A Forgotten Nightingale: Part 3

Saravanan Natarajan writes:

A Forgotten Nightingale: Part 3

Sorrow, of course, seems to have been Bala’s strong point. Listen to her plaintive cry ‘Dhayavillaiyo annaiye’ (Naan Vanangum Deivam/KVM). No heart-rending sobbing here, only hushed, dignified suffering. ‘Anbe paavama, adhiledhum bedhama’ (Devadas/CRS-MSV), ‘Vidhi seitha sathiyo aththaan’ (Sumangali/ M.Ranga Rao), ‘Eliyorai thaazhthi valiyorai vaazhthum’ (Thai Piranthaal Vazhi Pirakkum/ KVM), ‘Maname un vaazhvil ee’ (Nalla Kaalam/ KVM), ‘Sudar thaarai sabhaiyil unai kaanen naane’ (Vaanaratham/ Naushad), ‘Sugam peruveno’ (Aasai Anna Arumai Thambi/KVM), ‘Penngalil en pol’ (Sampoorna Ramayanam/KVM), ‘Oraam maadham udaladhu thalarndhu’ & ‘Maaligai vaazhvum enge’ (Harichandra/ KVM), ‘Sollu nee raja’ (Anbu Enge/Veda)…the list goes on….

Anbe paavama:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9l6C_2T3Sk

Watch an aged Bala rendering the Telugu version of the song live:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4t7SiiDnU8

Eliyorai thazhthi (with TMS):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dgA6h5MhoA

Vidhiyo seitha sathiyo (with Seergazhi Govindarajan):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EdUgDZ3rWg

And so we come to what is touted as Bala’s métier: Lullabies- from ‘Innisaiye ganarasa innamudhe

ennuriye’ (Bilhana/ 1948) to ‘Seeraarum paingkiliye’ (Thaayilla pillai/1961), Bala was flooded with a surfeit of cradle songs/songs sung to children. A sample: ‘Vaada malarthene’ (Thozhan/GR), ‘Singara punnagai kannara kandaale’(Mahadevi/MSV-TKR), ‘Ellorum unnai nallavan endrE’ (Bhakiavathi/ S.Dakshinamoorthi), ‘Kanne vaada kaniye vaada’ (Iru Manam Kalandhaal Thirumanam/ S.Dakshinamoorthi), ‘Aala pirandha en kanmaniyE’(Uthamaputhiran/GR), ‘Kannamoochi aattam’ (Yaar paiyan/ S.Dakshinamoorthi), ‘Pillai kaniyamudhe pedhai endhan pudhu vaazhve’(Pen kulathin pon vilakku/ Master Venu), ‘Amma Amma’ (Aandi Petra Selvam/ T.K. Govindan) and the mother of them all: the immortal ‘Neela vanna kanna vaada’ (Mangaiyar Thilakam/S.Dakshinamoorthi).

Balasaraswathi’s caressing voice did have the magic ingredients of motherhood… the selfless love that only a mother is capable of, the warmth of her bosom, the protection of her proximity, the pride of her possessiveness….and all these lent pulsating life and rare authenticity to these songs.

Ellorum unnai:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5r9SqwwkAU

Amma amma:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvHNwbymHr0

Kannamoochi aattam:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC7PzF_qYVo

Singaara punnagai (with M.S. Rajeswari):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faocj4sZf2g

Aala pirantha kanmaniye (with A.P.Komala)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRHVR0yKWM8

Bala even sang for the legendary Naushad in Vaanaratham, the Tamil version of the 1955 Hindi movie Udan Khatola. Her 2 songs ‘Sudar thaarai’ and ‘Aa nenjin nilaimai’ found repeated airtime and are remembered even today. But her experience was far from happy. Bala said in an old interview, “In Bombay they made a movie called Udan Khatola under Naushad's music direction. It was a double version picture- Hindi and Tamil. At that time Naushad got all my records from Madras and he liked my voice and called me to Bombay. I went there and sang two songs for the Tamil version. And Lata sang for Hindi. First day Lata sang for the Hindi version and the second day, I sang the Tamil version. When she did her recording I listened and sang differently on the second day. That time Ghulam Mohd, Kalyanji - Anandji were assisting Naushad. Then Ghulam came to me after recording and praised my voice a lot, and requested me to stay in Bombay. Lata saw this. And next day the remaining songs that I was to sing were cancelled because Lata refused to sing unless I was sent back to Madras. At that time no one was there for them to sing in Hindi except Lata. So they were forced to oblige her!” The remaining Tamil songs were sung by Lata.

All through the 50s, Bala sang many songs in Telugu and Kannada. Many of them were chartbusters in their time. Except for few stray instances, she did not sing much in the 60s in Tamil, and was soon forgotten as the years passed by. She was blessed with 2 sons- Venkata Raja Gopalakrishna Surya Rao and Venkata Mahipathi Surya Rao. Her husband passed away in 1974. Actress Vijayanirmala who is related to her, brought Bala from her exile and made her sing ‘Poyi raave amma’ for the movie Sangam Chekkina Shilpalu (1979) under the baton of Ramesh Naidu. That was Bala’s last film song, she did not receive any offers thereafter.

Bala lived for a few years in Bangalore, and then moved to Hyderabad. After her husband’s demise, she fell upon bad times. Deprivation tortured the family whose riches were legendary in the distant past. Her 2 sons were not educated to pursue any gainful employment. She said sadly in an interview that though her elder son secured admission in a Medical College, her husband did not allow him to take it up, declaring that he would not see his son ‘bandage the hands of all and sundry!’ Misplaced trust in unscrupulous people and woeful ignorance of financial matters led all her to losing her properties one by one. She sold some land to a temple trust in Annavaram for a pittance, but later a detailed survey of the land revealed that the extent of acreage was much more. She filed a case when she came to know that a Police Academy was proposed to be built in her land.

She sought an appointment with NTR when he was Chief Minster. When she related her sorry state of affairs, NTR had tears in his eyes and assured her of all help. To her bad luck, NTR was soon toppled by his own son-in-law and though she met Chandrababu Naidu twice, no help came from the Andhra Pradesh Government.

She was presented with a purse of Rs. 2 Lakhs by Mr. C.C. Reddy, an industrialist in August 2003. But apparently, she was in dire straits again, and this time, she petitioned the Tamilnadu CM for assistance. Moved by Balasaraswati’s plea for succour, Jayalalitha allotted a house for the legendary chanteuse in 2005 and also ensured that an amount of INR. 6,000 was made over to her every month.
Bala is held in high regard by her contemporaries. During my interaction with the late PBS, he professed himself to be a great admirer of Bala. Janaki has expressed her reverence for Bala on more than one occasion. Susheela revealed the great respect she has for Bala when she named Bala as one among the members of the P. Susheela Trust set up in 2008.

‘Time is a sort of river of passing events, and strong is its current; no sooner is a thing brought to sight than it is swept by and another takes its place, and this too will be swept away'. So said Marcus Aurelius in his 'Meditations'.

I leave you with that one song that will enshrine forever the name of Ravu Balasaraswati in the chronicles of Tamil Film Music:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPdzO1jxXkM

Part 1 here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1018417744856618/permalink/1629037280461325/
Part 2 here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1018417744856618/permalink/1630255277006192/