and listrening to such songs, i was actually moved. Really they are Precious and yet to be preserved. Those hard rocks cannot sustain in peoples mind for a long time, these classical songs they have a longer life cycle.
Rajendra Kumar 5 Feb 2007 12:08 pm: The article is well written and it is obvious that the author has a sound knowledge of Carnatic Music.However, I must add that there are some factual errors. 1.Thendrale ennai thodu was released in 1985 and Kaadhal Oviyum in 1982.Therefore, it is wrong to say that his first Malayamarutham was in Thendrale Ennai thodu.But a little known fact is that Raja had indeed composed a song in Malayamarutham in 1980 for the film Nenjil adum Poo onru and the song is Kodi inbam …sung by SPB and Janaki.It is a pure Malayamaruthum and an excellent composition.Unfortunately the film was never released .. 2.The female voice in Thendral ennaimuthamittthu is Sasirekha’s and not Shailaja’s. 3.Amudhe Thamizhe is based on raga Rasika Ranjani-Raja’s own creation. 4.Finally, though the author is entitled to have his opinion, I do not agree with him when he says that Manthira punnagai-from Manal Kayiru is the best Revathi.I feel that Kanavu Onru Thondruthe from Oru Odai Nadhiyagirathu is the best Revathi I have ever heard in fim music because of the way it is composed and the way it is rendered…What a superb orchestration! Same is the case with Sindhu Bhairavi-a raga used by Raja very often.Valai osai, Attama therottama(Captain Prabhakaran),Enna Satham indha neram, Muthu mani malai..Mani osai kettu ezhundhu….the list is endless..Can these be matched by any other composer?I have my doubts…
AKILANDESWARI 17 Dec 2006 12:00 pm: One small request sir, I need the song lyrics (in words) from the film “Enn Rasavin Manasalae” the song which Act by Meena as “Kuyil Pattu oh” Please kindly send me the lyrics for this song From I Akila.
Sai Magesh 18 Mar 2009 12:19 pm: Chembarthui has a beautiful melody(may be best among other songs from the same film) “nila kaayum neram saranam”. Why didn’t the author mention about that? Is it not based on any Raaga?
jeyamohan.in » Blog Archive » இசை, கடிதங்கள் 28 Mar 2009 7:09 pm (pingback): […] இங்கே காணக்கிடைக்கின்றன. http://www.s-anand.net/blog/classical-ilayaraja/ பயனுள்ளதாக இருக்கும் என […]
usha 24 Jul 2010 7:00 am: nilawe nee ware vendhum, Oooo…. taniyeh unn tunai vendhum, Oooo…. Vaan tedhuthey unnai than odiwa..Ooo Ooo Ooo (Ilayaraja paadiya, intha paadal entha padathil endre teriyuma? Terinjal ennake solunggal…pleaseeee
balasoupramanien 18 Mar 2011 4:01 pm: Friends, he is not a young raja (Illaiyaraja) Big Big Raja! he is unreachable and not comparable . I never bored with his songs. He is a big big treasurer of every music learners (Coordination of Instruments, Chorus, Mood of the situation, vocal modulations, Experiments in music, language(s)). So, Pl keep listen, enjoy and learn music easily. Thappa sollalanu nenaikiren!!!! any comment please!
MBJ Pancras 26 Nov 2011 5:33 pm: Nothing But Wind Music the world filled with, And is God-breathed the melody in it. Music moves the world around on its way, And it’s wind in music dwells. Muse of Music! Let me imbibe thy notes For sans thee my voice lies half-dead When my heart is to sing That NOTHING BUT WIND is music. My soul enters the sylvan woodlands- The abode of musical birds, And in quest of music haunts every nest. It’s music that birds chirp, And I lay my soul on a pasture, And the chirping of birds does caress my soul: The cuckoo sings with twain quick notes, The nightingale babbles with nectarous notes, The sparrow squeaks with mumbling thoughts, The throttle bubbles with drizzling thoughts, All sail into, my soul cherished When wind turned to music through birds. Crickets join the orchestra with their wings rubbed the air, And music flows when their wings flap. My soul journeys along the bank of musical stream, Where bamboos rustle when wind penetrates them: It’s “Bamboo” music breathed thro’ flute, I learnt the love for music born thro’ bamboo Perfected with beautiful melodies. Dwelling on pastures music grows personified: Harps reverberate at the hands of the shepherds, Green music born of pastoral spirit join the bleating of lambs: The lambs bleat and music is breathed, And the whole of the pastures flutter with joy. Into deep woods my soul moves, And lions roar I hear, elephants trumpet, And ravens voice hoarse notes When “bamboo” music is tried by machines: Harp turned to Guitar, bamboo turned to piano, And music now flows thro’ science - Science that survives with computers. When engine whistles I hear music And train follows it with “friction” music, Rhythmic beats perfected on rails. ”Friction” music turned to “roar” music When air-plane has been invented. My soul speeds up - speeding up And hears jet engines launch musical roar Yet perfected by computer technology - An impeccable rhythm thro’ jets. My soul runs atop the mountain peak Where rockets zoom into the sky with “rocket” notes Blasting off for the stars, Measured with “light year wavelength”. Stars roll down with noise and roar, The universe being filled with “lightning” sound. Seeks solace the world shrouded with machines… ………seeking solace thro’ divinity With mantras chanted; Yet “disco vogue” lingers on earthly pleasures, And man is belittled by his social excusable sins, And his society turns to animalism. Down from the mountain peak my soul rolls down… The peak that showed me fleeting moments of life. An inevitable holocaust shrouds the earth, And a victim with wounds and bruises am I. Back into the sylvan woodlands my soul runs now- Into the sylvan woodlands, the abode of musical birds, And haunts every nest in quest of music. To breathe “bamboo” music I run, For I learnt the love for music born thro’ bamboo. Forlorn! Bamboos are found nowhere. My soul longs for “bamboo” music, Yet learns a truth that music is NOTHING BUT WIND. And my soul is convinced that Wind is Music, and Music is Wind. Longing for silent music at the threshold of woodlands My soul now lies. Muse of Music! My heart sang a truth That NOTHING BUT WIND is MUSIC. And it’s my garland of thoughts presented unto thee. This verse is penned as the versifier (I) has been inspired by the musical album of Ilayaraja, the first Asian who composed symphony at Royal Philharmonic Orchestra England, whose real genius has not been understood by many. The musical album is NOTHING BUT WIND. He is an Indian.
MBJ Pancras 26 Nov 2011 5:38 pm: Ilayaraja (Haiku) music genius born in Indian soil living in ragas.
Sita vishwanathan 12 Mar 2011 3:03 am: @somaskandan……..prabho ganapathe seems like raga tilang to me.
இசையோவியம் 1 – அமுதே தமிழே « இசையெனும் இன்பவெள்ளம் 15 Sep 2011 6:16 pm (pingback): […] http://www.s-anand.net/blog/classical-ilayaraja/ has more on the technical aspects of the song. […]
Ravichandran.N. 23 May 2013 9:38 am: Could you please tell me how do you identify ragas? I used to hear classical songs but am unable to identify ragas. Could you suggest means to get it? (Dont say I need to go for classes). However, you are a WONDERFUL person. I see MSV/TKR, ILAYARAJA, KVM as GODS.
Sudha 4 May 2018 5:25 am: In Sindhu Bhairavi ragam, we have IR’s “Maadha un Kovilil”, “Naanoru sindhu”, “Keladi kanmani paadagan sangathi”, “Poongatru pudhidhaanadhu”, “Mani osai kettu ezhundhu” etc…… all of which are as good as MSV’s Unakkenna mele nindrai. For different emotions, there are “Vanithamani vannamogini”, “Muthu mani maalai”, Oru naalum unai maravaadha", “Ram ram hey Hey ram ram” etc…..Lyrics are bad in “chalakku chalakku selai” because it was a coming-of-age kind of love story and it could also depend on the director / producer’s wish. S.P.Sailaja’s voice is a different one and IR has only used it perfectly. “Thendral vandhu muthamitadhu” is an excellent number. Maybe the male voice could have been KJY though I cannot put Krishna Chander’s voice factor down. There is a group of people that bashes IR for not giving enough chances to “newcomers” and then there is another group which bashes IR if the songs by the newcomers (or not the regular set like SPB/KJY/SJ/Mano/Chitra/PS) voices “spoil” the song! Intriguing! It is weird when people talk about the use of carnatic raga & grammar in film music and then complain about deleting from/adding something to it. Also, when the lyrics are bad, IR gets the whiplash while the tune is forgotten and when both the tune & lyrics are terrific, the lyricist gets the cake?????
vignesh 9 Jan 2018 7:53 am: Our favorite Ilaiyaraaja songs are compiled on his official mobile app. Get Maestro’s Music now for android and iOS on https://u3su2.app.goo.gl/VZeB

Tamil songs by Ilayaraja in 1980s

Thu, 20 Jul 2006 12:00:00 +0000

More songs by Ilayaraja, composed in the 1980s. Can you guess which movie they are from? (Films are NOT repeated)

Don't worry about the spelling. Just spell it like it sounds, and the box will turn green.

Comments

arunvis 20 Jul 2006 4:51 pm: Most of these bits have the movie name in the file info when played in Windows Media player!
S Anand 22 Jul 2006 9:23 am: You’re right. I’ve fixed that now.
capriciously_me 26 Jul 2006 9:54 pm: awesome fun :) 1, 13 and 26 please?
S Anand 27 Jul 2006 4:55 pm: 1 is a film starring Prabhu, 2: Kamal and 3: Suresh
Anonymous 28 Jul 2006 12:34 pm: the clue u ve gvn s wrong.2nd s a movie starring karthik and 3rd s the one wth ramarajan
S Anand 28 Jul 2006 8:34 pm: Sorry, I meant 1, 13 and 26 respectively.
Sathya 31 Jul 2006 12:28 pm: thalaiva … thats just great collection. BTW, if you have the BGMs alone, could you put them as well ?
Sathish 1 Aug 2006 12:53 am: The Quiz was great..I saw ur site today..I have completed 28..if you could give another 5 more seconds of music for the songs 10 & 11, i would appreciate
S Anand 1 Aug 2006 10:15 pm: Sathish, 10 and 11 are both Kamal movies. Does that help?
Sathya 2 Aug 2006 10:52 am: Have you written the common.js yourself ? thats great. I would like to re-use/flick the “maptamil” function. You are quite wicked that you use one way SHA1 hash … there is no way to hack the answer (is there a way ?). So pls do post the answers ;-(
S Anand 2 Aug 2006 5:02 pm: Yeah, wrote mapTamil myself. Took me 2 weeks of testing on raaga.com – feel free to reuse!
S Anand 2 Aug 2006 5:05 pm: The reason I picked SHA1 instead of MD5 was that it’s tougher to crack. It can be done, but in about 2 power 69 calculations
Sathish 6 Aug 2006 11:39 pm: I figured out all the 30 movies..was a good quiz..Great work!!
vijay 4 Dec 2006 11:49 pm: This is awesome work … nice pics …I got 20 … @5 …know the song ..dunno the movie … Can’t wait for your 90s and 2000 list … when can we expect that .. I can give you a list of these kind of marquee songs that people are expected to find in
Muthuraman 31 Dec 2006 7:19 am: great work. keep going.
Archana 15 Jan 2007 1:23 pm: Anand, i want answers to this puzzle. Can you please help?
sundar 1 Apr 2007 1:20 pm: good quiz can give some clues here and there too
santhosh 9 Apr 2007 11:19 am: thakns
Ramkumar 29 May 2007 1:38 pm: What’s the film name for 26. I have listened to that BGM several 100 times… but couldnt find the name… :(
Ramkumar 29 May 2007 1:40 pm: Sorry, I want the name for 18.. 26th is Kozhi Koovudhu
vijayasarathy 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: I got it all 30 right man. it was interesting.great. thanks.
N.Ragavendran 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: I identified only 18. but it is very interesting. Even they give 100 songs like above. its really time passing.
shanthirou 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: Movie Name :kan simittum neram Song : unnai thotta thendral enru ennai thottu sonnathoru seidhi ullukulae aasai vaithu thalli thalli povathenna needhi.. please sent the song lyrics
Sathya 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: Hey! good one… i could get all 30 right …except for 26 which took some time to hit my mind…good work… thanks
A. Saravanan 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: Hai Anand, hw r u? i like to down load the song ‘anandaragam’-panneer pushpangal. But i could’nt. hw can i?. pls .
Lavanya 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: Hi, I was able to find for 22 out of 30 could u please tell me what is the answer for 2, 4, 5, 10, 15, 16, 18, 21
chandramouli 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: iwant all illayaraja songs from A to Z.Rply me as soon as possible
prana 20 Jul 2006 12:00 pm: 11 - Couldnt identify, can u let me know, which song is that one
jai 14 Aug 2008 2:28 am: 30/30 good test for (g)old memroy…
Prakash 22 Aug 2008 9:02 am: Hi,
How your are managing your time for this?… songs in diff langueages, movie… and others.

Its great stuff. I have gone thro your site/ diff experiences.

Fantastic. All the best

Prakash.K
ganeshen sk 9 Sep 2008 10:46 pm: realy i am enjoy all song
manikantan 24 Sep 2008 12:11 pm: I think i have found the maximum
mathew 8 Oct 2008 9:22 am: Good selection. Especially 30th-Kaadhalin deepamondru…..
Im going somewhere………
S Anand 8 Oct 2008 9:34 am: Thanks, Mathew. Glad you enjoyed it.
purushothaman g 17 Oct 2008 9:01 am: Ilayaraja song list is very very funtastic
SHANKAR 20 Nov 2008 10:57 am: Very Nice Bits from Raja………..
mathu 4 Feb 2009 6:31 am: very nice songs
KAAVALAN 11 Feb 2009 9:07 am: ILAYARAJA SONGS VERY FANTASTIC
S.Nanthini 12 Feb 2009 8:14 am: Very nice song from illayraja sir specialy i like song Tendral vanthu thidhum podu(Avadaram) i like so much becoz some time i think the song special to me….thanks for u sir»»»
Kavitha 14 Feb 2009 11:30 am: Can we know what movies are 7,26 and 22.?
srini 2 Mar 2009 4:47 am: Great work.. Found most of them. Can you tell me where the answers are so that I myself on the head for not getting that.. thanks
Barath 3 Mar 2009 6:41 pm: Dude, I got 28 right. Song 26 song information clearly displayed in real player. Song 8 was a real challenge. Give me a clue. Regards, Barath
S Anand 3 Mar 2009 6:59 pm: Yeah, my goof-up on Song 26. Will fix it soon. Song 8 is a Kamal song sung by Mano.
Reena 26 Feb 2009 4:50 pm: !! BINGO !! Finished all 30 !!! :) First shot :)
karthik 7 Mar 2009 3:34 pm: Great I Got 24 Of Them right..thanks for sharing
balaji 22 Feb 2009 5:42 pm: hi friend fantastic work by u gr8 hits of ilayaraja still remains!!!!!! r u fan of ilayaraja reply regards balaji
ashok 4 Mar 2009 3:25 pm: I got all thirty. GREAT quiz. keep going. why can’t you try SPB’s songs? You can pick up all rare gems out of his 36K + songs.Thanks for the initiative.
suriya 11 Mar 2009 11:58 am: great work!!! lovely songs… found 23 . 4,5,9,10,16,20,25…. any clues 4 tat?
chandru 11 Mar 2009 7:23 pm: Hey, amazing work dude,, keep it up :) but couldnt get 3 songs,, no 1 and no 10 & 26 , though 10 sounds very familiar and known,, pls do let know,, thankin you in advance
azhar 14 Mar 2009 8:57 am: hey, i have found all songs. its very easy. if u need any help tell me
sambasivam 15 Mar 2009 5:43 am: Excellent quiz Mr.Anand. Expecting more of that soon. got 23 out of 30
suriya 16 Mar 2009 3:03 am: help me with 4,5,9,10,16,20,25 plz
Usha 22 Mar 2009 12:58 am: Good one need to jog the memory
sriraghavan 5 Apr 2009 10:18 am: This is a good one… I accidentally came to this site while searching for something else. I was able to listen to such nice bits after a very long time. It brought back memories. I don’t know how to get the results; but all answers were green. I am sure all of them are correct but I need to confirm.
S Anand 5 Apr 2009 4:14 pm: Sriraghavan, if the boxes turned green, then the answers were correct!
sathiyanarayanan 2 Apr 2009 7:09 am: good one i scored 21 good effort
V. Srinath 10 Apr 2009 7:50 am: Hello All, I manage to score 27/30 - Box for song#18 never turned green despite the fact the answer is correct (I am 100% sure on the answer and my memory)
V. Srinath 11 Apr 2009 5:31 am: Hi! I tried again and got a score of 28/30 - Song#18 and Song#26 are still eluding. Would you mind mailing me the answers to my email id? Could not resist the temptation of knowing the answers.
SangeethaSaravanan 12 Apr 2009 10:03 am: good website.and a lovely collections of illayaraja.
gayathri 12 Apr 2009 2:27 pm: hi, this is very interesting.i got 20 correct out of 30.and i want d answers for 4,5,9,11,16,18,21,26,27
Terrence 13 Apr 2009 10:14 am: I guessed everything right cause the musician and his music lives in me.
naguleswaran 17 Apr 2009 4:38 pm: i guessed 25, i need 1, 10, 16, 23, 26.
Pattabi Raman 25 Apr 2009 12:13 pm: Hi I have got all 30 right
Pattabi Raman 25 Apr 2009 12:14 pm: 18 is idhyathai tirudathey 26 is kozhi kuvudhu
prem 25 Apr 2009 7:51 pm: really very interesting
Dr SIVARAMAKRISHNAN 10 May 2009 8:35 am: I am highly interested because I am a thick fan of RAJASIR.Iam now at kerala .He won the hearts of malayalees too.His latest BHAGYADEVATHA songs are big hit.
Varunkumar 12 May 2009 7:28 am: Hi All I too got all 30 Right
chandrakumar 29 May 2009 9:10 am: good collection, 29/30,one mistake is from song 23 .It is kathal oyivathillai .directed by bharathiraja .actors are kannan and radha .but it is not showing green signal
Swaminathan 27 May 2009 5:15 am: i WANT TO know song # 10 and 22 pls……
Swaminathan 26 May 2009 12:16 pm: I got 28. i want to know #10 and 22
Natarajan.S 30 May 2009 9:54 am: It really brings out …. I cant express the feelings …his work is such a heart touching that a piece is helping us to remeber the song ,I know all 30 but am not getting the spelling rite….
Saravana Prabhu G 2 Jun 2009 9:04 pm: Good Quiz Mr. Anand
Hakeem Raja Mohamad 17 Jun 2009 11:29 am: I got only 18.
mary 25 Jul 2009 6:08 pm: Very nice and interesting quiz for one to recollect songs. Excellent work
N.Dhinakaran. 16 Jun 2009 8:16 am: sir i like this type of approach very much and i enjoyed the same. i feel very interesting and spent my deep reactions in your quiz. thanking you and once thanks a lot for you.
Harish kumar 2 Jul 2009 6:37 pm: Brilliant Mr.Anand. The Most Wanted Site
Leo 24 Jun 2009 1:16 am: It was an easyone. Good effort.
mr public 21 Jul 2009 1:43 pm: nice work man.! i managed to get 28/30; missed 10 &26.!
Sankaranarayanan.M (MSN) 26 Jun 2009 5:27 am: Good effort, i can only get 15 marks. Realy good effort…
udaya 1 Jul 2009 1:07 pm: nice one anand… i got 27 though the other three i know the songs but not the films… good
vikram 30 Jun 2009 7:01 pm: hi am a gr8 fan of raja sir.He is a Legend.So the titile mastero opt’s to him.
Muralidharan 28 Jun 2009 8:47 am: HI Anand I got 28/30.Need answer for 1 and 19
sundar 29 Jul 2009 5:52 am: would like to know the answers for 30,16, 13, 12 and 7. i think it was pacha mala poovu from kilakku vasal. jst let me know the answers but i enjoyed taking it
S.Thangakani,Tuty 10 Aug 2009 1:46 pm: What a great quiz for ilayaraja fans.Keep it up Mr.Anand. I love ilayaraja songs from my childhood days.My best wishes to him.
A.Ashok Kumar 10 Aug 2009 2:14 pm: This is a good quiz.I remembered Raja sir films and i scored 30 out of 30,Good effort .
sagar 12 Aug 2009 2:29 pm: Hey it is realy superb nice music experience, good for music lovers
RAJU 20 Aug 2009 2:49 pm: Few songs need a little longer to recall .Otherwise a nice attempt to relish Gnani’s songs
nhnsn 9 Sep 2009 12:52 pm: hey i got 27/30.it really very interesting. i liked it a lon and i am a great fan of the evergreen illayaraja. Fantastic quiz
jayapriya 1 Nov 2009 3:59 pm: hai……good effort.i accidently entered this website.after that i know its like a quiz………iam a great fane of ILAIYARAJAsir.i loved his songs…………thanks for giving this website to us anand……….expecting more from u like this
Sujatha 15 Sep 2009 8:39 am: Excellent Quiz for Raja’s fan.Could have been more challenging.Do you have moe quizzes for the maestro’s fans?
Divi Bhaskaran 20 Sep 2009 12:40 pm: Excellent Mr. Anand. Great effort. Once I was just dreaming about such projects and now you have made it a reality. Fine. Thanks a lot. By the way I scored 28/30. I can’t find the song No.1, but managed to idendify the song No.5 as “Puttham Pudhu Kaalai” but not sure about the “Film Name”
Sitrodai 12 Oct 2009 3:39 am: Excellent…I got 24/30…
Kumaradevan 27 Oct 2009 1:57 pm: Excellent Site. Great Content. Clean layout.. A Rare combination.. Keep it up…!
Ramprabu 19 Oct 2009 1:31 pm: Mr. Anand, really it was nice. I got 27 out of 30. Pl. help me to find 16, 21 & 22.
venkatraman.s 19 Oct 2009 1:22 pm: a good excercise to review rajas songs.28/30 correct.
srilatha 28 Sep 2009 11:16 am: Mr. Anand wonderful collections and great attempt.
Ram 7 Nov 2009 6:14 am: got only 17 right guessed many songs but don’t know movie names :(
Selvam S 7 Feb 2010 5:53 pm: Really Fantastic work Anand ! im a great fan of Raja sir… looking forward more and more from you.. i guessed 27/30.. can somebody help to find out 10,21 & 26. Awesome!!
Veera 12 Jan 2010 10:21 pm: Excellent quiz.got 29 /30. Kadalora kavithaigal was wrong.
Subbu 11 Mar 2010 12:08 pm: Hi Anand, really a good web site. I came to this site with a great hope. I am looking for a song which was sung by his highness isaignaani ilayraja himself - the song goes some thing like this “…unnadamale ponnagamaa marayidey…” may be the words which i wrote might not be correct but sounds some thing like that… pls help me…
Jothibasu 3 Feb 2010 8:16 am: great ..I scored 27/30
boopalan.r 6 Feb 2010 8:24 am: I am not able to hear the full soing.
Krishnavel 16 Nov 2009 1:36 pm: Nice quiz. Myself and my wife could manage to get 29/30. Many thanks. However, Song 1 took one full day.
Kishore 23 Dec 2009 6:47 pm: Good One. But most of them very easy for Raaja fans. Some were tough. Can you post answers?
rita 3 Mar 2010 10:02 am: Really i loved this quiz, i love raja sir music, so i was able to guess 26/30
Subbu 12 Mar 2010 11:00 am: hello again, Anybody can help me on that pls…:)
yesgee 2 Jun 2010 9:09 am: I got 26 songs. It’s a very good choice to hear these songs.
shane 5 Sep 2010 12:21 pm: great feeling in answering the 30 wonders of the music world. i scored centum, and hope to score a real cent-um of isai kadavul’s songs. good work , pls continue
Vijay 10 Mar 2010 3:50 am: I scored 29/30. good work Anand.
R.Srinivasan 27 Mar 2010 12:13 pm: Hi thank you. I got 26/30. Really interesting
Subbu 26 Mar 2010 11:18 am: Hi and Hello, At last I have got the song which I was looking for - it is Thendral Vanthu Theendu bothu from Avadharam movie. :)
Saaju 27 Mar 2010 6:06 am: Anand, If possible listen to the song " nana yaar eval" from the movie " Ninaya ninatha paathen. This is a movie which was not a hit, but this song i feel is awesome. Pls comment Saaju
Sathish 5 May 2010 8:20 pm: Mine was 26/30………could have been better :-(
morees 13 Jun 2010 8:27 am: good collections..thx
Krishnamoorthy 2 Jul 2010 7:13 am: Beatiful songs by isai gnani. Raja Rajathaan.
K.Angayarkannan 5 Sep 2010 7:32 pm: hello,Ananad sir,I scored 29/30.26th song is your checkpoint.this song not hit song and song duration very low time.anyway Goodjob.all the best.
Gowri 14 Sep 2010 10:29 am: I got 20/30…didnt hear others!!!bcoz i’m in office…Great guys!!
shanthini 14 Sep 2010 1:14 pm: I entered 30 songs.
DiLRuPhA 18 Sep 2010 12:38 pm: Wowwwww….wonderful website….. thanx 2 u Mr.Anand :) really entertain me…. n i juz got 15/30 :(
Saku 7 Nov 2010 7:48 pm: Good one.. got everything except 26.. agree with angayarkannan, it isn’t a popular one i think so.. appreciate if answers are made available..
lenin 11 Nov 2010 3:49 am: hi, anand,is a nice collections….. nothing impossible
L.Dadhichi 14 Nov 2010 6:17 pm: Awesome quiz
Rooban 7 Dec 2010 7:45 pm: excellent work Anand. hats off..
Eswar 10 Dec 2010 5:52 pm: Hi,i just want download maestro’s famous melody cum rap song casted by silk smitha in a bar.which starts from ’la la la la la laa laa la la’pls i dont know the words.pls if somebody can help me it will be greatful.thanku
MICHAEL JACKSON 27 Dec 2010 6:11 am: I scored just 12………… I would have scored 30 if i ve lived in 1980’s…
kumar 13 Jan 2011 12:51 pm: scored 30/30
thanigai 14 Dec 2010 8:40 am: hey… i got 30/30….. @
thanigai 14 Dec 2010 8:44 am: @ selvam: can somebody help to find out 10 : Film : Kadal meengal, Song: Thalatuthae vaanam…. 21 : Film : Agni Natchathiram, Song : Oru poonga vanam…. 26 : Film : Kozhi Koovuthu, Song : Annae Annae sippai Annae….
saravanan 21 Aug 2012 7:16 am: good try to brush up the ialayraja fans memories
Sudhakar Dhanapal 19 Jan 2011 11:50 am: ohhh. just 26
DINESH 20 Jan 2011 8:11 am: Scored 21 out of 30. Except song No.1, I heard all the songs and the songs are very familiar. Even then I could not find out the film name. Thank you
P.SASI KUMAR 16 Jul 2011 5:09 pm: Excellent Work .same this way as a illayaraja fans we like it
Srini 2 Jul 2011 3:36 pm: got just 24/30; few songs really seem to be close ….
sivasankaran 27 Apr 2012 6:03 am: i got 4 out of 30.. i enjoys this quiz.. memory is out of date.. ha ha.. but i can guess al the songs..mmm really isai sidther is great…
KARTHIK 1 Aug 2011 3:16 pm: I scored 29/30, except song # 26.
Devi Shaji 27 Jan 2012 10:53 am: Hai Anand congrajulations,and thanks a lot . Wish you all the best. God bless you.
Ganapathi 12 Jan 2012 4:51 pm: Ilayara, alias music I can say the best musician in the world is none other than Mr.Ilayaraja.
Thiyagarajan.B 10 Dec 2011 7:15 am: Mother is God Music is God Illayaraja
kagithan 5 Jan 2011 6:53 pm: 2, 4, 8 & 22 help please
RCSekar 18 Jun 2011 4:04 am: Fantastic Exercie for our memory. Good work done by Anand. Long live Anand and Ilayaraja. I scored 29/30. I could not guess the song related to no.1 Anybody to my help? RCSekar-Chennai
mpganesh 11 Mar 2011 4:12 pm: i scored23/30;good job; i could not remeber some movies name;i am one of the fans of raja sir;thank u anand
Nandhakumar 28 Aug 2011 7:32 pm: Amazing collection and wat a composing guys. I got 30/30. Beautiful songs to here in night times. I think every one here will accept this comment. Thanks a ton.
gopi 2 Jan 2012 3:28 am: illyaraja songs was gold. whenever i get tensed that time i listned raja’s songs all sads was gone. raja’s is best.
Muthu 7 Dec 2011 7:45 am: Hi Anand Thanks for posting like this and post more raja sir quiz, I’m one of his greatest fan I got 27/30 pls tell me the answer for 7, 15 and 22
D R RAJA 21 Jan 2012 2:27 pm: hai, it is really suberp. can i get the lyrics of illayarajas songs.
Emmanuel 24 Oct 2011 11:50 am: eampa George appo MSV ya Eanna Solla pora?……………
Nandakumar. P. B. 22 Apr 2012 12:42 pm: Maesto is great and cannot express about him in words. His music is a soothing effect / remedy for day to day life complexes. Not like to stop even after repeated listenings. Some addicting magic in his songs and not seen in other musicians. So we like his musics done in 70’s, 80’s & 90’s etc. Thanks to God for getting chance to enjoy his musics.
madurai mouli 7 Apr 2012 11:20 am: We, the Tamilians are gifted by having been born here., Sivaji ,Kamal., Ilayaraja.,Kannadasan-the supremoes in their art ,world class,,who could only be duplicated,not replaced.
Anamika 12 Feb 2012 10:19 am: paaraamal pona pournami ellaam pariththu kodukkum oruvan kaelaamal pona paadalai ellaam thiratti kodukkum oruvan…
vikram 21 May 2011 4:03 pm: i like these songs i always listen at night ………
Baskar 14 Apr 2011 1:03 pm: I got 30/30. Was not easy. Some songs gave a very tough time especially 1 and 26. Great work Mr.Anand. It was like getting transported to the past.
natesan 9 Jun 2011 2:11 pm: got 23.. couldn find 4,11,15-17,20 & 23
kagithan 8 Jan 2011 5:00 pm: help me for 8 and 22
kagithan 8 Jan 2011 5:19 pm: one more to go shortly i’ll reach 30. thank you anand.
sathish 25 Feb 2011 5:31 pm: I have scored 29/30. Thanks Anand for wonderul work u have made.
g.s.rajan 29 Apr 2011 9:26 am: It is excellent.I have scored30/30
Vikram 7 May 2011 8:34 pm: I Scored 20/30
beulah 26 May 2011 6:48 am: i scored 29/30 :)
Dhiwakar 8 Aug 2011 11:20 pm: Please tell me the film of below song: Kaalangaathalae oru velai illame siru kallori pen pinnal sutrum kadal mamavane
gayathiri 26 Aug 2011 3:56 pm: im great fan of raja sir………legend of music………………i got 29/30…………..i dnt knw 2 find song 18……………great!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hariram 17 Aug 2011 11:33 am: Raja rajathi rajan intha ilayaraja
George 11 Sep 2011 4:02 pm: Isaignani is a god of music
Sophia 14 Oct 2011 8:14 am: Loved the quiz! got a complete score.. and ur collection of maestroz music is cool too.
arun 15 Dec 2011 5:55 am: very good
Kannan 24 Oct 2011 10:36 am: Excellen collections. Got full score… Actually this is kids play for hardcore IR fan like me. Thanks.
Rajesh 3 Mar 2011 10:28 am: Hi I’m looking for an 1980’s ilayaraja song which goes like this “Kabiniyae, kabiniyae….unnnadum…vandaen.” Can you please help me get the right song /film details, so I can track it or download from somewhere?
p.niroshi 14 Jun 2012 3:26 pm: i wish to hear again the ilayaraja songs i knew all the songs but i typed the name it could not accept although i don’t bother about it because i love the all songs.
Vijay 16 Jan 2012 3:33 am: Feel gifted to exist and share the world with a genius like Ilayaraja.
suren 17 May 2012 1:44 pm: Good Collection
reghuram 23 Mar 2012 4:59 am: Raja sir is Nature’s grand living sound instrument. The sequence of notes that hit one’s heart comes so effortlessly to this maestro that one remains possessed for the entire time listenng to his music. I am particularly awe-struck at all the intro bgms of Raja sir. They have a unique pattern which no other can imitate nor fathom. to cite an example just listen to the intro of the Nalinakanthi piece “enthan nenjil nee thane”. Raja sir has that uncanny knack of picking up the key notes of a raga which will not be revealed until the actual pallavi is heard. In fact his into bgms are itself a great rpertoire for research on chors and carnatic music.
R. Vidhya from Thanjavur 6 Mar 2012 1:47 pm: Ilayaraja Sir is like a guru to me. With his songs only I get interested into music. I am thankful to God to hear his music especially rerecoding and orchaestration. Thanks to share with everyone.
Jeyaprakash 5 May 2012 2:05 pm: Got 30 out of 30, I really enjoyed it
s.karthik 16 Feb 2012 6:44 pm: ILAYARAJA IS GENIUS AND HE IS BRAHMMA OF MUSIC
venkatrajan 2 Mar 2012 6:14 pm: illayaraja the grammar of music.he is the heart pain reliever by his music
Ganesh from N’Castle 29 Feb 2012 6:52 pm: 30/30, grown up with Illayaraja music. Part of life. For every song there has been special and unforgettable occasions and moments. Those days we our friends are very much eager to hear new songs, For us cassettes are expensive, In our town (Pudukkottai) one Tea shop who owned by Sathya ( He resembles Sathya Kamal having beard and styled like Kamal, so we call him Sathya) bought new releases we all our friends top up there hear music with ‘Dhum’ and Tea for more than an hour. 80 ’s are the years which never come back again with full of joy and carefree attitude… Nothing But Raja’s Muzik…
Bala 20 Jan 2012 2:23 am: Ilayaraja sir is a god to me. He is the best musician in the world
mathi 16 Jan 2012 12:53 am: Ilayaraja is Gods Gift.
Arun Kumar MK 25 Aug 2012 8:24 am: No. 23 - Naan oru ponnoviyum kanden - Is it the movie Kadhal oviyum or Kannil theriyum kadhaigal? Anand, as usual outstanding stuff. I grew listening to these songs a million times. It did not take me more than 2 or 3 seconds to catch a song
thambidi 21 Jul 2012 9:21 pm: Dear anand ,Thanks a lot.30 /30 Expecting more quiz 1975 to 1990
Murali Deena 13 Jun 2011 3:25 pm: Listening to the songs (music) first few seconds also making me to enjoy it a lot… I could find all the songs first line.. But not the movie names.. Great collection. Thanks.
Anuja Nair 10 Jul 2012 9:18 am: Chanceless, What a legend, he is…..God’s gift to Indian music. Even a child will turn silent hearing his music. No words to describe…a heavenly feeling hearing his music. Should see him atleast once in my lifetime.
sarankumar 12 Aug 2012 7:32 am: ilayaraja is music god
Kaushalram 20 Aug 2012 11:22 pm: Thanks a Lot. Please can someone tell the answer for 1, 10 & 26. Theriyama mandey vedichirum..
a.m.basha 2 Aug 2012 9:28 am: i love heart raja
guru 5 Oct 2012 4:58 am: illayarajr is a gift for entair music fans
Malarvannan 8 Sep 2012 1:51 pm: Great Stuff… got 29/30, Whats 26?
Chenbagaraman Natarajan 24 Oct 2012 8:54 pm: Song7 - Kilakku vasal, song8- Michael Madhan kamaraj, and Song26 - Kozhi Kuvuthu..does not give a green to me –Y?
gopi 8 Jan 2013 5:12 pm: Thankyou for the Quiz. I got 30/30
Guitar chords 30 Nov 2012 8:50 am: I like all this songs and also the quiz..
Ravindran 30 Nov 2012 5:25 pm: Very Good Collection. Thanks for your Effort.
Hemamalini 15 Jan 2013 7:34 am: Nice collections. What are the answers for Nos. 1, 11, 21, and 22? It was very nice answering the questions.
venkatkrishnan 16 Jan 2013 8:33 am: song ,padiva thendrala .from move ,mudivala arampam. excellent guitar cords, and high frequienced drums ,i like this songs every time ,thank you
Panimalar 17 Jan 2013 11:05 am: Gud collections. luking forward for more quizes like this.
sasi kumar.P 21 Apr 2013 7:30 am: It is very good idea, i am interested very much, every one loves raja sir will get 30/30
Senthil 2 Apr 2015 4:15 pm: Wonderful collection from website…hats off admin.
Valavan 15 Mar 2016 11:56 am: Hi! Eswar, I was also looking for the same song for years and finally go it. It is from the movie “Vazhkai”. You can download video at You tube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qveg840rPDY. The song starts with “mella mella ennai thottu”
Prabhakar 8 Oct 2019 4:12 pm: @Eswar, 24– I think the movie you are referring to is valzkai and the song is mella mella enai thotu

Tamil Songs - 1975s

Tue, 09 May 2006 12:00:00 +0000

Ilayaraja scored Annakkili in 1975, and ruled Tamil film music for 15 years as isai gnaani. He took the mantle from MSV, who continued to score great melodies until 1980.

Here is the background music from some hit songs between 1975 - 1980. Can you guess which movie they are from? (Some films appear twice)

Don't worry about the spelling. Just spell it like it sounds, and the box will turn green.

Comments

Anonymous 9 May 2006 8:36 am: 17/20 5 songs not playing are 1,4,7,19&23 9,12,22- not got but i think will get if i come back later and try i struggled a lot for 5 spelliing got the song before the first second got over same for 18 but its not accepting my spelling maybe u can hv a few more options isai inban oh btw the quiz is good fun thanks
S Anand 9 May 2006 8:41 am: Oops, looks like I forgot to upload those 5. I’ll get that done by 6pm GMT.
Kaps 9 May 2006 9:56 am: Anand, The boxes are not turning green for 18. I think you need to provide more spelling options. I managed to find out that you have given a space between the two words for #6. even in #17 there is a space between the first two words. I also struggled a lot for 5. you should introduced an option with the letter t instead of k. any clues for songs 12, 21 & 22? I have also managed to find 17 / 20.
S Anand 9 May 2006 10:06 am: Funny, I thought I was ignoring spaces. I did think of the ’t’ option vs ‘k’ option for #5… will implement that. As for clues, I’m afraid I’m at office now – can’t hear the songs, and don’t remember the order. Will post clues by end of day.
zero 9 May 2006 10:16 am: At least a couple of songs are not playing right now. will come back later. Terrific stuff! Thanks.
S Anand 9 May 2006 10:51 am: Hopefully, it’s all fixed now.
zero 9 May 2006 11:41 am: 15/25. Failed - 9, 12, 14, 16, 18, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25. Got 21 and 22 coz you said some movies appear twice ;). So, am not counting that. 18, 24 - the songs are way too obv, but i am struggling to recollect the films :(
Kaps 9 May 2006 11:47 am: Anand, 24/25 this time. I’m having problems cracking the spelling for #18. I’m quite confident of the movie. Once this is set right, my score would be a perfect 25. You might consider giving an option for the letter v instead of g in #23.
zero 9 May 2006 11:57 am: Death to me for not finding out 18.
Kaps, I guess Anand will not be considering that ;)
Googled for 24, the other got-the-song-not-the-movie one.
sudheer 9 May 2006 1:32 pm: I got only 7 movies right.. got a few more songs - without the movies.. but awesome quiz tho.. had good fun. thanks anand
Asa 9 May 2006 3:27 pm: I face problem in playing the song bits. I don hear any thing when I click the play button. Any pointers/help?
SLN 9 May 2006 8:21 pm: I got 23/25 on my own couldnt place 21 and 22. Still thinking, will try again later.
prakash 10 May 2006 2:10 am: 23/25
srivatsan 10 May 2006 2:45 am: song no. 18 is kanmaniye kadhal enbadhu from aarilirundhu arupadhu varai (that’s what i guess) but the answer doesn’t turn green?
zero 10 May 2006 5:05 am: prakash, you are right. It turns on for ‘aruvathu’
Vijay 10 May 2006 5:15 am: Try “aarilirundhu aruVadhu varai”.
sivaramakrishnan 10 May 2006 5:50 am: i got the spelling for 18.just spell it the way u wud speak out the name of the film.got 18/25
thennavan 10 May 2006 6:03 am: 25/25 once again confirming which era I belong to :-). Good selection of songs for all the periods.
Anonymous 12 May 2006 6:37 am: clue for #12 pls got the rest. isai inban
S Anand 12 May 2006 9:06 pm: 12: Kamal, K Balachander
hari 17 May 2006 12:26 pm: 15 points 3 with spellings mistakes
sambasivam 15 Mar 2009 7:10 am: first quiz in which i got full marks. dear anand, keep going
kamesh 16 Apr 2009 4:17 am: song no.7 not playing, and i could able to find out no.21, i think the song is cholam vidaikayile from 16 vayathinile it seems. any one let me know.i got 23/25. anand superb quiz. keep going
Mina 16 Oct 2009 5:40 am: Good one Anand. I too struggled with #5, but the “t” vs “k” option was a giveaway. TQ
Sujatha 16 Sep 2009 6:33 am: Got 25/25.Make it harder.
Saku 8 Nov 2010 2:17 am: good one.. except for the slight juggling for spelling for 21.. Isn’t it ’t’ instead of ‘v’?
paramesh 23 Jul 2011 12:09 pm: i got 25 correct . very nice
Kannan 24 Oct 2011 11:28 am: Two scores from the same song (12 and 14). I could not identify 21….feel bad
Panimalar 17 Jan 2013 11:22 am: Got 24/25. Can anyone tell me the answer to song #9..sounds familiar but unable to find it.

Tamil Songs - 1990s

Sun, 07 May 2006 12:00:00 +0000

In 1992, A R Rahman emerged. Ilayaraja may have scored more tunes until the first 3 years of the decade than Rahman did the whole decade. But the decade belonged to Rahman.

Here is the background music from some hit songs from the 1990s. Can you guess which movie they are from?

Don't worry about the spelling. Just spell it like it sounds, and the box will turn green.

Comments

Blogeswari 7 May 2006 5:10 pm: hi , posting all my entries..
prakash 7 May 2006 6:29 pm: 21/25
thennavan 7 May 2006 6:40 pm: 14/25; actually I know two or three more too but it is like at the proverbial tip of the tongue but am unable to spit it out :)
lazygeek 7 May 2006 6:50 pm: again 25/25
anantha 7 May 2006 7:12 pm: 24/25 with my roomie blurting out the other even before i could try. Honestly i couldnt have got it, i think!
Cipher 7 May 2006 7:38 pm: 22/25 - 1,5,16 theriyalaba :-(
S Anand 7 May 2006 8:16 pm: Cipher, these are the actors who sang 1, 5 and 16. Lots of kids, Kamal (sort-of) and Arvind Swamy. Does that help?
lazygeek 8 May 2006 2:09 am: cipher, semma easyba !!
Bala 8 May 2006 7:00 am: Superb quizes! Thanks.
Arun 8 May 2006 10:38 am: only 12/25. But knew 22-23 of the songs. If you had played a bit more, would have done better, methinks :-) Great stuff!!
Priya 8 May 2006 4:32 pm: Hey, excellent quiz, I know I got all 25 right in the 1990s quiz and all 10 in the 1980s. But how do I confirm, my box deosnt turn green or anything. Is there any other way to track the score?
Ashwin 8 May 2006 4:48 pm: 24/25. I could identify some songs in about .75 seconds. :)Same as priya. Box does not turn green though!
Anonymous 8 May 2006 6:01 pm: 24/25. isai inban. i think its no.18 i am stuck on. Music is familiar was racking my brains for some ilayaraja number then thought maybe its arr by some strange chance. But cant figure. clue pls
S Anand 8 May 2006 7:23 pm: No. 18 is not Ilayaraja, actually.
S Anand 8 May 2006 7:24 pm: Priya, Ashwin: what browser & version are you using?
S Anand 8 May 2006 7:28 pm: Clue for No. 18: the actor is Arjun.
Aravind 8 May 2006 11:04 pm: 24/25. Couldn’t remember the movie for the 25th.
zero 9 May 2006 10:12 am: Anand, The 16th is not playing. Couldn’t get the 6th. Damn! 23/25 :(
Priya 9 May 2006 2:28 pm: I got 25/25….this section was quite easy
Ashwin 9 May 2006 3:15 pm: Anand, I was stupid. I was typing song names
Ashwin 9 May 2006 3:21 pm: one giveaway was that all clips were chronological
P 9 May 2006 4:46 pm: Hi, I am stuck on 14….any clue plz
Ashwin 9 May 2006 6:48 pm: 14 had Nasser in it
zero 10 May 2006 5:07 am: Song no. 16 is still not playing for me.
kummy 10 May 2006 8:18 am: got 24/25 any clue for 10th one
S Anand 10 May 2006 2:55 pm: 10: Vineeth is the actor
Karthik 10 May 2006 5:35 pm: stuck on 25th.. any clues
S Anand 10 May 2006 9:19 pm: 25: Sung by Shankar Mahadevan
SuperStarFritz 12 May 2006 3:20 pm: Got 23/25. Have no idea about 10. 23 I know the song, but can’t proceed from that tune onwards. Thoughts?
S Anand 12 May 2006 9:07 pm: 23: Arjun song.
janani 15 May 2006 2:24 pm: hey again, 18/25 on this one. am getting a tad better.
shri 16 May 2006 3:00 pm: wow.got 25/25.cool.its so nice to play ths one.
Anonymous 26 Jul 2006 2:24 am: couple of songs dont register..especially bombay and kaathalukku mariyaathai
Ranganathan 25 Oct 2006 10:53 am: Hi Anand… Ranga here… How are you ? Came to know about this site… Quite Interesting… I am trying some of the quizzes here… This one I got 25 / 25
karthika 10 Dec 2006 3:44 pm: This site quite is interesting
Prin 11 Dec 2006 10:19 am: Please help Anand, i have done everything from 1, 10-25. Others I need help considering i’m 14 and am a Londoner. Thanks
sorna 31 Dec 2006 5:29 pm: 14 has nasar and revathi
Seetha 4 May 2007 5:52 am: Not able to listen to the 19th one..it says not supported by the s/w :)
Seetha 4 May 2007 6:21 am: Got 24 except for 19 :-)not able to lsiten to t :)
kiran 16 Feb 2009 4:20 am: 25/25. Pretty easy though. (6 was a tricky one, common tune used by Raja in a couple of other movies)
suriya 16 Mar 2009 3:25 am: 23/25…. help me with 6 and 10 plz…
Senthilkumar.S 24 Mar 2009 7:28 am: got 23/25. couldn’t find 1 and 10.
Gopi 27 Feb 2010 6:50 pm: Acheived 25/25
Sujatha 2 Oct 2009 12:17 am: Got 30/30.
Selvam S 7 Feb 2010 6:09 pm: Got 24/25… can any one give clue for No. 1….
Archana 1 Mar 2010 5:12 pm: i got 23/25
ilayaraja 17 Jun 2010 2:40 pm: i got 22/25
Vijay 24 Jun 2010 1:07 am: Nice quiz. Got all right, but needed a bit of help on 18.
Manoj 28 Sep 2010 6:53 pm: Very nice.. 24/25.. 6 theriyala..
TRG 8 Apr 2011 12:15 pm: GOOD I GOT 25/25
Charan 16 Jan 2011 1:03 am: 25 out of 25
ravindra babu hyderabad 18 Dec 2010 1:50 pm: nice quiz romba naalachi tamil songs kettu really superb quiz
Sudhakar Dhanapal 19 Jan 2011 12:03 pm: i got 25/25… yeahhhhhhhhhhhh…. :)
Kannan 24 Oct 2011 11:35 am: Yes. Got 25/25. It’s like cake walk for me.
Shobhana 17 Oct 2011 12:03 pm: hi.. i got 23/25.. missed on 6th and the 3rd.. the rest were quite easy.. can you please help with 3 and 6? thanks
Srikan 11 Mar 2011 10:43 pm: Which name of the song from titel 12?
das 17 Aug 2011 5:23 am: nan 22/25 than
Ranjani 7 Aug 2011 1:56 pm: 22/25
Shobhana 20 May 2012 5:25 am: Yay!!! I got 25/25… nice quizzes Mr. Anand. It passes time very effectively..

Tamil Songs - 1980s

Sat, 06 May 2006 12:00:00 +0000

Ilayaraja ruled the Tamil music industry in the 1980s. Below are short clips with the background music from his hit songs.

Can you guess which movie they are from?

Don't worry about the spelling. Just spell it like it sounds, and the box will turn green.

Comments

Anonymous 6 May 2006 12:00 pm: 9/10
lazygeek 7 May 2006 9:38 am: 10/10
S Anand 7 May 2006 9:55 am: I should’ve guessed you’d be able to get them all! Well, I’ve got a 1970s one coming up. Will try and make it a little tougher, just for you :-)
prakash 7 May 2006 6:32 pm: 10/10
thennavan 7 May 2006 6:39 pm: 10/10; Compare this to my Rehman score and you’ll be able to reasonable say to which era I belong :)
anantha 7 May 2006 7:12 pm: that anon comment was from me
Cipher 7 May 2006 7:47 pm: 9/10 - 2nd is so familiar that i forgot it ;-)
S Anand 7 May 2006 8:17 pm: Anantha, which did you miss? Cipher, the actor for the second song is Kamal.
Cipher 8 May 2006 12:06 am: Was it tik tik tik or Sigappu rojakkal ?
lazy geek 8 May 2006 5:09 am: cipher, it was andhi mazhai
Anonymous 8 May 2006 5:41 pm: 10/10. isai inban.
Aravind 8 May 2006 11:03 pm: 10/10
zero 9 May 2006 10:08 am: 10/10
kummy 10 May 2006 8:21 am: 10/10
janani 15 May 2006 1:48 pm: hey am pretty terrible at the 80’s music. hmm… does that mean i am ultra modern or just badly informed. nvm.. they’re just as bad. but it was awesome fun. going on to the 90’s one now.
K.Shyam 12 Oct 2006 8:14 pm: 10/10
Peri 14 Oct 2006 4:58 am: hey wat is 5 th. It is verrry familiar but I couldn’t make it.Some Bharathiraja movie. That is sure !!
S Anand 14 Oct 2006 6:54 am: Peri, yes it’s a Bharathiraja film. Hint: Karthik and Radha.
ASHOK KUMAR 18 Oct 2006 12:04 pm: HELLO SIR I’AM ASHOK. I VERY INTREST YOUR ALL MELODY SONGS .SO I want to ilayaraja hit nengil nendra ragam.plese give to this alubm
keyan 28 Nov 2006 11:20 am: not challenging illayrajas music is in blood
sathish 6 Dec 2006 9:12 pm: got all 10.. It was easy one..took 5 minutes
madhu 4 Feb 2007 5:15 pm: got 10/10
Seetha 4 May 2007 6:18 am: Got nine..Wats fifth??s t not alaigal oivadhillai?? its not turning green :-)
sathya 6 May 2006 12:00 pm: i like illiaraja very much his music is something different from other music when i sleep at night fistly i hear illiaraja sir music then i myself sing then sleep
Sridhar 6 May 2006 12:00 pm: 10/10
ASHOK 6 May 2006 12:00 pm: I LIKE THIS COLLECTIONS GOOD,KEEP IT UP.
Ahamed 6 May 2006 12:00 pm: Your site has been one of my favourites.. Uniquely beautiful to see a great site in a web world of obscenity and vulgarity. Keep up the good work
Vinod Tamodharan 15 Aug 2008 11:59 pm: I LIKE THIS COLLECTION
Kavitha 16 Nov 2008 2:28 am: All Songs are nice
Deva 16 Nov 2008 10:22 pm: 3rd one is en iniya pon nilave. i forgot the movie name.
ashok kumar 25 Dec 2008 12:13 am: all songs are very nice and i give 10/10
kiran 16 Feb 2009 3:57 am: 10/10.. but beautiful collection. I am getting to like your site as well :)
Ashokkumar 16 Feb 2009 1:20 pm: Hi Gentelman I am very like & love your all songs I have your music song but i need your old melody song did you send me pl pl pl pl pl …………….
archana 4 Mar 2009 1:08 am: 10/10 beautiful songs evergreen
suriya 16 Mar 2009 3:15 am: 9 th i know the song..(poove sembuve) movie name dont know
why do you need it? 3 Apr 2009 3:01 am: 10/10 for me. I love Ilayaraja songs. There is a torrent with over 4GB of free Ilayaraja mp3 songs. mininova.org. Enjoy…If there is a better site, please post…
Selva 26 May 2009 3:35 pm: its interesting ya and i got all right
Vishnu 5 Jun 2009 2:58 am: ha.. finally scored 10/10 on a quiz.. these are very good brain teasers by the way.. thanks for the effort :-) ..
- Vishnu
Chnadru 13 Sep 2009 12:26 pm: Why is there no Panchu Arunachalam lyrics collection? Like kanmaniya kadhan yenabathu karbanayo……….
DJ 7 Aug 2009 9:51 pm: beautiful songs brings back my beautiful memories…..its like my soul….Ilayaraja the GREAT!! these songs automatically giving a pleasant feeling to heart, can’t express it…. but i feel to listen listen listen…
Sujatha 15 Sep 2009 8:45 am: 10/10.Very easy one.I enjoy these quizzes alot.
sharanya 16 Jan 2010 6:03 am: It’s very nice & Interesting
Anita 7 Jan 2010 3:40 am: Hey, i wasnt able to recollect even one movie, but all songs are my favs.
Merlin 2 Apr 2010 7:10 am: I got 10/10
kutty 2 Apr 2010 4:27 pm: i got 10/10
mahi 24 Mar 2010 5:25 am: i got 9/10 .. i can’t guess the 6th song …
S.Chandrasekar 2 Jul 2010 10:03 am: I got 10/10. This is just because I have lived with Ilayarajas songs .
Vijay 25 Jun 2010 1:44 am: nice one. got 10/10. You site is quite adictive.
senthil kumar 19 Jul 2010 9:08 am: dear sir, very mush ur musiq and songs so like this ur songs and musiq every body thanks for ur goods music ……
Ramakrishnan 6 Jul 2010 3:34 pm: I LIKE VERY MUCH ILAYARAJA MUSIC Bcase of he is the ONE & ONLY Legend of Music.iam always hear his songs.He reveled the own culture in every songs.
shanthi 24 Sep 2010 3:20 pm: very good collection…i got only 6 correct….its really interesting…I wish I know about this site earlier…
vijayabaskar 20 Nov 2010 12:55 pm: pretty nice collection..its really easy to recollect the songs with the base tune… not realised that it be difficult to guess the movie name….just got 5 out of 10
303 14 Nov 2010 6:39 pm: yay!!!.. naanga pass aagitommmmmm…. :) .. adhuvum 10/10 :)
TRG 8 Apr 2011 12:17 pm: I AM ILAYARAJA THEVARA RASIGAN 10/10
Kartick 14 Feb 2011 12:17 pm: @Sundar - Mella mella from vaazhkai.. guess u must’ve heard it in sarvam.. :)
Sundar 13 Jan 2011 10:44 pm: could some one help me find this song . I can just remember the starting music i think this movie suresh and either nadiya or purnima jayaram or revathy acted . Please listen to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEOOsnLaQPw you might know . Please let me know at rdsundar@yahoo.com
kagithan 1 Jan 2011 3:23 pm: 2m.. 3m.. theriyala
ravindra babu hyderabad 18 Dec 2010 1:27 pm: hi nice to hear and collections
Sudhakar Dhanapal 19 Jan 2011 11:56 am: Easyyyyyy.. 10/10
kuttuvababu 25 Mar 2011 12:27 pm: very easy and popular songs
DINESH 30 Dec 2011 10:16 am: NIZH, R.PARVAI, P.MUDIVATHILAI, M.VASANAI, V.KATHIRUNTHAL, S.BAIRAVI, M.RAGAM, N’GAN, S.T.MANASU, KARA’KARAN 10/10. BUT SONG 3 IS TRICKY
Shriram 14 Jan 2012 4:34 pm: got 10/10
Anamika 12 Feb 2012 10:38 am: Pogum paadhai dhoorame vaazhum kaalam konjame jeeva sugam pera raaga nadhiyinil nee neendhavaa…!
Arulselvam 2 Sep 2011 3:02 pm: 10/10 Nice collections
viji 20 Jan 2012 12:30 pm: 80’s songs are classic, romance, simply superb, its creates magic when v listen those songs people just forget the problems for sometimes enjoy the life, hates off to illayaraja for giving those awesome music, especially kamal + ilayaraja combo is a magic
das 7 Nov 2011 3:06 pm: yehhhhhhhhhhhhh nanum 10/10
das 17 Aug 2011 5:13 am: 9/10
vijay renu 15 Dec 2011 9:52 am: we got 7/10
Ranjani 7 Aug 2011 1:29 pm: 5/10
padmanaban 15 Apr 2012 6:59 am: Nice collection, good to listen best wishes. 9/10
Ulaganathan 5 Mar 2011 3:45 am: Yeah…. Aatha Naan Pass Ayiten. 10 out of 10.
divya 6 Mar 2012 2:41 pm: i just love raja sir
Shobhana 20 May 2012 5:10 am: I got 10/10 in this one too.. :)
madurai mouli 6 Apr 2012 8:15 am: 9 answer than kandupidichen. miss aanathu 9 avathu pattu. gotha ,just’la missu.
Kesava Pillai 20 Jun 2012 7:00 am: 9/10 ,பூவே செம்பூவே …மட்டும் என்ன படம் என்று மறந்து விட்டது …
Malarvannan 8 Sep 2012 1:57 pm: 10/10
Panimalar 16 Jan 2013 6:09 pm: Easy. Got 10/10. Very interesting to guess.
balaji 4 Feb 2016 9:45 am: wow ! 10/10feeling great
Aravindan 7 Apr 2020 6:08 am: It’s ever green songs very easy to identify the movie.so nice