Maestro ilaiyaraaja news & titbits

[Devaraagam]

Suresh,

I hear that the concert will happen in Bangalore, Delhi & Pune also.. BUT NOT IN HYDERABAD!! BLOODY DISCRIMINATION!!!

Hmm..you can travel when you decided to banglore, pune from hydrabad.

my dears, again and again do not make me upset by posting HTNI live related news. pls post some videos/audio like NBW posts by rajasaranam

[K]

http://tamil.oneindia.in/movies/awar...2-aid0136.html
தமிழ் சினிமாவுக்காக உலக அளவில் நடத்தப்படும் நார்வே தமிழ் திரைப்பட விழா 2012-ல்
சிறந்த இசை அமைப்பாளர் விருது அழகர்சாமியின் குதிரை படத்துக்காக இசைஞானி இளையராஜாவுக்கு வழங்கப்பட்டுள்ளது.

[Gregorysab]

I think NEPV audio will be out in May. Time is ticking!

[Plum]

llaiyaraja is a humble man. Only, his humility is not the humility of the ignorant or the *mediocre. It is the humility of a genius. Naturally,* a major part of our society, which is obviously not a genius cannot understand his humility. I am neither but thankfully, I have been given the gift of comprehending the humility of a genius. So, what do I mean by that? There were at least 2 instances from a special concert held on 29th April.

The excuse was the silver jubilee of his iconic album “How to Name It”. But, as it happens on such occasions, it was a celebration of his genius, and much more.*The first surfaced when he spoke about L Subramanian, whose prodigy of a son, Ambi Subramanian, hailed as the “future of Indian music” by Anil Srinivasan, compere for the event and a renowned pianist himself, performed a majority of the “pieces” from the album, in the concert.

He spoke about growing as another “kozhandhai” of the Subramanian household along with LS himself, and his talented and renowned brothers, Vaidyanathan and Shankar.*There was humility in his tone when he said this – rather unusual if you ask the usual critics of the man – but then this, friends, is the humility of genius. It bows only before supreme talent. It is not the humility of the mediocre – think AVM Saravanan – which praises anyone and everyone and acknowledges even minor capability in others. That humility is a façade for a non-controversial existence, hoping not to rub anyone the wrong way. That is humility towards humans.

Genius is humble, too – but only before their art, their discipline. Naturally, followers of the “humility mafia” will never understand this. Nor would a majority of the society, even if they aren’t part of the humility mafia. I consider myself blessed that I can comprehend this aspect of a genius’s mind. If you don’t, I pity you.I am more blessed than you are.

The second surfaced when he chided his own daughter for allowing such songs as “hey unnai thane” to be performed on an evening which was a dedication to two great composers, which this album was 25 years ago, performed on this day under the gaze of gigantic images of them. “But these are your songs, appA”, said Bhavadharini, the daughter who successfully evoked maa sentiment twice before with him on the day. “So?” said the man. That one word sums up his humility – the only kind that matters to real lovers of music. “Don’t be so humble, you are not that great” goes an unknown saying, and there is no better illustration of this genius from a remote village of Tamilnadu. The saying refers to the false humility we alluded to before, which is not present in this man. His humility lies in his recognition of his place in the pantheon – he knows exactly where he stands in reference to his Gods, and while music theory isn’t a strong suit of this writer, it is easy to follow from the few slices of his mind that he exposed on the day, as to how rational his placement of himself in that pantheon is.

The other aspect that emerged, and a rarity for such concerts, is the child-like wonder in his voice when he started talking about JS Bach, and the genius of the Western Classical Musician considered part of the holy trinity of WC. He started explaining the features of Bach’s fugue, getting Anil to demonstrate it on his piano live. He checked himself at some point, voicing that it is not his call to go into such details of theory but couldn’t help articulating his wonder at Bach’s creation of an “invertible counterpoint with 10 bars”, while writing it with 8 bars, which is apparently the “ABC” of such efforts, takes him “ whopping one hour”.You read it right – he does that in one hour, and that is not good enough for him. Do we even comprehend that?

Obviously, this aspect of his mind doesn’t usually exhibit itself while talking with common folks such as us. Last I have heard him talk about invertible counterpoints is in Guitar Prasanna’s account of his personal conversations with Raja, where-in , Raja, apparently, asked Prasanna child-like about whether the latter had managed to write a 32nd invertible counterpoint, or something like that. The gnaanasoonyam in me will never remember. What separated this concert from others, which I have seen only on TV, was not just that I saw Him Live but also that for some reason, he opened up to a bunch of musical illiterates, which I am making the presumption that most of the crowd was. Not that we would understand much of it, but the fact that the genius chose us to talk to, is an experience that not many fo you will get.

Which is why, in my first account, I had talked about poorva jenma palan. As I said then, there are two categories of people in this world now – those who* have poorva jenma palan, and these are the ones who attended the concert yesterday, and the other is one who don’t, and these are the people who didn’t attend the concert yesterday. I regret to say, folks, if you are in the latter category, you have wasted your Life.

[San_K]

laiyaraja is a humble man. Only, his humility is not the humility of the ignorant or the *mediocre. It is the humility of a genius

yov plum enter key-nu onnu irukkuyaa

[Plum]

I'd like to thank our Wizzy whole-heartedly for getting me the tickets. Left to myself, I 'd never have got round to booking the tickets circumnavigating the usually tedious process of clicking a thousand five hundred and thirty six links. Wizzy, it turns out, is a young, dynamic entrepreneur, and thankfully not the "evil, who-knows-what-kind-of stranger from a forum" that my wife warned me panickingly when I told her I am going out to a concert, with the tickets to be brought by an unknown stranger whom I only know as "wizzy" in an online forum. "Don't eat anything he gives", she warned me concernedly. "Don't worry", I said, "we'll not have the tinme to think about food or beverages". And so it turned out, and I must acknowledge that both wizzy and KV are nice, pleasant young boys, with KV especially surpassing all of us in his commitment to Raja, travelling down from Bangalore just for this concert, upsetting his parents in the process and ignoring the duty of a bunch of relatives at home in Bangalore apparently. I guess he must have been barely born when HTNI was released. KaNgaL paniththana, idhayam nanaindhadhu.

[Plum]

San-k - enter key unfortunately is a problem for me. Hub doesn't recognise mine. I wish there was a solution to this.

[Gregorysab]

Plum has a single point agenda (even in his huge paragraphs). To make others who couldnt attend the concert (like me) feel like useless insignificant creatures! go easy dude i can understand your thoughts and we all know we missed something spectacular!.. but spare us and go easy

[Plum]

Some nuggets from my random notes:

*** wish there was a seat- cam between IR and LS. As the two chatted away during and after the performance of individual pieces, what would I not have given to be a bedbug on the seat

***Wiz and KV suspected that "Plum" had spent a proxy to the concert. Apparently, they expected me to look like AK Hangal, based on my hub personality. You have seen too much of the malayalam film "salt and pepper", guys.

*** a couple of ladies just behind us when Anil Srinivasan introduced Chamber welcomes Thiagaraja *s "let's now welcome Raja, not Ilayaraja but Thiyagaraja" : the response from the ladies: "reNdum oNNu dhaanEppA". Neither was a looker but just for that comment, if only I were uncommitted...

***karthikeyan nuggets will be a separate post by themselves

***for skv and bala: IR talked about how Kamal visited the studio during the recording of htni, and how he'd keep humming the tunes. There was his theory about how raagas aren't that important in the bigger scheme of things, and how a musical piece simply reflects the "manobhavam" of the composer/perfor$er at the time of composition/performance. Oru maadhiri puriydhu - and very consistent with his philo of spontaneity - but to comprehend that fully, I guess you have to be Raja himself. " If you play it, your mental condition will reflect in your music". That's the quote - make what you will of it.

[Plum]

Aakarsh, sorry. But you've got to make allowances for my mindset. I mean, in what is largely meaningless lives we live, this is the sort of spark that doesn't even happen once in any of our liftpetime. It may be pure luck that it happened to me this time but idhukku kooda perumai, garvam, pogaru pada lEdhantE elA? It is like when you were in School, right, and your cousin from Chicago presented you that funky toy or whatever. You were just lucky you got it and your classmates, but would you stop boasting about it? Fat chance! I am going to be on this High for the rest of my Life. "Yo little boy", I'll ask my grandson, "its alright you might have gone to the moon and all", I'd say, "but did you attend that concert by IR in 2012 and did you get a peek of his genius mind", I'd rib "thought not. Now that should shut you up from yapping all about your lunar tour and stuff".