One song at a time - 42. Nagu Endide
One day while driving my car to office I tuned into a Kannada FM channel heard this song. Right from the first flight of violins I knew that this was definitely an Illayaraja song. As the song progressed, I would have wagered my salary on it. I wanted to know which movie this song was from. Unfortunately by the time I reached office I had forgotten the lyrics. Given my inability to sing even the simplest of the tunes, all I could tell my colleague was, "It was a wonderful song and it went like..lalala lalala". She smiled, probably thinking that this was one mystery which even Sherlock Holmes would be hard pressed to solve. Then I saw this song on TV but as is their wont, they did not put up the film name!! One day I saw a cassette of the movie 'Pallavi Anupallavi'. Knowing it was a Raja - Maniratnam combination movie I immediately picked it up. And I was pleasantly surprised when this song played. We will listen to this song today.
If you observe Maniratnam's movies, you can clearly see that all the technical aspects improving in every movie. Be it cinematography, set designs, locations, editing. Each movie seems to better the earlier one in these aspects. Every technical aspect except music. For in his very first movie for Maniratnam, the master set the benchmark so high that subsequent movie were able to match it but never surpass it.
The first movie Mani made was in Kannada, 'Pallavi Anupallavi' and Raja gave unforgettable music for this movie. Yes, Raja - Mani combinations gave us some outstanding music later as well, be it 'Pagal Nilavu', 'Geetanjali', 'Mouna Ragam' or many more. Similarly the Rahman - Mani combination with 'Roja', 'Dil Se', 'Alaipaayudhe' has been wildly popular. Still, I hold that while some of these, like 'Pagal Nilavu' may have equaled 'Pallavi Anupallavi' none surpassed it. I am sure many have your own favorites and will debate with me on this but I will steadfastly hold that this particular movie had the best music of this combination. (I will probably concede that 'Pagal Nilavu' is at the same level.)
'Pallavi Anupallvi' had four songs. All of them amazing melodies. And all of them quite experimental as well. Take 'O Premi' for example. A lot of experimentation is happening here on the synthesizer and the guitar but throughout all that Raja keeps the melody intact. Then there is 'Naguva Nayana'. What can one say about this song!! The twist and turns of the song are pure Raja. Right from the first bit of humming, the song reeks class. (Will probably need to write a separate post on this song someday). Then there is the very Salilda sounding 'hridaya rangoli'. Definitely will go down as one of S P Shailaja's best solos. Finally, 'nagu endide' the song we will see today.
'nagu endide' seems to be picturized so as to show the love and affection between a mother and her child. There is a danger when tuning for such situations. You can easily make it very syrupy. (Almost wanting you to take an insulin injection after hearing the song.) Raja avoids this and gives us a lovely melody. A wonderful prelude leads you to the pallavi. Now, if you observe the pallavi, you will see that the drumming is going in a totally different direction with respect to the tune. The drumming is very staccato in nature while the tune is free flowing. It is a nightmare to sing this song live because you will definitely be pulled away by the rhythm. Hats off to Janaki for singing so beautifully amidst a beat which seems to have a mind of its own. Another thing which the beat does is to some extent reduce the sweetness of melody. I don't say this in a bad sense. It is just that the beat draws a bit of attention to itself and that ensures the melody doesn't turn out to be too syrupy. Yet, the whole (tune + beat) seems so natural. That is why Raja stands unique amongst all Indian music directors. His experiments always fuse different genres in such a way that you don't have a clue that underlying the tune and interludes are so many genres. You just feel it is a nice song!!! To get an idea of what I am saying, observe the first interlude. When the music is going the Western Classical style with violins leading the way, suddenly a flute appears and plays what can be thought of as a piece of our folk melody. And then the western violins take over. Everything done so seamlessly!! He was a master of orchestration, no doubt and was in inspired form for this movie. The charanams gain in sweetness as the song proceeds. An outstanding song if I have heard one. I am sure you will agree after listening to this song that my assertion of this movie being Raja - Mani's best combination is not unfounded!!
My friend Kamal Aakarsh and his friends had written in more detail about this song. You can check it here:
Finally, just came to know today that Violin Vicky, who has a superb blog, Raaja Paarvai, which explains the intricacies of Raja's music, has started an official Illayaraja site along with his friends. Content will be up soon. For the time being please bookmark this link, Raaja.com and keep checking.
Now let us enjoy our weekend by listening to this song:
Comments
Thanks for sharing!
As I said I am more than certain that everyone will have their own favorite from this combo. I fully agree with you that they were consistently unique.
Prasantha,
More than happy to share such gems.
Also, I disagree with Ilaiyaraaja when he says that his output does not depend on a director but script. That he has given classic even in shoddiest of the films with horrible directors at the helm of such projects is undisputable. But still, Ilaiyaraaja did sprinkle some magic, when it came to directors such as Mahendran,Balachander, Maniratnam, Bharathiraja, Balu Mahendra, Kamal Haasan, K.Vishwanath, Vamsy etc. Some magic, that was exclusive to them. Probably the difference came about in the tenacity of the directors to extract something out-of-the-routine from Ilaiyaraaja and Maniratnam was one of those. I think he was passionate and demanding about getting the best out of every department of film-making.
Thanks for mentioning my blog-post here. I dont have any further comments on this song. It is all up there :-)
I still miss this brilliant combination. Mani tried to rope in Raaja few times, but his efforts failed. I hope he succeeds soon!
As Raj said, the Raja Mani combination is indeed a varied one and everything finally would boil down to personal preferences.
I agree that Raja gave something special to certain directors. He also knew the profile of a film and accordingly delivered. As far as I know he is the only music director whose music never failed when the stakes were high. Big budget and hyped movies like 'Dhalapathi', 'Kaala Pani', 'Guru', 'Pazhassi Raja' had unbeatable music.
At the same time I not too sure about the extraction business. From what I heard from friends, in case of Raja not much can be done by the directors to 'extract' from him!!
good post! I consider Geethanjali was the epitome of Raja and Mani's combo. Be it songs or BGM, Geethanjali stands at the top. And it has been been mentioned by many Raja fans.
Not sure whether PAP which was also the 1st movie of this combination was the best but i can say the 1st movie of Mani - ARR combination Roja is still the best in their combination !!
By extraction, I dont mean the exercise of 'directors rejecting raaja's tunes many times and making raaja toil for days for that magic tune'. By extraction, I only mean about clarity and depth. There is always a difference between asking for "a love song conveying basic love feeling"(which results in a "konjum Konjum from Mayakannadi - not that i dislike the song but it might not be an epic song too) and giving the details of character, situation premise,picturisation idea,context,kind of melody needed etc.Extracting also means letting the composer familiarize himself to the school of thought of the director,apart from the story.Ilaiyaraaja says that director is immaterial for him and it is only the story and characters that inspire him.Agreed,but i refuse to hold it true for all 900 odd films.if all directors behaved alike,when it comes to taking songs of raaja,then all the albums would have looked similar.Some albums,helmed by some directors,were different(from all those 900 odd films) and I think they also had a definite role in that. Just like how Kamal Haasan wanted a song like Yeh dil Deewaana in Devar Magan,but with rural backdrop.