ILAIYARAAJA GETS CENTENARY AWARD

FOR INDIAN FILM PERSONALITY

OF THE YEAR @ IFFI 2015

Weaving
Magic
with
Music
What sets Ilaiyaraaja apart is the magnificent
ease and efficacy with which he fuses Tamil folk
traditions, the strains of Carnatic music and
Western orchestration to create a soundscape that
instantly draws the listener into its depths
By Saibal Chatterjee

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ndian film composers make music.

Ilaiyaraaja makes magic. His compositions add value to a film, at the same
time, they also have a life beyond the
films that they are embedded in. Could
there be any other reason why he is a
household name across the length and
breadth of the country?
Operating in a league of his own, Ilaiyaraaja has been striking the chords of
the hearts of millions of admirers for all
of four decades. His consistency borders
on the phenomenal. He is widely, and
rightly, regarded as a peerless force in the
domain of film music.
Ilaiyaraaja, who made his debut as an
independent music director in the 1975
Tamil film, Annakili, has continued to
dominate the south Indian film music
scene despite changing fads and popular
tastes. He moves with the times without
bartering away the soul of his music.
When he branched out on his own he
was simply known as Raaja, so his first
producer added the prefix Ilaiya (meaning young in Tamil) to his name to distinguish him from a music director who
was already in the industry, A.M. Rajah.
The name stuck and rose to heights that
nobody had scaled before him. He soon
emerged as the undisputed Raaja of Raaga.
Ilaiyaraaja grew up in rural Tamil Nadu
and imbibed the lilt and range of the regions folk music. He was only 14 when
he joined his elder brother Pavalar
Varadarajans itinerant troupe. He travelled with it all across south India over
the next ten years, honing his skills and
sharpening his ears to the unique sounds
that he heard around him.
It was during this learning curve that
he composed his first number an adaptation of an elegy to Indias first Prime
Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, penned originally by the great Tamil poet and lyricist
Kannadasan.
Ilaiyaraaja learnt the ropes of classical
music from the renowned Madras-based
guru Master Dhanraj and subsequently
did a course in classical guitar from Trinity College, London, which is an institution that also drew A.R. Rahman to its
hallowed corridors many years later.
Ilaiyaraaja absorbed various influences,

and he brought all that he acquired along

the way to bear upon his musical output.
It has been so rich and varied that he is
deservedly counted among the very best
music directors that Indian cinema has
ever produced.
What sets Ilaiyaraaja apart is the magnificent ease and efficacy with which he
fuses Tamil folk traditions, the strains of
Carnatic music and Western orchestration to create a soundscape that instantly
draws the listener into its depths.
Those that do not know better often draw
comparisons between him and his accomplished protg A.R. Rahman. The latter,
who in his formative years was a keyboardist in Ilaiyaraajas musical troupe,
dismisses all these attempts as odious.
Rahman sees his mentor as a trendsetter,
a genius who paved the way for the work
that the Oscar-winner does today in India
and elsewhere in the world. Ilaiyaraaja,
on his part, never hesitates to describe
Rahman as a phenomenon.
That generosity of spirit extends to everyone. When the doyen of Tamil film
music, M.S. Vishwanathan, passed away
in July this year, Ilaiyaraaja took the lead
in organizing a concert to pay homage to
the man who composed songs for over
1,200 films.
The remarkably prolific Ilaiyaraaja has
composed over 5,000 songs for more than
1,000 films, besides the background score
of numerous other successful feature
films.
Besides, he has to his credit several acclaimed non-film albums, including How
to Name It and Nothing but Wind, both
of which he released at the height of his
prowess in the 1980s.
How to Name It was Ilaiyaraajas first
fusion album. The numbers draw inspiration from 18th century poet-musician
Thiyagaraja as well as legendary German baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach. The album was proof that
there was nothing in the musical sphere
that was beyond the ken of Ilaiyaraaja.
The purely instrumental album Nothing
but Wind had compositions that featured
flautist Hariprasad Chaurasia playing
raagas with scores of violins. No Indian
music director had ever attempted something of this nature am audacious blend

Saibal Chatterjee is an independent New Delhi-based

film critic and writer who has worked on the staff of
several leading publications, served on the editorial board
of Encyclopaedia Britannicas volume on Hindi cinema
and authored a biography of poet-filmmaker Gulzar.

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Ilaiyaraajas
contribution to lm
music is second to
none. There couldnt
be a more deserving
Centenary Award
winner
of Western harmony with the patterns of
Hindustani classical music.
He continued composing remarkable
non-film music through the subsequent
decades.
In 2010, the Government of India bestowed on him the Padma Bhushan. This
honour was a crowning glory for a composer who has won the National Film
Award the countrys highest prize for
cinema on as many as four occasions.
Three of his National Awards have been
for Best Music Direction for the Tamil
film Sindhu Bhairavi (1986) and the Telugu films Saagara Sangamam (1984) and
Rudraveena (1989).
His fourth National Award was for Best
Background Score for the Malayalam period epic Pazhassi Raja (2009).
On the national level, Ilaiyaraaja is
known for his music in films such Mani
Ratnams Nayagan, Balu Mahendras
Sadma, Bharathans Thevar Magan,
Priyadarshans Kaalapani and Kamal
Haasans Hey Ram. Among the countless other films for which Ilaiyaraaja
composed music are Thalapathi, Mudhal
Mariyadhai, Pudhu Pudhu Arthangal
and Pithamagan.
Today, aged 72, Ilaiyaraaja is still in the

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thick of the action, setting benchmarks

that only the exceptionally talented can
attain. He is currently collaborating with
Hindi film director R. Balki for the fourth
time after Cheeni Kum, Paa and Shamitabh. The upcoming film is Ki and Ka.
In the first half of the 1970s, he was a musician for hire and he worked with many
composers, including Salil Chowdhury,
playing a variety of instruments. He also
served as assistant to Kannada film music composer G.K. Venkatesh before taking the independent plunge.
His rise was meteoric but his success was
obviously no flash in the pan. He built
steadily on the early momentum, delivering hit after hit with relentless regularity.
He has never faltered. Such is the flow
of his music that even those who could
not understand the Tamil or Telugu lyrics were swept away by the power of his
compositions. Only a true maestro like
him can rise above the limits imposed
by verbal language and communicate
through pure music.
Ilaiyaraajas contribution to film music is
second to none. There couldnt be a more
deserving Centenary Award winner.

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