Home   Forum   Wiki   Notes   Register   FAQ   Sitemap   About Us   Contact Us  

Illaiyaraja' music and style already in other parts of the world?

Topic started by Nithin (@ nc.pr.mcs.net) on Thu May 7 22:48:50 EDT 1998.
All times in EST +10:30 for IST.

Friends, this is an ambiguous quesiton. It actually a rhetoric, or it begs the question? I am not sure. However, I want to ask you Raja die-hards if you have found anything similar to Raja's style of music and Raja' s tunes in other parts of the world? I believe I have and I want to make certain soon enough.

---

Responses:

• Old responses
  
• From: Venkat (@ intrepid-27.fuse.net) on: Tue May 19 23:36:37 EDT 1998
  
  Danny Elfman info:
  Ok, here it is - check out June 1998 issue of DETAILS magazine (you might have a tough time identifying her, but its Gillian Anderson on the cover!) - theres a small box feature on page 42. The earlier heading that I ascribed to the article was wrong (confused with another magazine article )- but the contents refer to "Current pop-culture obsessions" of a random collection of people, and Danny Elfman refers to Khalnayak.
  
  
• From: Nithin (@ nc.pr.mcs.net) on: Wed May 20 20:13:43 EDT 1998
  
  Venkat
  
  Thanks man. I checked page 42 last night at around midnight!!! I read it, it is unbelievable at least for me. Because, here I am arguing with musical connoisseurs or THE VIDWANS such as Bharat, Udhaya, Srikant ( Friends,I mean it)
  and you come up with this startling discovery vindicating my gut feeling which had for some time made me feel paranoid about the whole thing of Danny Elfman seeking inspiration from Indian film music. Thanks a lot, man.
  
  Bharat, Udhaya and Srikant, what do you folks say? I mean, Khal Nayak is a bit of a let down, however, is it not stimulating to know that one of the brightes composers of Hollywood is looking to Indian film music for inspiration. I bet he must have found who the best composer in India is!
  
  Recently, I read somewhere that Danny Elfman would sit down and compose something classical stuff, maybe a symphony or opera. So, Raja again is definitely on the parth of laying out his pattern of musical expressions.
  
  WE ARE ALL THERE FOR THIS GREAT MAN!
  
  Thanks guys, once again!
  
  
  
• From: Bharat (@ dsi.mids.com) on: Thu May 21 11:54:10 EDT 1998
  
  Nithin:
  
  Well, congrats! I guess your stance is vindicated now.
  
  I think I know what you mean when you say Khal Naayak is a bit of a let-down. However, it is an extremely beatsy album, and maybe provided an easy entry-point to our (meaning Indian) music.
  
  
• From: Bharat (@ dsi.mids.com) on: Thu May 21 11:54:35 EDT 1998
  
  Nithin:
  
  Well, congrats! I guess your stance is vindicated now.
  
  I think I know what you mean when you say Khal Naayak is a bit of a let-down. However, it is an extremely beatsy album, and maybe provided an easy entry-point to our (meaning Indian) music.
  
  
• From: Udhaya (@ 205.218.142.217) on: Thu May 21 19:35:13 EDT 1998
  
  There is no vindication in the enjoyment of music that is common to all and enjoyed by all of us. Yet again my insistance to not drag down other worthwhile MDs while crowning IR has been misunderstood as IR bashing or ARR backing. As I'm writing this I'm listening to Miles Davis' "Flamenco Sketches" from the seminal Album "Kind of Blue". It is amazing time and again and like nothing I've heard before. But just before that I was listening to the MSV/TMS/Pattukottai Kalyanasundharam combination, "Unnai Ninaikkaiyilae Kannae", which was amazing and like nothing I have ever heard elsewhere. Before that I was listening to the TR Papa/TMS combination, "Mutthaithiru Pathithiru" which was unlike anything I have ever heard elsewhere, and before that I was listening to VM/IR/SPB/SJ combination, "Kannil Enna Kaargaalam" which was unlike anything I have ever heard elsewhere, okay right now I am listening to "Manimegalaiyae Maniyagalayae" a Deva/SPB combination which is unlike anything I have ever heard . . .
  Earlier I looked out my office window and saw a beautiful lark and enjoyed it. Later a sparrow flew by totally different than the Lark and I enjoyed it too. The guy next to me was saying how we should shoot down the Sparrows because the sky only belonged to Larks. I disagree.
  
  
• From: Bharat (@ 207.67.32.1) on: Fri May 22 11:06:34 EDT 1998
  
  Udhaya:
  
  Maybe you misunderstood my posting. The "vindication" I refer to is only of Nithin's stance that Indian music is influencing Western composers. There is no this-MD-is-greater-than-that-one argument in this thread at least (as far as I remember). In fact, if anything, this thread has people expressing interest in a variety of musical styles and composers.
  
  However, I think it is impossible not to have favorites (or think that such-and-such composer is better/worse) however unbiased one is toward music or any other artistic endeavor. Strictly my feelings, of course!
  
  
• From: Udhaya (@ 205.218.142.217) on: Fri May 22 11:50:00 EDT 1998
  
  Got you, Bharat, and I'm glad we are celebrating all music. I didn't mean to burst your bubble earlier, Nithin, because your enthusiasm was charming. But let me say something about Danny Elfman. Danny is nowhere in comparison to all the great south Indian MDs: G.Ramanathan, MSV-TR, G.K. Venkatesh, KVM, L.Subramanian, and of course IR. Danny Elfman used to be the lead singer for a trendy punk Rock group in the early 80s called "Oingo Boingo". They were amateur musicians whose claim to fame was their silliness and irreverance to rock's traditions. Since Batman, he has become a popular movie composer. I admit he is prolific and has a lot of interesting sounds, but a classical composition by him leaves a lot of question marks as to where Classical music is headed these days. John Williams (Star Wars) who was the biggest for movie scoring before Elfman, wasn't all that original either; my friend showed me the blatant rip offs of Williams from the great composer "Mahler". So, Hollywood is hardly the place to look for ground breaking composers, at least the Hollywood since the 80s is sheer unadulterated business of catering to the masses. If you want good movie scores, check out stuff that came out in the 50s like "A Streetcar Named Desire". In recent years, the best score with East-West mix was the score for "Dead Man Walking" which had some classic stuff by the great Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. The lead singer from the rock group "Pearl Jam", Eddie Vedder sought out Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan to sing with him. Fateh sings in Hindi and Vedder sings the same verse in English in the same tune--mesmeric stuff. Another great East-West collaboration is "Passages" which teams Broadway composer Philip Glass with Ravi Shankar. In "Passages" there's a great prayer song sung by our own SPB. If you guys love musical innovations, also listen to Jazz, especially the bebop era with Miles Davis, John Coltrane and co. That stuff takes you places you won't believe. Enjoy, keep it real.
  
  
• From: venkat (@ 198.30.208.242) on: Fri May 22 12:40:40 EDT 1998
  
  Udhayas' references to Philip Glass reminds me - folks, check out his (Philip Glass,i.e :-))score for "Kundun". Which brings me to my next question - why hasn't anyone prevailed on IR or his record label to release a collection of his memorable background scores from movies ? Well, I guess the "average" TFM listener doesn't really care, but still....
  
  
• From: udhaya (@ 205.218.142.217) on: Fri May 22 13:49:05 EDT 1998
  
  Another point about how the West was won over by the East: Zakir Hussain scored the climax piece for the great Francis Ford Coppola movie, "Apocalypse Now" from the 70s. It seems Coppola invited compositions from all over the world and Zakir's composition beat out 2000 other submissions. Source: a Zakir Hussain interview.
  
  
• From: Sree (@ orchid.cs.concordia.ca) on: Wed Jun 24 14:14:37 EDT 1998
  
  I saw "Good Will Hunting" last week and the music was by Danny Elfman.The Title score(One which appears in the starting of the film) appears very IR ish style of music.I would like to know whther someone has noticed it.
  
  Sree
  
  
• From: sree (@ orchid.cs.concordia.ca) on: Wed Jun 24 14:18:29 EDT 1998
  
  By the way the music was very nice in "Good will hunting",I could not notice any IR ish BG music in the film.
  
  Sree
  
  
• From: MPR (@ hindsight.nodak.edu) on: Wed Jun 24 14:37:09 EDT 1998
  
  Sree:
  
  I saw 'Good Will Hunting' longtime back.
  One of the best movies I have ever seen.
  But talking about BGM of that movie, I
  haven't noticed anything similar to IR's
  BGM.
  
  
• From: sree (@ orchid.cs.concordia.ca) on: Wed Jun 24 14:44:59 EDT 1998
  
  MPR:
  I did not say that BGM had IR style, but the title at starting.I am saying that because i saw it on this saturday.Sorry for the disgression.I would say that GWH was a good movie with nice acting from my fav star Robin Williams.
  
  

---

List all pages of this thread

---

Back to the Forum

Post comments