Deeper analysis of the unusual conversations –

part 1
We did a detailed review of Raja’s unusual conversations, which are basically, CR arrangements
outside his usual instrument combinations. In summary, we reviewed 35 clips consisting of 129
segments of his unusual conversations. What does this review of his orchestration technique tell us?
In my view, there are several things that can be surfaced if we start deeply analyzing the data that led
to those several posts on unusual conversations. This technique has a strong correlation to his
popularity – tall claim, huh?

Let’s try and look at this data, layer by layer, to drive home some observations. I did not use the term
conclusions, as no one technique can lead to any strong conclusion of a composer’s work that is so
broad and so deep.

To begin with, let’s go back to restate some of the assumptions in this analysis:

1. Usual conversations are C&R arrangements between violins, flute, guitar. Unusual
conversations are C&R arrangements that can involve one of the usual instruments, but the
other instrument cannot come from this grouping. For example, a violin-flute or guitar-violin
conversation is considered usual, but for analysis purposes, a guitar-veena, trumpet-flute
conversation is considered unusual
2. The unusual conversations have a close relevance with usual conversations. In fact,
the volume of these two types of C&R arrangements vary, but the overall trends that they
indicate are equivalent
3. The list created for this analysis purpose, used about 1,600 tracks of Raja’s work.
Though he has about 4,500 tracks, the assumption is that these 1,600 tracks are sufficient to
uncover any trends
4. There are few tracks in the unusual conversations database that have more than one
entry. Most of them are single entry per track

Now let’s try and understand the unusual conversations data that was used in the past 20 posts or so
in creating tracks that you enjoyed.

Unusual Tracks with

Instrument Occurrences
Bass Guitar 2
Bells 24
Chorus 5
Dilruba 1
Harmonium 1
Jathi 4
Mirudhangam 4
Persussion 12
Sax 2
Shehnai 7
Sitar 4
 Solo Violin 1
Synth 57
Tabla 5
Trumpet 7
Veena 43
Voice 30
Water 1
Grand Total 210

There were 210 tracks where unusual conversations were observed in an overall population of 1,600
tracks. The above table shows the unusual instrument and the number of observations involving such
an instrument. For example, the veena line shows a number of 43. The way to read this is as follows:
there were 43 observations of Raja’s interludes where he has used veena in conversation with
another musical instrument. All the observations must comply with the rules of a C&R arrangement.

Let’s take a slightly different view of these 210 observations and link them to the decade of their
occurrence:

Unusual
conversation
Decade occurrences Percent
1970 6 3%
1980 151 72%
1990 47 22%
2000 6 3%
Grand
Total 210