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Ir's limitations

Topic started by krishnan (@ uswgne11.uswest.com) on Wed Jul 8 15:52:59 EDT 1998.
All times in EST +10:30 for IST.

I know I am going to get a few bouncers.Let me start off any way & put
on a helmet.If one were to play with numbers, considering all of IR's
4000 plus songs ( atleast the popular ones) one could classify most of
them under 15 main ragas.( eg. mohanam, kalyani etc).I know of countless
songs he has done in mohanam & MMgowla.Well, one has to give dure credit
to him to have composed in nalinakanthi & kambiranattai.And how many
folk in sindhubhairavi.I understand that even a pure classical singer
limits himself to these standard ragas.That does not mean IR has to
tread on the same path ( applying these ragas).Well, has IR done in
umabharanam or dwijavanthi or any of the rare rags that dikshitar has
done.No comparisons here please.This is the challenge that lies ahead of
the future musicians.IR may have started on a western background, &
started to pick up on carnatic later ( with the help of TVG).I would
like to see him do more on some rare ragas.No more
mohanam,kalyani,S.bhairavi please.

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Responses:

• Old responses
  
• From: doubter (@ 208.142.210.30) on: Wed Dec 20 11:38:49 EST 2000
  
  swamiji
  
  I think you have given vent to your sincere emotional outburst. Can you now explain to me about 'strings' and in what way RDB, MSV, IR, ARR etc differ from one another?
  
  Fan, you should also contibute something technical.
  
  
• From: aruLaracan (@ 134.124.160.10) on: Wed Dec 20 11:50:41 EST 2000
  
  naveen,
  
  i also had such a thought as soon as i read the name :-)). vsn is too close to ir to write such thing! :-))
  
  
• From: Naveen (@ 204.255.14.188) on: Wed Dec 20 12:04:59 EST 2000
  
  yeah.. definitely he is not VSN. This fellow's views are much similar to my North Indian friends opinion towards Tamil music. But his name sounds like a South Indian. it is really confusing. who is this genius?
  
  Naveen
  
  
• From: e.hari (@ 199.67.140.20) on: Wed Dec 20 12:39:54 EST 2000
  
  Naveen,
  I think, he could be a south-indian settled in north. Few people I know of, have large bias towards old hindi music, and this article also reflects that bias. He hardly talked about 60's TFM and that too his remarks on MSV-TKR as a clone of S-J is also very amusing.
  
  regards
  e.hari
  
  
• From: time (@ 64.208.81.180) on: Wed Dec 20 12:57:25 EST 2000
  
  guys,
  Here is the info, I spoke with my friend in bayarea, it seems this guy plays some instrument for the well known pallavi group, he has also done few albums, He is known for these kinds of arguments.
  
  ehari you have a valid point, this guy has not heard tamil music since his birth.,
  
  
• From: kiru (@ 192.138.149.4) on: Wed Dec 20 13:18:04 EST 2000
  
  Hey Time, your background checks are scary :)
  Anyways, there was a disclaimer in that guys' article , 'based on the tapes I have'. That should explain it all :)
  
  
• From: time (@ 64.208.81.180) on: Wed Dec 20 13:39:51 EST 2000
  
  kiru :)
  Lets us send this guy all the songs that he had been missing for 30 years now. :)
  
  
• From: hihi:-) (@ 134.124.160.10) on: Wed Dec 20 13:47:44 EST 2000
  
  instead, please send them to me. at least, i will enjoy for sure :-)))) and desist from making any baseless remarks (vattangaL mAvattangaL mannipArgaLAga :-))) )
  
  
• From: Naveen (@ 204.255.14.188) on: Wed Dec 20 13:55:31 EST 2000
  
  time,
  
  don't forget to remove the string tracks and send the songs to this guy!
  
  Naveen
  
  
• From: UV (@ 134.113.200.17) on: Wed Dec 20 14:31:45 EST 2000
  
  Well One limitations I find with present day is IR is he cant give any nice dancy beats for the present generations say something like Mustafa song or Kadalikkum pen (kadhalan) songs
  thats what he is lacking ofcourse imagination dried completely in the new songs,may be he lost interest in the present day dog race and prefers to write great BGM scores!!
  
  
• From: Swamiji (@ 198.102.112.201) on: Wed Dec 20 15:14:48 EST 2000
  
  Doubter,
  If you want to understand IR's strings / compostion, you have to understand some of Bach's works and his work on Counterpoints. You have to devote quite a bit of time to study his writing style like fugue, canons and so many more. It was Bach's ultimate end to creativity.
  While RDB strings arrangement is a precursor to what IR did (you can say, he started bringing the elements of WCM into Indian music), IR strings are a little more whole in itself, and have very beautiful manipulations of some of those ideas (although i should say he was very limited by instrument players available then).
  ARRs compostions dont have too much emphasis on strings. You have to understand that every instrument he brings in must have an element of rythm to it. That is the essence of composing pop music. He uses strings during a chorus line (not voice chorus, but chorus as in a song), or syncopates them to make it very rythmic. He has given us a treat of other exotic instruments (that we haven't heard of)....and mixed them tastefully, almost to perfection (coz i seriously doubt he probably edits his sounds 100 times before he actually applies it)
  IR had a different approach to music, and that is basically writing for an orchestra. He is not a great pop composer, becoz thats not his intent.
  
  
• From: time (@ 64.208.81.180) on: Wed Dec 20 15:40:47 EST 2000
  
  Swamiji, I see a change in you, you are starting to like Arr's form of music, I still remember your "samayal theory",
  Idhu TriTon seiyum Vellai Yo :)
  
  
• From: pg (@ 12.20.190.1) on: Wed Dec 20 15:46:34 EST 2000
  
  ir's true limitation : non-musical communication. He cannot speak to the media coherently.
  
  
• From: aruLaracan (@ 134.124.160.10) on: Wed Dec 20 16:29:51 EST 2000
  
  i have another serious question: has ir composed any "real" imitation or fugue? towards the end of htni in htni, there is a fugue - first it is for three voices and then when it repeats immediately, i think - i might be wrong, it is repeated for five voices! (therefore, on an average, there is a fugue for four-voices :-)) ). besides this, i cannot recollect any of ir's serious attempt at fugues. even in this piece, the cadence (the ending of the fugue) doesn't sound correct! (very abrupt! :-( ).
  
  there is a beautiful three part counterpoint for three flutes in i24h (i don't remember the track name - the fifth or sixth one - beautiful beautiful flute for about a minute). in the same album there is a 11 sec. chaconne (i think) for violin. there is a song in kadavauL (enakku oru rAsA vENum) the first interlude of which has a good counterpoint. most of his counterpoints are free-styles. why? is it difficult for ir to bring in the different well established "constructs" to tfm? can someone list the various types used by ir with examples?
  
  hi fan and others: thanks for listing a few songs with tempo changes. (how could i forget the thaLapathi song rAkkammA kaiyyath thattu?)
  
  
• From: pg (@ 12.20.190.1) on: Wed Dec 20 16:38:23 EST 2000
  
  How about
  Mad Mod Mood Fugue from HTNI ?
  
  Is this not a valid fugue ?
  
  
• From: Swamiji (@ 198.102.112.201) on: Wed Dec 20 18:30:09 EST 2000
  
  It is a marvelous fugue set to a carnatic raaga. Let me explain to you what a fugue is (I will better paraphrase from existing websites)
  "A fugue is written for a set number of "voices" (independent melodic lines) or individual instruments. It begins with a single voice or instrument stating the theme (or "subject") of the piece by itself. Then a second voice takes up this theme while the first voice continues on with a new, independent melody, sometimes known as a "countersubject." Then a third voice may take up the theme while the first two go their separate ways. There are as many entries of the fugue theme as there are voices. (Most fugues are written for two to four voices.)
  When all the fugue's voices are going at once, the effect is that of a conversation between different melodies, each commenting on or echoing what the other is saying, yet retaining their individual characters. "
  I cannot recollect how many fugues IR composed. They are all in some song or the other. The piano intro in the song "oru kiliyin thanimayile" from poo vizhi vasalile sounds very much like a fugue.
  
  
  
• From: time (@ 64.208.81.180) on: Wed Dec 20 19:19:10 EST 2000
  
  swamiji..."beerangi" endral enna ?
  
  
• From: Swamiji (@ 198.102.112.201) on: Wed Dec 20 19:28:13 EST 2000
  
  beerangi means something like this
  1st voice: a b c c a b c d a b c c .....
  2nd voice: a b c c a b c d a b .....
  and so on. Basically the 2nd voice has exactly the same notes and timing, but starts a little later. Its a pain to write cannons, coz these melodies have to obey strict counterpoints. Bach seemed to have composed canons for intellectual satisfaction (as i have read)...and there is a portrait of his where he is shown holding a "puzzle" cannon. He basically writes one line of melody and does not indicate where the 2nd line should start. He has left the puzzle for us to solve!!!
  
  
• From: eden (@ 61.1.250.168) on: Wed Dec 20 23:58:16 EST 2000
  
  Read somewhere that IR never allows the singer to improvise and thus the creative output of the singers suffer...& hence it's one of his limitations...Heard this morning a song `ennavendRu solvathammA' from a film called rAjakumAran...alas, what a waste...such a beautiful composition, with a potential to become another `enna saththam indha nEram' totally wasted by SPB's unnecessary `improvisations':-( I wonder whether IR went on a tour & asked his juniors to oversee this song...
  
  
• From: pg (@ 12.20.190.1) on: Thu Dec 21 09:42:59 EST 2000
  
  Douglas Hofstadter's amazing book : Godel, Escher and Bach describes fugues in a very understandable way.
  
  Fugues are music for multiple voices or multiple melodic lines. A main voice introduces a theme, the voices following play a variation of the theme. The variation can be several like playing the theme at a different pitch (half / double), playing the theme at a different tempo, playing the theme in reverse, lagging behind the main theme by a time measure. Of course the variations can be combined : i.e a voice can play the main theme in half the pitch and double the tempo.
  
  
• From: Naveen (@ 204.255.14.188) on: Thu Dec 21 10:56:18 EST 2000
  
  Bach's fugues and two part inventions are difficult to play in organ or piano. More than listening to the pieces, while practising I discovered lot of specialities in fugues & two part inventions.
  
  listen to some of Bach's compositions
  http://prs.net/bach.html
  
  check this site for info on fugues and canons
  http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~tas3/bachindex.html
  
  shall we discuss this topic on 'IRs WCM based Compositions' thread?
  
  Naveen
  
  
• From: Swamiji (@ 198.102.112.201) on: Thu Dec 21 14:38:19 EST 2000
  
  Sure Naveen. It would really be intersting. We may post some interesting links too!
  
  

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