Milliblog India Top 10, 2012

Your argument is like the age-old argument of fundamentalists who claim that small, personal acts can kill Hinduism. Raja’s music has a solid base and can’t be insulted or humiliated by one tiny blog like this. Rahman’s music is moving in that direction (I’m sure you’d have a problem with this.)

This is not Rediff or BBC – just a small music blog with one person’s opinion, who also bothers to respond in a sane manner to those who argue against some of the posts.

You judge my approach to Raja’s music based on 4 lines in one post? Would you not take into account my 200 words for Sri Rama Rajyam and the fact that it topped the Telugu list last year? Or, my 200 words for Dhoni or Azhagarmalai? No, you’d perhaps only look at this post’s 4 line so-called insult and imagine why this blog didn’t give 200 to Puthiya Theerangal. And Gundello Godari. And Mayilu. And Ayyan.

Why should life be so linear and made of zeroes and ones? Why shouldn’t someone have the freedom to express what he/she feels about individual soundtracks without the Damocles Sword of, ‘but you’re his fan!!’ hanging over his head?

How would you react if I say, in all my road trips out of Bangalore since 2001, the only music I have listened to is Raja’s 80s and 90s film songs and not Rahman’s? How would it change your perception of my approach to Raja’s music? It perhaps won’t since you are busy getting outraged with my 4-states comment.

This 4-states business is a personal opinion – not the bible. This blog’s opinion is definitely not worth your outrage – I find it awkward that you outrage over one person’s opinion about Raja’s career arc, that too, posted as an open assumption.

Humble request: look at the whole picture and add context. Don’t look at 4 lines alone – the whole picture has so much more that you don’t know and can’t even comprehend. I try and say this to myself all the time – there is more to everything in this world… if we care to open our eyes and see them.

The fact that I respond to most fans who have contrarian views to mine is reason enough to assume that I don’t all of them are rabid – wouldn’t you say so?

“do you really see if our music industry is leading in the right direction?” – I have a problem with this statement. Define ‘right’. In my view, there is no single right direction; it is up to each individual, depending on his upbringing and exposure to music across years to determine what is right, in his own narrow view.

“We certainly see a lot of compromises in today’s composers and their compositions” – Times have changed. Today, the competitive scenario is different compared to the times when Raja was ruling the roost. If that demands other ways of composing, so be it. If mankind did not take this pragmatic approach, then we’d still be reading and writing in stone tablets.

“We are not even aware how much disgrace we are doing to this maverick composer whom we don’t’ even get to see in million births” – this sounds like a rabid fan rant, but let me not go there.

My summary is simply this:

1. I’m a HUGE fan of Raja. But that does not mean I consider him God; he is shades above present day and most other composers for me.

2. I’m of the opinion that any composer is within the scope of comparison, if both the composers in question are operating in the same time period. People who consider a composer as God may not like that line of thought, for obvious reasons. This also means I’d not dare to compare say, Madan Mohan and Ilayaraja; or MSV and Raja.

3. I would like to believe that I treat each soundtrack for its own value and not for the entire history of the composer.

“Just the time period is enough to compare? haha.. How naive? How simple it is right? If you are comparing we should compare apples with apples right?”
–the problem here is that you define your own apples and your own oranges. Can you, for a minute, step outside that zone and start to think that others’ view of these apples and oranges may be different?

“Was it entirely composed by that composer or he loaned some of his musicians brain or technology to get that output.”
–Music making is a collaborative process in current times. This is not 1980. I’d request you to accept that basic fact and then start an argument.

“Let us first sort these basic things first before starting comparing Maestro with others. Give both of them just a piano, a situation and 1-2 minutes to come up with a new and fresh tune. Give them both 5 minutes to come up with a lyrics which fit the tune. Give them 30 minutes each to come with the arrangements, singers etc. Give them 1 hour to complete the take to give us the end product. If this happens and we get the end product from the second one, then we can start comparing, till then let us keep our mouths shut.”
–The year was 1440. Some people were highly annoyed by Gutenberg’s printing press. They said, ‘This will kill our hand-written manuscripts. 100s of people who write beautifully with the quill will lose their jobs. Give that monstrosity of a machine a manuscript to compose and lay it out and give the same thing to 100 of our best writers – let’s see who does a better, beautiful job!’

“Please I don’t want you say again ‘I am a huge fan of Raja’, it is a total disrespect to him. You already let him down on many occasion for no reasons.”
–This, Sir, is intruding in my personal space. I’ll continue to say this till I die and it is my prerogative to say so. If ‘you’ find it disrespectful, you can do what you deem fit. If ‘you’ find that I let him (I’m happy you did not write ‘Him’) down, please find an appropriate manner to drown your sorrow.

“If you have every right to cross my personal space to call me a ‘rabid’ fan umpteen times, I too have the same right in calling you not a ‘HUGE’ raja fan.”
–Are you being intentionally obtuse? There is a difference between calling someone something and asking someone not to say something. The former is a point of view, the latter is intrusion into personal space. You did not call me ‘not a HUGE fan’; you asked me not to say that again. I can ignore it easily too, but I thought I should your word since we are discussing something.

“You seem to understand all my posts as a ‘rabid’ fan rant which is unfortunate.”
– Not all. Only those that elevate a human to Godly levels. Clue: religion.

“Music making is a collaborative process”. Who said that and who defined that? We define our own rules and stay happy with that. We preach these wrong things and educate younger generations. If you say, I defined my own apples, what are you doing then in saying music is a collobrative process? Is it not your own definition?. Is music not an art? It is not a programming job to do coding, testing and bug fixing and take infinite time to deliver. Whenever I talk of art and the fascinating brain of human, you talk about printing press.”
– A vast majority of music makers work collaboratively. A relatively few of them work independently. The ‘collaborative process’ is not my personal opinion, it is a fact as per what most seem to be doing, these days. That doesn’t make it wrong or right, it is just an evolution of a process. Right and wrong are only from which side we’re seeing it from. From your side, it may seem wrong and regressive; from mine, not so bad. The point on printing press was not to showcase lack of use of human brain, but how progress is perceived across history, in the initial stages, by people who are not ready to accept it for assorted reasons. Even in collaborative process of making music, individual brains come together to create art, and most importantly, they are all individually credited!

“there is not a single appreciation on Maestro’s huge original works (only by him) by these younger generation.”
– Really? Have you searched the net? There are tons of youngsters who love and write regularly about Raja’s original works. I follow most of them to know their point of view even though I may not agree with gushing platitudes… they do have very valid points to showcase Raja’s genius.

“My concern is bigger than this. Veena is now a dying instrument. After 50 years or so, we can only see this instrument in a museum. After Pandit Shivkumar Sharma, who is going to play santoor? Who is going to play shehnai after bismillah khan? We luckily have Ballesh ji with our Maestro to play this (he was pivotal of all shehnai classics of Maestro). We are going to loose a complete set of live instruments as this trend continues, with more and more music directors depend more on technologies and next generation kids are more willing to learn just piano rather than these other live instruments. Who and what is leading them? No one cares about these, but instead they care much about reach and pan-india.”
– Entirely valid concern. I, by virtue of growing up in the 80s, still think Doordarshan was the best, in terms of serials. I hate present day teleserials. But this blog has a very different focus and is not about keeping alive dying instruments and forms of music. For that, write to Narendra Kusnur, to start with: http://narenmusicnotes.wordpress.com/2012/12/24/instruments-from-india-4-sarangi/

“but he is the last link of the original composer of our times, which we fail to understand and appreciate, instead crib about him all the time, which is even fine, but on the other hand, we keep raising our voices for mediocrity which is far worst than this”
– We do not crib about him ‘all the time’. Only at those times when I (forget we) find some of his present day music to be mediocre (again, my opinion – not others’). If that’s not the case, all we should be doing is simply sing his praises day in and day out. That is called religion (second clue).

Sigh. I apologize for crossing your personal space – let me know when and how I did this. Would help me not do it again even subconsciously. Let me reiterate the difference, if you missed it – Your saying, “Please I don’t want you say again ‘I am a huge fan of Raja’, it is a total disrespect to him”. Let me know when I asked you to not say or do something.

Your crossing my personal space is well documented here anyway – not that I expect you to understand or apologize for that. That’s your prerogative and you have posted your last message anyway.

Theek Hai.

Thanks Tipu for your comments. Since you have asked with interest, I am putting my thoughts here.

1. Consider a filmmaker making a movie. Should the filmmaker enact every single line in the movie to their actors? Should the filmmaker convey how every single shot has to be pictured to their cinematographer? Should the filmmaker literally tell the musical technicalities to their music directors? Should they be involved in that level of detail with every aspect of filmmaking before calling it ‘A Mani Ratnam Film’ or ‘A Steven Spielberg Film’?

I am again talking only with respect to Indian films. Movie making process is completely different when compared to composing music for a movie. Before even coming to enacting, a team of director with his asst. directors sit and first discuss the story and script. That’s why he credits in the title the list of ‘asst. directors’ worked in a film. Once the script is ready, then they select the actors and explain them. Same way to their technical crew. Mostly movie making has always been a team effort, but every one of them will be credited on their roles in the title.

But when composing music for a film, there were no asst. directors, except there was this duo concept (shankar jaikishan, Vishwanathan Ramamurthy et al). Few music directors had asst. music directors which they were properly credited in the film title. For example Joseph Krishna was asst. to Vishwanathan and Pughazendi was for asst. K V Mahadevan. They mostly did the background score for the film. So all this was clean and transparent then. So when composing music for a film, it is solely on the music director.

Only thing the directors do is explain the situation of the song and immediately the composing happen. Nowadays directors explain even the technicalities upto what instruments they want and what singer they prefer, but that’s about it. Some may even tell with raagam they wanted or which genre they wanted. There is no more role for the directors there.

Once the situation is given, there is no hide and seek game till some 20 years back on when will the song be ready. It will mostly be ready by that day. With Raja, it will happen immediately and spontaneously, as we know he has composed all songs for a film in around 30 minutes. We have heard this and also witnessed this on numerous occasions. More than spontaneity, he even writes the notation even without hearing the song, just like we write the text, no corrections to it (that’s another beauty, as it is not created, it is born purely). He is pure and his music is crystalline. Everything in front of the director at that moment, no hide and seek.

2. Does using special effects in a movie reduce its inherent quality (A movie like ‘Saving Private Ryan’/'Inception’/'The Dark Knight’ is not worthy in the lines of ‘The Longest Day’/'Ben-hur’/'Spartacus’)?

Again we are talking to different entities here again with respect to film creation and music composition. As you have already expressed, I appreciate Ben-hur more than current any special effects films of today, considering the availability those days. Again my line of thought, is if we depend so much on technology that override your creativity, then I am not at peace.

3. What makes you cherish a piece of

art: ‘the process of making it’ or ‘the output of the final product’?

Please also refer to #1 about the uniqueness of Maestro. For me both are important, but I am more interested in the process of making it, as it gives me super confidence on the composer and I am at peace when I listen to his compositions. Main reason is I know I can credit and appreciate whole-heartedly that composer for his work, as it was originally done only by him with no help from anyone. If they do some behind the scene gimmicks in the name of ‘collaboration’ then it kind of cheats the listener, as the brains who contributed to the composition were not properly credited. When I listen to these compositions, I really don’t know if I really have to credit only the composer of the soundtrack, or every one (which again is not transparent) who contributed to the composition (not playing instruments or just singing), then I am not at peace. However beautiful that composition might be, it kind of hurts/irks me in whole-heartedly appreciating him. The sad thing is all this is happening today. In future, all these wrongs will be made as a benchmark in composition, which would be the darkest day for music. I really want that honesty and transparency in art, which we are slowly losing out and terming in terms of marketing as ‘collaboration’ and ‘team effort’, but that is pure dishonesty to art and stabbing the listener at his back. That’s why I don’t like any comparisons made between Maestro and his true, pure, original and unadulterated work with ‘collaborated/iterated’ work of others of today. He is nature’s wonderful gift to mankind.

Let me stop here, we can talk offline if you wish to continue.

Whoa !!! You do jump into a lot of conclusions dont you?? Just out of curiosity , have you worked under Ilayaraja or ARR or both ?? You seem to know everything they do much better than themselves I guess !!

@adithyavijay:Please dont take it too personal. We all love Raja sir but dont expect everyone to worship him as you do. Rama is a God to some but for some he was just another man while some believe he was a villain. You should understand the same thing can be seen from angles varying from 0 to 360 degrees.

Is the time taken to record a song of any significance ?.Isn’t the time for how long the song remains of greater significance ?.And you can never really compare one song to an other ,It might appeal differently to you and me

Why should life revolve around taking a decision on which one is better? Both kinds have their pros and cons, depending on who is seeing it and where he/she is seeing it from.

This is precise problem I have with some rabid fans (of any composer). Praise one of their albums, and they go, ‘wah-wah’! Pull one down and they go, I’m biased. Praise the next one and they forget the earlier bias and go ‘wah-wah’ again. Same is the case with you – in one specific context, I made a list that was Tamil top 10. It had NEPV on top, deservedly, in my opinion. And look at your turn-around for this list where I have explained the context threadbare.

As for counts and numbers, I have never bothered for that anyway – else ‘Fevicol se’ would be on top of my list. Why would I bother about counts now?

to me NEPV/YVM’s greatness lies in new/innovative styles of music for most songs – except yennodu vaa & katrai konjam.
‘new’ compared to ilai’s standard template.

an old-man and should-be-musically-exhausted composer (near to 1000 movies) re-inventing himself and challenging young composers of today’s generation (who are struggling to make ‘new’ music, trends ending up with noise and dhi-chik dhi-chik pounding ppls heads)

coming to why ilai didnt make waves in north/beyond: could be that, to like his music, people need exposure to atleast one of his core ingredients – Western Classical, JAZZ, Carnatic Classical, South Folk.
Rahman’s case: most people in his age are already exposed to some or the other western/worldmusic due to internet.

If you observe – Rahman still DOES NOT appeal to most masses/rural ppl, but ilai does. most of them dont understand rahman’s music and cannot appreciate or enjoy it. his fans are mostly the new gen or urban class ppl who are exposed to global flavors or are capable of analyzing his style/sources/tech/templates etc. these days many have xposure enough to start being a critic

p.s: i no longer put ilai in film music list. his experimental albums show his true class n potential ! he is a true CLASSICAL COMPOSER alongside the greats of Vivaldi, Bach, Mozart, Schubert, Tchaikovksy, Thyagaraja, Muthuswamy Dikshitar etc..