MD has to sit and compose at least 15 different tunes to satisfy the director.

The lyrics have to match the tune and the situation. After these two issues are solved - orchestration come into picture, has to hire musicians and sequence the score, book a studio, book singers (Dates are important),

The Recording day (often night) comes with pomp and galore, MDS goes round the studio explaining his score to musicians and explaining the placement etc. He wants his score to be recorded perfectly; the sound engineer has to cooperate with him.

Tune must be explained to the singer(s) along with BGM interludes, situation, pronunciation, feel etc. Each line is done at least 10 times to get the right one. It happens again with the musicians - it is not easy to obtain perfection in spite of the musician being a professional.

After all this! - Finally, the song is recorded. Next task is balancing. The fate of the song lies now in the hands of the sound engineer, (who often fails).

Balancing - Since all the instruments are recorded on separate tracks - their volume and other levels must be controlled, masalas like reverb, delay are added, panning is to done. If the Movie is on a DTS production - job becomes more difficult.

After all this, the album goes for tape/CD production - CD production is somewhat easy, except the cost. Tapes: The tape on which the work is duplicated must be good (which is often not), if not the entire work will end up in a mess.

After all this hard work!, he waits for the album release (worst part for an artist), his fate is in our (fans) hands. When we hear the tape, (which we buy or in most case we record it from someone.), We just utter a word on the album, which might be

1. Great

2. Ok

3. Waste

4. Copied

We are not aware how the production is done, how many work very hard for the

Srikanth

Responses:

• Old responses
  
• From: balaji (@ schubert.crhc.uiuc.edu) on: Wed Sep 23 23:41:09 EDT 1998
  
  srikanth, it is surprising that IR uses english most of the time. in all his interviews i heard, he talks in tamil without english. keep writing more about ur experience. one relevant thing in this thread is the composition of songs for guna. part of the discussion was taped and put into the
  audio cassette. in it, u can see that kamal knows exactly what he wants and IR knows exactly how to give it.
  
  
• From: A Fan (@ chcgb104-15.splitrock.net) on: Thu Sep 24 01:13:24 EDT 1998
  
  NCR, can you tell us more about IR and Kamal's conversations?
  
  Tx
  
  
• From: Reva (@ 202.54.37.18) on: Thu Sep 24 01:20:34 EDT 1998
  
  Just for information:
  
  The vaa veNNilaa song's tune is a rehash
  of the MSV/TKR tune for vaan meedhilE inba
  thEn vandhu paayudhE, a song from the movie,
  chaNdi raaNi which came in 1952.
  
  
• From: Sriram Lakshman (@ sf-dnpqo-075.compuserve.net) on: Thu Sep 24 03:32:18 EDT 1998
  
  If you guys watched 'Moovendar musical night' where IR, MSV and KVM participated with a host of singers like TMS,PS,SPB,SJ,Chitra and Mano. MSV and IR talked about how 'Vaa Vennila'was composed. It seems IR's hot favourite song was 'Vaan meethile' sung by Ghantasala and Bhanumathi in 'Chandi rani' somewhere around 1952-53 (just after Devadas) ,but CR Subburaman's (MSV and TKR were his assistants then) name figured as the MD of the movie. IR mentioned this song to MSV and MSV revealed that it was actually he himself who had composed the tunes for Devadas and Chandi Rani as CR Subburaman had been bed-ridden. MSV used the santhams of the 'CR' tune and created 'Vaa vennila'. If you notice even the tune for the stanza sounds similar. In this program, SPB sang this song in 'Vaan meethile's' tune after the second stanza.
  
  
• From: Sathish (@ 206.103.12.125) on: Thu Sep 24 04:42:28 EDT 1998
  
  Dear Kaushik
  
  Can u please tell the date when that song from prashanth movie was recorded. Who was the singer and how was it. Was it classical or western or folk type.Elaborate.
  
  
• From: Srikanth (@ proxy1.dpn.deere.com) on: Thu Sep 24 10:44:37 EDT 1998
  
  Hi,
  The reason he talks in english in a recording is many of the artists are anglo Indians, so in order to convey he uses english (this my view)
  
  Regarding "vaa ven nila" - MSV use to say
  5+2 =7 also 2+5 = 7 - the first bars were interchaged in from "van metheele"
  If you see the notes for pallavi of both the songs same notes appear but interchanged.
  
  Rahaman composing : This is what I heard from Noel, ARR's asst.
  First ARR composes the tune and records it using he keyB (sound he uses is often pan flute for this) then he places each arrangement using his keyboard, lays all the tracks.
  Then he invites one artist at a time and records the original scores, then he mixes the original and his syth sounds in a manner that makes the track sound fantastic.
  Parasana - guitarist told me once he played around 20 parts, Arr recorded all the 20,then ARR came out with a new score mixing (cut and pasting) all the 20 parts. (Samba Samba gutiar piece (set to Bhilahari ) in Mr.Romeo)
  (20:1 = this is the main reason ARR takes time.)
  
  Anupama (Singer) also mentioned to me the same thing, he records around n number of chorus tracks and mixes them to few and places them perfectly.
  
  Eg:Pakathe Pakthe has excellent chorus parts.
  BTW most of Arrs recoring are after midnight hours. (1.00am to 5:00am)
  I still remember the number of tracks he took for chadralekha song!, just plenty - I was chased out of the recording area as ManiR would not like anyone hearing the music before release, also he his mood will be spolit (bcos of me!)
  This was the last time I was spoke to noel for a very long time about ARR.
  
  
• From: Anand Mahadevan (@ freedum.proxy.lucent.com) on: Thu Sep 24 11:25:19 EDT 1998
  
  srikanth,
  Does ARR put those compositions in stave notations and how does he communicate with fellow musicians in terms of music? I understand cut and paste is the order of the day but an insight of the methodology he adopts will be great.Does he have anything written?
  
  
• From: SR Kaushik (@ sol12.cs.wisc.edu) on: Thu Sep 24 14:17:47 EDT 1998
  
  I went for the recording around Aug 10th. As I said, only the orchestra was recorded, noit the voices. So I don't know who the singers were. I would have found out if I had stayed longer in India. Anyway, nowadays, IR's instrumentalists aer quite free - I trace the reason to be mainly the presence of KR who is very friendly and keeps praising them.
  
  I knew a person who plays guitar for IR, that's how I got in.
  
  
• From: Nirupama (@ mut-53-0766.direct.ca) on: Fri Sep 25 15:19:40 EDT 1998
  
  Srikanth, you have mentioned before that in order to sing for IR, a singer must be able to understand the swaras. I don't think this is true because how will this work with SPB, who claims to have no knoweldge in classical music, or with Asha Bhonsle who may not understand Carnatic? Don't they use track singers sometimes to teach the lead singers?
  
  Though, what you're saying may be right when it comes to Chitra. Once I saw a video of an IR concert(1995) sponsored by the Malayalam Arts Society. On stage IR had a pre-written song(in malayalam) and started composing a simple tune to go with it. He asked Chitra to join him in singing and he sang the first two lines for her. Chitra followed but couldn't get the first line right. He repeated the line about 2-3 times and she still kept missing a note. Finally, I think the fourth time, IR sang the swaras of the same line. She immediately picked up the tune and sang perfectly. This incident might indicate that Chitra feels more comfortable learning the tune through the use of swaras, whereas the others singers may not.
  
  
• From: Srikanth (@ slip-32-101-16-120.il.us.ibm.net) on: Fri Sep 25 21:46:53 EDT 1998
  
  Hi Niru,
  Who told you Spb cannot understand Swaras ?
  SPB can understand it perfectly than anyone else.
  Though he has not gone for formal training he knows it very well. I dont think formal training is required to sing based on swaras -if you have a good voice,with good practice you can easily pick up swaras. I dont have formal carnatic training., I know only western classical - but I can pick up swaras very easily just by hearing.
  Carnatic swaras and hindusthani or why Western notes are all same -
  We call SA - Hindusthani call its Se - and western calls it C or Do.
  Musical notes are same, but their sound depends on their basic scales, an arabic scale Re will be slightly different from an Indian Re, but all boils down to the 12 notes.
  
  Recording is different from live - Raja prefers to understand notes - sometimes his assts explains - Raja will distribute only notes - if needed he or sn surendar or Arul Mozi etcs will track and the tape will be sent to the actual singer. This is for the singer to understand things better as there is huge time constraint on them.
  
  This does not mean they dont understand notes.
  
  
  Srikanth
  
  
• From: aruvi (@ spc-isp-tor-uas-77-66.sprint.ca) on: Sat Sep 26 00:06:45 EDT 1998
  
  SriKanth
  
  What exactly is the role of the sound engineer. You have wrote that the success of a song is up to them. But isn't it raja who tells them what should be done. Also, he had once said in an interview that if the mixing had been done well, the BGM for 'Devadhai' would have been better. Isn't it he that controls how the song should come out. Then why all the "SOTHAPPAL".
  Please explain.
  
  
• From: srikanth (@ slip-32-101-16-75.il.us.ibm.net) on: Sat Sep 26 00:45:06 EDT 1998
  
  Hi
  Arvui :
  SoundE balances all the sounds. He is the person responsible for the final output.
  He makes sure of the volume levels of all the tracks are proper - MD cannot do this, SE by the virtue of his knowledge and experiance will know the levels of instruments.
  
  For example when a singer sings thru the mike, if there is a blow - SE will know the blow.
  The sound balancing is an ART.
  SE has check all the sound levels etc. Md tells him the panning (moving left to right etc), but SE is man who places the sound.
  In simple words - bring or containg 24 track in 2 tracks - streo, if it is DTS he has to work more to balance the sound for 6 outputs, as he has to coordinate with the movie.
  
  The western SE's have a very big role.The can change the entire recording to new one - just by mixing.
  
  How ever good photographer you are - your processing must also be good else the real color will not be seen, Sound engineering is also like that.
  
  Srikanth
  
  
• From: aruvi (@ spc-isp-tor-uas-77-66.sprint.ca) on: Sat Sep 26 01:31:18 EDT 1998
  
  Srikanth
  
  I have a question about how the music directors teach the songs to the artists. To my believe, preknowledge of swaras is essential for professional singers. But then musicians such as SPB, who are self taught may have trouble grasping swaras, though you have said he does not. But as Nirupama stated, I have also seen Raja compose on stage in a couple of stage programs. The artist he always calls upon is Chitra when there are all the others there. Please explain.
  
  Do you think that the extent of knowledge in music affects the composing. Because as you know, these days most composers admit that their musical knowledge is "Keelvi Gnanam"(what they here). How can the listener not critisize their music. Especially since most listener's in foriegn countries are aware of the copied songs.
  Have u ever been to a Deva recording. Just wondering! But seriously, please answer the questions in detail.
  
  
  

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