The Golden Era of Dr.IR and Dr.SPB

[PARAMASHIVAN]

App Anna

I am unable to post "regularly" for the next couple of weeks, due to office changes, please continue your gigantic service

[app_engine]

There are two other SPB songs from veettula...movie that cannot be called hits, possibly heard a few times on radio but I have to really stretch the memory...so, skip. Just for ref, one is a duet with SPS 'Atthuppakkam thOppirukku' and another solo 'manamum guNamum'.

So, moving on to another movie for the song for Saturday...

[app_engine]

#135 மார்கழிப்பார்வை பார்க்கவா தாமரைக்கைகள் சேர்க்கவா
(உயிரே உனக்காக, 1983 , ஜானகியுடன்)

What a sweet and soothing song from an unreleased movie! This one was among the last few numbers that managed to get airtime in IOKS before we lost it. Prior to the "recording center era", IOKS was the sole source for songs from unreleased movies. However, as seen in this thread, we had the recording centers mushroom during early 80's and this monopoly had gone. Most ardent IR admirers who had access to cassette players feverishly captured every new disk coming out to the recording center on their TDKs. This song happened to be one like that and I remember hearing this on buses too (apart from homes).

As the movie didn't get released (supposedly a Prabhu-Sulakshana starrer) and the title got reused by Motherland pictures with Lakshmikanth Pyarelal as MD, the identity of this song somewhat got lost ( Later-day-UU was the first MP movie without IR. The producer who started having 'ilAyarAjAvin innisai mazhaiyil' kind of ads on the posters for the first time, went away from him in 1986).

The confusion is captured by dhool Saravanan here in a tfmpage archive thread :

yaaro, 'maargazhi paarvai- Uyire Unakkaga- SPB & SJ' would be on my list each time I discovered a new recording center, but when after days of delicious anticipation, I brought back the tape home, I would be dismayed to to find that the @#$%&*^! person had taped 'I want to be a rich man' or 'Kavithaigal viriyum vizhiyile' (

Finally I found a Srilankan friend who had the record with him ( yes, Prabhu in a white uniform--I thought it was a Naval Officer uniform!), and taped all the songs from him

Needless to say SPB and SJ excel in this song!

[app_engine]

I have still 3 more songs to post to catch up.

Looks like it's time for the last movie of the year as I have exhausted all other movies from 1983 that had SPB hits

Come on oceans, your confluence is on!

[app_engine]

#136 வான் போலே வண்ணம் கொண்டு வந்தாய் கோபாலனே
(சலங்கை ஒலி, 1983, ஷைலஜாவுடன்)

Gavaskar duck, Srikanth duck, Mohinder / Sandip Patil / Yashpal all perished for single digits.

India 17/5 against Zimbabwe in a crucial league match in the 1983 Prudential Worldcup in England.

That was the day and time when our 3rd sem ejjAms were over and we were happily planning to go to the latest Kamal release in Kalai arangam theater in Trichy. (Don't remember whether it was already called 'Thiagaraja Bagavathar ManRam', it was a state / city owned theater). Every one of my first 7 semesters in the college had exams postponed - at least once. Same was the case with this 3rd sem too and we never had "post-exam" holidays. One way it was better because I could stay in hostel during the "study holidays", enjoying all the freedom that came with it.

Well, we knew that there are not many holidays before classes start again, so not wasted any time to start for the movie. There was neither any TV in the hostel nor live telecast anywhere. Only radio commentary. Since the matches were in England, we could happily use short wave radios to listen to 100% englees commentary from foreign stations (rather than suffering the 15 min englees - 15 min hindi kodumai by AIR).

On the 1983 cup, Indian team wasn't a favourite to even enter the semis but started off fabulously, beating the top seeded WI in the first league match and then Zimbabwe. Then came two losses - to Aus & then to WI and our spirit was down. Most of us did write them off and didn't care much. Since Zimbabwe also had a win against Aus, some of us were busy with calculators on the run rate business, wondering whether Kaps' boys will make it to semis.

And then came this disastrous start with Zimbabwe in the penultimate league match

In any case, our enthu for the "movie-that-too-Kamal-movie-on-ejjAm-end-day" carried us to the town, with one in the gang not forgetting to carry his pocket transistor, checking the score even during the interval.

For some reason, I didn't have much idea about the movie, prior to watching it. Possibly because it was from a Telugu original (sAgara sangamam, for which IR won his first NA). There weren't much articles / titbits / hype in the magazines at all IIRC. Never heard the songs before. All that I knew was ejjAms are over, going to town, watching this Ilayaraja-Kamal movie!

Meanwhile, Kapil started his historic innings while we were on the bus to Trichy and was in extreme form (terrific is an understatement, most of us know the rest of the history about his 175 n.o.).

Once inside the theater and the movie got started, I totally forgot the world around me! rAsA was in extreme form there! When Janaki starts to sing for ShailajA's dance program, appadiye oru mei silirppu! Can't express in words! And Kamal, AhA, in what extreme form! The whole crowd was delirious when he did the demo to Shailaja (panja boothangaLum muka vadivAkum)! Simbly stunning to see even the tumbler dance on the ground! What a powerful performance!

It was a day of extreme peelings for me - even thinking of that day makes my whole body silirththufy!

While totally loving the flute beauty of this song, it is needless to mention that we were also ROTFLing to the brilliant picturization by K Viswanath. Geeta gave excellent company to Kamal (as did SPS to SPB) in this evergreen 'vAn pOlE vaNNam koNdu'!

[app_engine]

#137 நாத வினோதங்கள்
(சலங்கை ஒலி, 1983 , ஷைலஜாவுடன்)

Tell me if there's any who can listen to this song without tapping his / her feet - unless that person doesn't have them! (கால் இல்லாதவரும் தலையை மட்டுமாவது ஆட்டி அனுபவிப்பர் என்பது என் பணிவான கருத்து!) Even if they miss the pallavi, they got to feel like dancing when Shailaja starts the 'kayilai nAthar' portion - what a thuLLal melody with great accompaniment of mridhangam, flute, veeNai and a thorough classical feeling! A song that can be called arresting as I cannot allow my attention to defocus at any point!

Niwas did a fine job in this song of capturing the capabilities of Kamal and the beauty of Jayapradha (ennA azhagu avunga!). Relatively short song on screen but the disk version had the 'kAviri mangai vandhALammA ennudan kai veesi' portion together. If my memory is right, the radio used to play them together too. K Viswanath was quite smart in not including the folk-like portion in the movie part as that could have taken off some shine. (mEni / minukki / kulukki / mElAdai / vilakki etc business sounded very filmy / silly for kAviri mangai).

I haven't watched the Telugu original but when I watched the first time in theater, didn't feel it was a dubbed movie at all! I think the initial scenes featured Thamizh newspaper and they took enough care to do lip sync. It's highly possible that they shot in both languages separately for some scenes at least - as otherwise such an excellent picturization is extremely difficult.

[balaji]

App-Engine

The movied had 5 great SPB songs, your post said 3 more songs and hence made me wondering which film you are talking about
Yes surely one of the better dubbed movies. Sagarasangamam is a classic; Salangai Oli is no lesser in all aspects except for the dialogues and the so-called comedy track.

Great Job as always

[Plum]

I understand that you guys experienced only the dubbed version and such is the greatness of IR, still feel that it is a masterpiece.
Trust me, the original is 10 times the masterpiece that this is.

And the lyrics, app. Unfortunately, the tamil version has those thaLukki minukki lyrics. Original lyrics are authentic telugu folk, and while light on meaning, are sonorous and tune-apt. The lyricist, probably a spiritual cousin of Vaali, puts in a cheeky reference to "viswanatha palukai". You could take that as a reference to Lord Shiva or the Director.

And that tune itself was a separate song in Sitara(directed by Bharathiraja I think) starring Bhanupriya and Suman. (Kinnera saani vachindhamma)

Actually, this is not as bad as Geethanjali-IT, thanks to the presence of SPB in the tamil version. But once you have heard the original, the dubbed version is literally useless. Definitely the lyrics are a letdown.

[Plum]

And didn't veetula raman have a title song - not so much a song played during a title as one with the title as its pallavi - sung by SPB as well?

Veetula raaman veliyila krishnan eppodhum agaadhamma?

[Plum]

vEdam aNuvaNuvuna nAdham - vEdham aNuvilum oru nAdham. The former is a 'normal' phrase in Telugu. The latter looks strained and made up. These are the perils of dubbing but I can only state the net result.

Secondly the meaning, aNuvaNuvuna nAdham - nadham integrated into every cell of my soul. aNuvilum oru nAdham - meh, so distant, weak and diluted.

nA pancha prANala nAtya vinOdham - en aindhu pulangaLaiyum AtkoNda nattiyam ennum adhisayam

nAn pAdum something something nAtya vinOdham - dance strangeness in song I sing or something like that.

See the world of difference.
Again, the perils of translation. Remember the pramAdham-brahmAndam translation joke in Mumbai Express?

vaali, eh?