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Paadava EN Paadalai? Why do film MDs sing?

Topic started by Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on Sat Apr 6 09:58:32 EST 2002.
All times in EST +10:30 for IST.

Film Directors don't Act. Film Singers rarely Compose. Film Actors seldom sing (in every film.)

Yet, Film MDs sing. What could be the motivation behind this phenomenon?

Setting our preferences aside, could we share our thoughts on this blurring of professional identities?

Admittedly, there are a few songs that turn out to be appropriate (random example: Chandrabose's "Yendi Muththamma," MSV's "Sambo Siva Sambo" SDB's "Wahan Kaun Hai Tera" RDB's "Mehbooba" IRs "Aathadi Paavadai Kaathada" ) - but are these passable tunes enough to qualify MDs as Singers? Or should we just consider them to be fleeting (and interesting) abberations?

Here are few hypotheticals:
1. It's their tune, so why shouldn't they?
2. They know their compositions like nobody else.
3. There is a famine of good, trained singers.
4. It is cost-effective.
5. They can get away with it, thanks to their status as "genius" MDs.
6. Their fan-following pressures them to do so.
7. They know Music, so they should know how to Sing.
8. All successful MDs are failed singers, and this is their way to exact revenge for all the rejection.

Let's be critical (without being crass) in this investigation. If you have specific examples of Singer MDs hits and misses - and have any "formal" insights into their (non)singing - it would be a great help if you can share it with us all.

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Responses:

• Old responses
  
• From: hari (@ 66.68.96.108) on: Sat Apr 6 18:41:24 EST 2002
  
  Naaz, I stand by my statament. Ive talked abt this earlier in this forum. Purpose of music is listening. When listening preference is subjective, that music itself is subjective. Just like IR once said, there is music even in the bark of a dog.... You cannot identify a single piece of music thats liked by everyone in this world, and you cannot find a single piece of music (well sound, if u may) thats not liked by everyone in this world.
  
  Just because u say IR's voice or ARR's voice is not good doesnt make it a fact! As someone said, how do u define a singer? IMO its a good question. You listen to music for a certain purpose. He listens to music for a purpose. Shrudhi-suththam, modulation, carnatic vidwat etc are all just technical terms... dont mean anything in the market. Market is subjective.
  
  No-one can be called a good/bad singer objectively, because good/bad music itself is subjective.
  
  It all boils down to this - Either you like a piece of music or not. Dont ever say anything is GOOD or BAD, because theres nothing objective about it.
  
  Needless to say, IMO.
  
  
• From: sarat (@ 67.33.159.112) on: Sat Apr 6 19:14:09 EST 2002
  
  hari
  
  IMO its OK to have a bad voice/mispronounce the language
  But there cant be an excuse for singing Off key
  
  
• From: hari (@ 66.68.96.108) on: Sat Apr 6 19:20:40 EST 2002
  
  sarat: Example of IR. Thousands of people like IR's voice. He sings off key. Still a 1000 people come here and defend him. Are they prejudiced? Maybe. Does it matter? No.
  
  Who has to give excuses and who has to listen to them?
  
  By ur own logic... someone who loves thamizh will say he can sing off key but he cant kill the language. Theres no "excuse" for that. Is he right or are u right? Who is to say?
  
  
• From: s0 (@ 128.119.85.50) on: Sat Apr 6 19:37:48 EST 2002
  
  hari: you seem to have conveniently defined a singer as anyone who can make a sound. there will definitely be someone who will appreciate it, no doubt.
  but can't we have better standards than that? shouldn't we try to quantise music and give it qualities and expectations and define how it should be sung/played? doesn't your argument defeat the whole purpose of musical analysis.
  "who is to say?" is a good question. there are rules that govern how music should be. based on these rules, we can definitely make a judgement whether the rules have been broken or not. whether the singer is off-key or not. that is not at all subjective.
  of course, there is no need to observe these rules as omni-whatever and enjoy a dog's bark. but, isn't it a greater achievement to stick to rules and still produce quality music that is mass-appreciated? (Mass-appreciated is the key here)
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on: Sat Apr 6 20:47:55 EST 2002
  
  s0-
  
  Many thanks for your post. I did my best - without calling names or wihtout agendas - in the other thread, to explain the notion of what makes a "singer" - in a "formal/trained" sense - and I took home this accolade:
  "IRa praise paNNina orE vayathErichal. silaruku konchamkuda poruthuka mudiyaadhE." How does one address this summation? I've known all along that faith is blind. Apparently, I have just learned, that it is deaf as well.
  Your post here - the first para - distills the general attitude of understanding and rigor in music appreciation one finds in such fora.
  "Who is to say?" is a good question. Speaking TRUTH to POWER is always fraught with oppression and intimidation. It is no different from trying to reason with "fundamentalists" who, ironically, don't know the essence of the fundamentals they supposedly espouse. They can only be literal. Not literate. Those are the 1000 people who defend the indefensible. Just because the mob is greater than the solitary dissenter, it does not make the mob right. But the inequities are usually drowned in the fanatic sloganeering.
  
  "No one can be called a good / bad singer, objectively." If this is what "subjectivity" is all about, then it is about time we packed our music traditions/texts/strategies-tools of discernment to a land of no return. Coming to think of it, when one can say "not-so-great-voice" and still enumerate "best songs" in the same breath, it looks like we already have.
  
  Tell me this: Who let the dogs out ? :-)
  
  
  
• From: hari (@ 66.68.96.108) on: Sat Apr 6 21:35:29 EST 2002
  
  s0- Musical analysis is for personal entertianment / timepass as well,.. just like music itself is. There can be musical analysis without quantifying good/bad music and good/bad singer and setting "standards" and talking about what achievements are "greater". At the risk of sounding "egoistic", Id say there are many dark points in your previous post, and I dont have the patience or motivation to argue. I have amused myself enough for today.
  
  Naaz, mob buys cassettes, listens to music and enjoys IR's/ARR's voice. Why do you bother?
  
  just watched Nandha.. Amma yendrAlE is sung by IR and it gave me goose bumps. Similarly, chalE chalO made my road trip hajaar fun. TFM rules.
  
  bye bye
  
  
• From: hari (@ 66.68.96.108) on: Sat Apr 6 21:37:12 EST 2002
  
  oops chalE chalO is not TFM. Ok TFM MD-s rule ;-)
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on: Sat Apr 6 22:09:57 EST 2002
  
  Singing is both an ART and a CRAFT. Hence the rules and standards. TFM MDs may rule. What or Who they rule over is immaterial, I guess?
  
  
• From: isaiosai (@ 166.44.185.161) on: Sat Apr 6 22:24:48 EST 2002
  
  /--Who let the dogs out ? :-)--\
  the good ones were let out soon after u had escaped;-))))
  
  this man seems so fanatically clogged. Can't there be the "best songs" of a "not-so-great" voice? He fails to understand this simple a thing. This shows how fanatic and sycophantic adulation of an idol can lead to total blindness of other good things. Irony of ironies: talk of boasting about so-called "objective analysis" setting aside "preferences" with open mind and no "double standards" ha!
  
  hari,
  /--Amma yendrAlE is sung by IR and it gave me goose bumps.--\
  say so only if sung by VJ. else, u risk a free, all-enlightening , so-called objective analysis gyan session with choicest of words:)
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on: Sun Apr 7 00:14:10 EST 2002
  
  Thanks,isaiosai. I am sure, the others here can judge who is a fanatic and who is not. All the evidence is in our posts. However, feel free to share your limitless pearls of wisdom with us all. Welcome to this thread!
  
  
• From: mahabs (@ 203.197.138.163) on: Sun Apr 7 00:57:46 EST 2002
  
  well, why spb and a.m.raja composed music? imo, it is somekind of an artist's thirst to diversify himself. or may be ego.
  
  s0, whatever standars you have set for a good singer, he should convey the emotions of the song. take hariharan. he is a good singer, but in kasi, he has not shown any emotion and spoiled all the songs. (exp. en mana vanil) ir is definitely suitable for some kind of songs, but i accept that he has spoiled many songs. in his case, superstition also played.
  
  anbudan
  mahabs
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on: Sun Apr 7 03:07:53 EDT 2002
  
  "Amma Endrale" has been offered as testimony for a goose-bump inducing tune. I thought I had missed something on the first hearing (a few months ago) so I thought a second hearing might help me catch that something special which I had missed in the first time around. Instead I caught 4 off-key moments in the song, and two dismal high pitch transitions. Am I missing something here? With all due respect to IR, can someone tell me why a singer like KJY or SPB would have been a bad choice for this rendition?
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on: Sun Apr 7 03:17:02 EDT 2002
  
  There's one thing which became clearer, however, when I listened to the tune from Nandha: it is based on Raga Puriya Dhanasri.
  
  
• From: s0 (@ 128.119.85.50) on: Sun Apr 7 11:18:49 EDT 2002
  
  hari: first of all NOM to anyone who feels that he is offended by my post. I've tried not to name names, other than Saidapet Sisters :)
  
  thousands might like songs that were sung off-key or are technically sub-standard. But, do they like the song just because of its off-key-ness? or is it because they like it in spite of its lack of quality (which is decided by the rules that exist)? IMO, fans couldn't care less about the technical aspects. they like it because ARR/IR sung it or due to other factors likes good tunes, dances, picurisation etc.. off-keyness or other defects may not win fans. we are talking about heavy-metal here.
  
  we, as musically discerning, should be able to distinguish between what passes the test and what doesn't.
  
  By setting rules, we are trying to make and measure music as an objective tangible thing that we can rate if not on a scale of 1-100, atleast as pass/fail. we need not judge artist as better/worse. but we can point to mistakes and say maybe this would have been sunge better by someone else. whether that someone else will actually sell more cds/cassettes than the "worse" singer is a different question which we are not worried about in this discussion (I think!).
  
  it would be great if you can point out my dark points. after all, its a different day and you need your amusement for today.
  
  mahabs, conveying emotions is subjective. there are a lot of people who like Kaasi songs by Hariharan.
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.76.127.63) on: Sun Apr 7 12:12:24 EDT 2002
  
  s0 - To add to your lucid post above: Breaking rules is not as radical as it may seem. It is a sort of artistic licence. However, there has to be clear evidence that one knows the rules to begin with, and then we can push the innovative envelope.
  
  More on this a little later.
  
  

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