raaga 3

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. ...

I don’t like hunting for new songs either. Too much effort. External recommendations like Raaga Top 10 help, but not much. I usually like only 1 of the top 10. I don’t really know the recent music directors. But many interesting songs I’ve heard recently (like Ondra Renda in Kakka Kakka, Vaseegara in Minnale, and Kaadhalikkum in Chellame) are by Harris Jayaraj. So maybe if I can find the music directors I like, other songs by them would be good recommendations. ...

I saw this page 5 years ago, and thought I’d lost it since then. It’s a list of tamil film songs and their raagas. Try this: search for a song and listen online.