The Demo Site

This Ilaiyaraaja a great composer from the south is a phenomenon. He is turning 65 this June. Raja as he is known is a real genius. He was conferred the title of Maestro by the Royal Philharmonic London a rare honour for an Asian. He made dramatic changes to film and background music and his achievements in music are amazing!

A few weekends back I was watching Cheeni Kum in TV a nice movie. The director Balki an advertising professional is a big fan of Ilaiyaraja(IR). He signed him to compose music for his first Hindi movie as the director. When Raja wanted to compose new songs for this movie, Balki insisted that he himself would select some of his old favourites from Tamil and asked Raja to redo the same for the larger Hindi audience as they might not have heard these classics.

Listen to Sooni Sooni ( Cheeni Kum ).The original was his own in Manirathinam’s Mouna Raagam (Mandram Vantha sung by SPB).Why Mani has not yet thought of remaking this classic film in Hindi I wonder ?I have attached the Video clip of the Tamil song

Also a few months back as I was watching my favorite Sare gama pa Little Champs, the gifted boy Aamir from UP (Remember whose parents later created a hungama after he was voted out !) surprised me by singing this Ilaiyaraja number from Sadma “Yeh Zindagi Gale Laga Le” sung by Suresh Wadkar (The original song Poonkatru in Moodram Pirai Tamil was sung by Yesudas ).Then Suresh Wadkar explained that when this song was recorded in Filmstan Studios almost half of Bollywood was there to see this ace composer from south .Pl find attached the Video Clip of the Sadma number

Sadma
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9fNoT7Y1JM

Raja experienced poverty in his childhood and youth being from a poor family from rural Tamilnadu. The team of the brothers, the eldest being Pavalar Varadharajan, a poet, worked as a group of musicians traveling across the state, accompanying theater artists. They were struggling street singers for years. Raja learned to play the harmonium, the typical musical instrument used in street performances. He then studied under Dhanraj Master, playing the guitar and piano in the Western style. He later earned a diploma in music from Trinity College in London. This man entered films in his mid 30s. This is quite a late entry for any music composer as the younger creative years went in struggle for survival.

This was around the same time another Raja (Bharathiraja) the ace director coming from the village near Madurai made his debut . These two versatile artists both from rural Tamilnadu came to Madras city around same time(1969) sharing the same lodge and had to struggle for years for a break in Kollywood .

It was Panchu Arunachalam the screenplay writer who spotted the genius of Ilayaraja (when working as assistant to GK Venkatesh)and introduced him in the B&W movie Annakili in the year 1976. There was no turning back after that as it was a blockbuster mainly due to the music which became a rage.It was also a comeback venture for the versatile singer S Janaki. Macahanai Partheengala sung by Janaki became the song of the masses and every tea stall used to play the songs (which is the TRP rating those days!). Also Annakili started the trend of village based movies in Tamil and became the first movie which was taken completely taken out-doors.

Soon the director Bharathiraaja made his debut with16 Vayathinile (1977) with Raja as music director and the Raja’s together created history. Bharathiraja specialized in this new trend of rural themes avoiding studios and big sets taking the entire movie in the villages. Senthoorapoove a perfect dream song was the launch pad for Sridevi and with this song dream sequences with heroine dressed in white became the hallmark of Bharathiraja’s song picturisation. This was remade in Hindi as Solva Sawan again with Sridevi but flopped miserably due to the cultural differences.

This was followed by Panchu’s Kavi Kuyil . The Carnatic music legend Balamurali Krishna sang for Ilaiyaraja after a long gap (Oru Naal Pothuma in Tiruvilayadal).The song was Chinna Kannan Azhaikkiran set to Ritigowla Raagam. The flute interlude is mindblowing . Balamurali was so pleased in the handling of this raag by IR and considers this as a finest exposure of the intricacy of this Raag.

Then came Bharithiraja's 'Kizhakae Pogum Rail' another blockbuster with village based theme. The train song became a craze. Slowly the propaganda started that Raja can do only village folk type of music

Panchu Arunachalam his mentor wanted to break this .Their next Priya was the movie set in Singapore and the songs of Priya created history. It was for the first time Stereo Music was introduced in Tamil. The best song of the movie is ofcourse Paadal Onru ( very well choreographed again on Sridevi on the screen).

I was then doing Engineering at Coimbatore. We used to go to the bakery opposite to the PSG Tech college and take coconut buns just to listen to the Stereo effect. Those coconuts did not do any harm those days like now!

My dream of buying a Stereo system started with Priya. It took 7 more years to realize that dream (Finally in 1985) when we finally purchased a Philips 240W Stereo System for a fortune (10k ) those days just for Raja ! Every visitor to our home will be forced to listen to my Raja collections with snacks and tea in that dream music system !

Bharathiraja also wanted to prove that he can go beyond village themes .The two Rajas created a masterpiece with the thriller “ Sikappu Rojakkal”. Ninaivo Oru Paravai was the trend setter not only for the composition but for the song picturization. Ilaiyaraja for the first time made rerecording the highlight of the movie. The impact of the background score has never been explored to this extent in my opinion by any other music director in the past. This was again a jubilee hit.

Rajesh Khanna wanted to remake this movie to revive his sagging career then with Bharathiraja as director. When the movie was remade in Hindi (Red Rose) with RD Burman as a music composer, RDB complemented Raja and said he can no way create rerecording like the original .The Hindi version flopped miserably as it was released during the peak of Amitabh popularity and unfortunately during the downward phase of Rajesh Khanna.

These movies showed that the new star has arrived in the south. The Tamil film music till then was dominated by MSVisvanathan(MSV) for almost three decades from 1950s first as a duo with Ramamurthy and then later alone.

IR and MSV co-existed for 5 to 6 years between 1976-1982. Directors like Balachander were still with MSV for many years after IR came in. Movies like Balachandar’s Manmadha Leelai, Moondru Mudichchu, Nizhal Nijamaagirathu and Varumaiyin Niram Sigappu- all came during this period, and had music were all by MSV. On MSV’s request Balachander directed a complete musical “ Ninaithale Inikkum” with a dream starcast of Kamalahasan and Rajinikanth together with Jayapradha . Although MSV put his heart and soul for the songs for this film it flopped. All the big banners by then slowly deserted MSV one by one.

One great thing about MSV. After ruling Tamil movies for almost 3 decades as No 1 composer he was magnanimous and had no ego in joining as an assistant to Ilayaraja for a few years. No other music director would have done that. I have heard that he was helping IR then with managing orchestration. Both MSV and Ilaiyaraja share same warm relationship even today and mutually respect each other.

The Raja duo was joined by a new member Vairamuthu as a lyricist.The combination of Ilaiyaraja and Vairamuthu created innumerable hits like that of Kannadasan with MSV.

If Bharathiraja started a new wave of making movies with village based movies Mahendran started the new trend of visual excellence with minimum dialogues.The association with Raja started with Mullum Malarum . Remember the Yesudas number “ Senthayam Poovil” launching Shobha with Balu Mahendra as the cameraman .

CV Shridhar the ace director (Dil Ek Mandir) made a comeback with Raja in his Azhage Unnai Arathikkiren” . Naane Naana sung by Vani Jayaram was an intoxicating song like that of Asha Bhosle’s many songs for OP Nayyar !

Ace director from Malayalam IV Sasi followed by Fazil moved to Tamil and started remaking their Malayalam original hits in Tamil .SPB sang this amazing Number “ Ilamai Ennum Poonkatru” for Pagalil Oru Nilavu directed by IV Sasi.

In 1980 another ace cameraman became a director. That was Balu Mahendra in Moodu Pani. The rerecording for this movie is another masterpiece.“ En Iniya Pon Nilave” became a signature tune for guitar with typical Ilaiyaraja chorus in the background.

Very soon other big producers Balachander, Kovai Thambhi(Motherland Pictures) and GV(Manirathinam as director) all joined Raja and also stalwarts from Telugu Industry like Singeetham Sreenivasa Rao and K Vishvanath signed Raja.

What films and music these teams produced in the 80s! It is a golden era for Tamil music. I will cover the 80s music in my next.

Ilaiyaraja’s music was equally liked in Andhra and Kerala besides Tamilnadu. Ilayaraja’s songs became hits in Bollywood too but the credit did not come to him. More on that in my next .The fact is that he had the same potential like Rahman but he was destined to be successful only in the south.

Why is Ilaiyaraja a maestro? This is how Ilaiyaraja used to compose music for a song!

After understanding the song sequence from the director Raja will start writing the musical notes for the song.



Normally Music Directors used to write down seperate notes for each of the instruments and that would take a long time. In the case of Ilaiyaraja, he would sit and write the entire notes on a notation sheet. That note would include notes of all instruments at one stretch . As he writes, all the musicians would stand around him and take down notes related to their instruments. The song composition is over within 30 minutes for a good song. Then the rehearsal is done in the presence of Raja. Finally Raja goes into the recording and sits with the sound engineer. One more final rehearsal and then the final recording!




No other music director in my opinion could compose like this as he was gifted. That was the speed at which mentally ideas originate in a flash and the inspiration is spontaneous. The super hit Chinnathamby songs were all composed within 45 minutes!

Likewise, while doing re-recording for a movie, Music Directors used to watch the scene a few times. Raja used to compose simultaneously by notes as the movie scene rolls on in the screen in the studio. Another amazing feat .

When I saw the movie Amadeus recently I realized what a genius Mozart was . The entire movie is seen from the eyes of his rival a new concept in film making. Mozart used to be spontaneous composer and he could create symphony in no time whereas his rival used to struggle to compose the same symphony. I thought then that it would have been more appropriate to call IlaiyaRaja as Mozart of Chennai although the name is associated with AR Rahman now. I don’t want to add to any new controversy as the ever ongoing debates between Ilayaraja and Rahman fans on who is a better composer is as big a battle as between Saivites and Vaishnavites as depicted by Kalki in Ponniyin Selvan!

Rahman is a different type of composer who always believes in continuous improvement and takes days or weeks to perfect a melody. Subhash Ghai took almost a year and countless trips to Chennai and many sleepless nights to create the music of Taal a Masterpiece.

This is in contrast with the style of Raja who is a spontaneous composer. Also I heard from playback singers that Raja does not like singers to make any changes from what he has composed whereas Rahman gives full freedom for the singers to sing their own version and edits and takes out the best part.

The fact is that this spontaneity made him create music for more than 800 Films with little repetition. During the 20 years when he ruled the music world it was a one man industry like that of Amitabh in Hindi! He composed for almost 50 movies a year from A grade to C grade Films.

The other Spontaneous composer is ofcourse music director Jaikishan . Those were the days when the South blockbusters were remade in Hindi. I have heard that when Sarvar Sundaram (In Hindi Main Sundar Hoon) and Nenjil Oru Aalayam( Dil Ek Mandir) was remade this is how Jaikishan used to compose.

The Director used to show the original movie clips in the screen and Jaikishan will be sitting with a harmonium. He used to watch the original song and close the eyes for 5 minutes and spontaneously compose the ntirely new tune in Hindi with no resemblance to the original. Believe me to make music as good as the original when a classic is remade is next to impossible. Jaikishan did that with Dil Ek Mandir . Enkirundalum Vaazga became Yaadein Na Jaaye and so on .

When cine music artists were on strike, years back, IR decided to go ahead and make the whole song in the computer for the first time for K Balachanders "Punnagai Mannan".

In 1993, he wrote a symphony for the London Philharmonic Orchestra in an amazing one-month span. Raja tried to release this album commercially but could not do so till date .

His best album in my opinion is not a filmy one but this fusion album “HOW TO NAME IT’.

I must have listened to atleast 100 times and I still love this album. What a fusion of Classical music of Thyagaraja and combining with that of JS Bach’s music .I have attached a song from this ALBUM. See how the song progresses from a Carnatic Thiagarajar Krithi and blends with Bach style and towards the end the music reaches the crescendo when Ilayaraja cannot control himself! Pl click on the Audio below from " How to Name it "

A true Masterpiece from the Maestro
The photos of IR are taken from his official website.



Note from net Sivaram