Saravanan Natarajan writes:
The King's Treasuries- Part 23
காலந்தோறும் ஒரு கீதம் நீயானால்....
I spent some time in a lackadaisical attempt to sort and index my audio collection. And in the process, I rediscovered some old favorites that I had not listened to for ages. One such CD was one having all the songs from 3 movies, all in IR’s music: Salangaiyil Oru Sangeetham, Nalla Naal and Anbe Odi Vaa. I exclaimed aloud in joy at the sight of that CD, for these songs were ones that I had fallen in love with as a schoolboy and they brought back half-forgotten images and memories of my adolescent years. Ilaiyaraja was (and he still remains) God to many of my friends and along with them I too used to eagerly await each new album of IR. The songs then would become topics for animated discussions. It didn’t matter to us that many of these movies themselves were insufferable. We heard these songs on radio for a brief period around the time the films were released and seldom thereafter. Listening to the CD after many years, I felt the intervening years melt effortlessly in the magical mist of music…..
Eminently forgettable….but for the songs. Oh, the songs! Lucky, lucky Mohan! How many of Mohan’s lackluster movies had IR lit up with a nonchalant wave of his baton!
Anbe Odi Vaa was surely one of those wretches to be blessed by IR’s benevolence. How many ever times I listen to the delectable ditty ‘Idhazhil amutham dhinamum paruga vaa vaa’ (Vairamuthu/ Yesudas & Vani Jairam), I can’t help my knees going weak each time I hear a charmingly chic Vani croon ‘naan thaane nee, nee thaane naan, anbe Odi vaa..Odi vaa’. The opening humming by Vani shows her suave class. The song skips and leaps in elegant euphony. Yesudas shrugs off his somber serenity for a change, and becomes so dashing and debonair.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEaXoT3QIjA
Malaysia Vasudevan and Uma Ramanan have a lilting, graceful duet ‘Kaadhil kettathu oru paattu’ (Vaali). This song was a Radio Ceylon favourite, often heard in the evening ‘Mandha Marutham’ parade. ‘Kaalam thorum oru geetham neeyaanaal, adhan ragam naan aaven…’.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiHFH9Aezzk
‘Thullum ilamai ithu’ (Vaali/ SPB) is such a joyous, buoyant campus call. Raja’s catchy tune, feet-tapping arrangements and the ever ebullient SPB take the song along, despite the pedestrian lyrics….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1lLzZ16Cx0
The crowning glory of the album, is of course, SPB’s haunting ‘Jodi nadhigal paadhai vilagi serndhana’. Vairamuthu writes a melancholic ballad, but sprinkles the lyrics with lines of cautious optimism. IR comes up with yet another rare ragam (I read it as Kathyayini somewhere), and SPB is in his soulful best here.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJAwOQHnf0Y
We are left with two other dainty numbers from the album. Two songs set in the same tune, yet so delightfully different. Songs that would find place in the ‘inbamum thunbamum’ pantheon of Radio Ceylon. Vairamuthu fills in baroquely diverse matter to the same meter. A languorous SPB sings a romantic rhapsody, while a brooding Janaki laments of love’s labor lost. So SPB is in his dreamy, mellow elements, his trademark half-amused chuckle and all. And Janaki brings in a ghazal like ambience in her remarkable rendition- hark at her imaginative variations in each repetition of the Pallavi! Ilaiyaraja has a field day with his guitar strings lending a classy character to the songs, and the piano, violins and tabla ushering in caressing waves of enchantment in perfect cadence with the contrasting moods. Let the magic begin…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mcTE67tpC0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLrLgghro10
An album, nay, a treasure trove in itself, with precious, precious keepsakes…let us rediscover them, cherish them, resurrect them to rightful glory…
-To be continued….
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1018417744856618/permalink/1744166132281772/
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