Ilaiyaraaja

Ilaiyaraaja

Born : 02-06-1943
Origin : Tamil Nadu, India
Occupation(s) : Film composer, music director
Instrument(s) : Vocals (playback singing), guitar,piano,harmonium.



Ilaiyaraaja (born June 2,1943 as Gnanadesikan) is an Indian film composer, singer, and lyricist. He has composed over 4,000 songs and provided background music for more than 800 Indian films in various languages in a career spanning 30 years.He is based in Chennai, India.
Ilaiyaraaja was the most prominent composer of film music in South Indian cinema
during the late 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s.His work integrated Tamil folk
lyricism and introduced broader Western musical sensibilities into the South
Indian musical mainstream. He has thrice won the Indian National Film Award for
best film scoring.He is married to Jeeva, and the couple's two sons (Karthik
Raja and Yuvan Shankar Raja) and daughter (Bhavatharini) are film composers and
singers.

INDEX

1 Early life and education
2 Career and music
2.1 Impact
2.2 Style
2.3 Non-cinematic output
2.4 Accolades and notable works
2.5 Live performances
3 Awards and honours
4 Partial discography
4.1 Tamil
4.2 Malayalam
4.3 Telugu
4.4 Kannada





Early life and education

Ilaiyaraaja was born into a poor rural family in Pannaipuram, Then district,
Tamil Nadu, India. He was the third son of Daniel Ramaswamy and Chinnathayamma.
Growing up in a farming area, Ilaiyaraaja was exposed to Tamil folk music,
such as the songs sung by farmers working in the fields. His formative contact
with music-making and performance came at the age of 14, when he joined a
travelling musical troupe headed by his elder step-brother, Pavalar Varadarajan,
who was a propaganda musician for the Communist Party of India.He journeyed through numerous villages, towns and cities in South India with his
brothers for about ten years as one of the musical Pavalar Brothers. He first
tried his hand at composing music during this period: he set to music an elegy
written by the Tamil poet laureate Kannadasan for Jawaharlal Nehru, India's
first prime minister.Arriving in Madras (now Chennai) in 1968, Ilaiyaraaja enrolled under the tutelage of Dhanraj, a music teacher, as it became apparent that formal knowledge in music such as musical notation was vital for a professional music career. He was introduced to Western classical music during his training, and the music and compositional styles of Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, and Schubert,among others, were influences that would later become a motif in much of Ilaiyaraaja's compositions (such as the use of counterpoint). Ilaiyaraaja's classical music training culminated in him completing a course with a gold medal in classical guitar (higher local) with the Trinity College of Music,London.

Career and music

In Chennai, Ilaiyaraaja worked in a band for hire involved in performing music
for various stage shows and formal occasions. Ilaiyaraaja also worked as a
session guitarist and keyboardist/organist for film music composers and
directors such as Salil Chowdhury from West Bengal, who often recorded music in
Madras.Later, he was hired as an assistant to the Kannada film
composer G K Venkatesh, an event that marked his entry into film music
composition and direction. He assisted this music director in 200 film projects,
mostly in Kannada.During this stint, he learned the practical methods of
orchestration, and would hone his compositional ability through frequent
experiment accomplished by persuading session musicians to play, during their
break times, the scores that he wrote.
Ilaiyaraaja's break as a full-fledged composer came in 1976, when film producer
Panchu Arunachalam decided to commission him to compose the songs and film score
for a Tamil-language film called Annakkili ('The Parrot'). The resulting
soundtrack, together with others that quickly followed, earned Ilaiyaraaja
recognition for his adaptation of Tamil folk poetry and music to popular film
music orchestration. Ilaiyaraaja helped reinvigorate the Tamil film
music which, by the mid-1970s, was experiencing a stagnation of ideas.As
demand mounted for his 'new' sound, Ilaiyaraaja emerged by the mid-1980s as the
leading film composer and music director in the South Indian film industry.
Besides Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada films, he has scored music for
Hindi (or Bollywood) film productions such as Sadma (1983), Lajja (2001) and
Cheeni Kum (2007). He has worked with noted Indian poets and lyricists such as
Gulzar, Kannadasan, Vairamuthu and T.S. Rangarajan (Vaali),and film
directors such as K. Balachander, K. Vishwanath Singeetham Srinivasa Rao and
Mani Ratnam.

Impact

Ilaiyaraaja and musicians during a recording session Ilaiyaraaja's arrival onto
the scene of film music composition in South India broke some new grounds in the
industry. It saw increased efficiency in the film scoring process and a greater
centralisation of expressive control in the hands of a musical director.
The Indian filmmaker Mani Ratnam illustrates:
"Ilayaraja would look at the film scene once, and immediately start
giving notes to his assistants, as a bunch of musicians, hovering around him,
would collect the notes for their instrument and go to their places. When the
orchestra played out the notes, they would be perfect, not just in harmony but
also in timing — the background score would commence exactly where it should
and end at the exact place required... A film director can be taken by
surprise at the speed of events.”
Ilaiyaraaja was the first film composer to extensively employ within the Indian
film music framework the harmonies and string arrangements intrinsic to Western
classical music.This allowed him to craft a rich tapestry of sounds for
films, and his themes and background score gained notice and appreciation
amongst Indian film audiences.The range of expressive possibilities in
Indian film music was broadened by Ilaiyaraaja's methodical approach to
arranging, recording technique, and his drawing of ideas from a diversity of
musical styles.According to musicologist P. Greene, Ilaiyaraaja's "deep understanding of so many different styles of music allowed him to create
syncretic pieces of music combining very different musical idioms in unified,
coherent musical statements".Ilaiyaraaja has composed Indian film songs
that amalgamated elements of genres such as pop, acoustic guitar-driven Western
folk, jazz, rock and roll, disco, funk, doo-wop, march, bossa nova, flamenco,
pathos, native folk, Afro-tribal, and Indian classical. By virtue of this
variety and his interfusion of Western, Indian folk and Carnatic elements,
Ilaiyaraaja's compositions appeal to the Indian rural dweller for its rhythmic
folk qualities, the Indian classical music enthusiast for the employment of
Carnatic ragas, and the urbanite for its modern, Western-music sound.

Style

Ilaiyaraaja's music is characterised by the use of an orchestration technique
that is a synthesis of Western and Indian instruments and musical modes. He
pioneered the use of electronic music technology that integrated synthesisers,
electric guitars and keyboards, rhythm boxes and MIDI with large orchestras that
also featured the veena, venu, nadaswaram, mridangam and tabla.The
popularity of Ilaiyaraaja's music is attributed to his flair for catchy
melodies, and to his employment of subtle nuances in chord progressions, beats
and timbres.Ilaiyaraaja's songs typically have a musical form where
vocal stanzas and choruses are layered by orchestral preludes and
interludes.They often contain polyphonic melodies; the lead vocals are
interwoven with supporting melody lines sung by another voice or played by
instruments. Polyrhythms are also apparent, particularly in songs with Indian
folk or Carnatic influences. The melodic structure of his songs demand
considerable vocal virtuosity, and have found expressive platform amongst some
of India's respected vocalists and playback singers, such as K.J. Yesudas, S.P.
Balasubramaniam, S. Janaki, P. Susheela, K.S. Chithra, Malaysia Vasudevan, Asha
Bhosle and Lata Mangeshkar.Ilaiyaraaja has sung his own compositions for
films,and is recognisable by his rustic and nasal voice. He has penned the
lyrics for some of his songs in Tamil and other languages.
Ilaiyaraaja is known for his evocative film themes and background music, and
examples of these include his work for Pallavi Anupallavi (1984), Punnagai
Mannan (1986), Mouna Raagam (1986) and Geethanjali (1989).

Non-cinematic output

Ilaiyaraaja's first two non-film albums were explorations in the fusion of
Indian and Western classical music. The first, How To Name It? (1986), is
dedicated to the Carnatic master Tyagaraja and to J. S. Bach. It features a
fusion of the Carnatic form and ragas with Bach partitas and fugues and Baroque
musical textures.The second, Nothing But Wind (1988), was performed by
flautist Hariprasad Chaurasia and a 50-piece orchestra and takes the conceptual
approach suggested in the title — that music is a natural phenomenon akin to
various forms of air currents (e.g., the wind, breeze, tempest etc.).He
has also composed a set of Carnatic kritis that was recorded by electric
mandolinist U. Srinivas for the album Ilayaraaja's Classicals on the Mandolin
(1994).Ilaiyaraaja has also composed albums of religious/devotional songs.
His Guru Ramana Geetam (2004) is a cycle of prayer songs inspired by the Hindu
mystic Ramana Maharishi,and his Thiruvasagam in Symphony (2005) is an
oratorio of ancient Tamil poems transcribed partially in English by American
lyricist Stephen Schwartz and performed by the Budapest Symphony
Orchestra.Ilaiyaraaja's most recent release is a world music-oriented
album called The Music Messiah (2006).

Accolades and notable works

The cover of the Ilaiyaraaja album Thiruvasagam in Symphony (2005)Ilaiyaraaja's
composition Rakkama Kaiya Thattu from the movie Thalapathi (1991) was amongst
the songs listed in a BBC World Top Ten music poll.He composed the music
for Nayakan (1987), an Indian film ranked by TIME Magazine as one of the
all-time 100 best movies,a number of India's official entries for the
Oscars, such as Anjali (1990)[53] and Hey Ram (2000), and for Indian art
films such as Adoor Gopalakrishnan's FIPRESCI Prize-winning Nizhalkkuthu
('Shadow Kill') (2002).Ilaiyaraaja has composed music for events such as
the 1996 Miss World beauty pageant that was held in Bangalore, India, and for a
documentary called India 24 Hours (1996).

Live performances

Ilaiyaraaja rarely performs his music live due to heavy commitments to
composing.His last major live performance, the first in 25 years, was a
four-hour concert held at the Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium in Chennai, India
on 16 October 2005. The show was widely televised both in India and abroad.
Less well-known was his live 2004 performance in Italy at the Teatro Comunale di
Modena, an event-concert presented for the 14th edition of Angelica, Festival
Internazionale Di Musica, co-produced with the L'Altro Suono Festival.
He had done a few small-scale shows early in his career in Sri Lanka and
Malaysia and was involved in a charity concert to raise funds for the
construction of a Hindu temple in India.A television retrospective titled
Ithu Ilaiyaraja ('This is Ilaiyaraja') was produced, chronicling his career.

Awards and honours

Ilaiyaraaja has won the National Film Award for Best Music Direction for the
films Saagara Sangamam (1984), Sindhu Bhairavi (1986) and Rudraveena (1989).
He won the Gold Remi Award for Best Music Score jointly with film composer M. S.
Viswanathan at the WorldFest-Houston Film Festival for the film Vishwa Thulasi
(2005).
He was conferred the title Isaignani ('savant of music') in 1988 by Tamil Nadu
Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi and received the Kalaimamani Award, an annual
award for excellence in the field of arts from the Government of the State of
Tamil Nadu, India.He also received State Government Awards from the
governments of Kerala (1995), Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh (The Lata
Mangeshkar Award) (1998) for excellence in music.
He was conferred honorary doctorates by Annamalai University, Tamil Nadu, India
(Degree of Doctor of Letter (Honoris causa)) (March, 1994), the World University
Round Table, Arizona, U.S.A. (Cultural Doctorate in Philosophy of Music) (April,
1994), and Madurai Kamarajar University, Tamil Nadu (Degree of Doctor of
Letters) (1996). He received an Award of Appreciation from the Foundation
and Federation of Tamil Sangams of North America (1994), and later that year was
presented with an honorary citizenship and key to the Teaneck township by Mr.
John Abraham, Mayor of Teaneck, New Jersey, U.S.A.

Partial discography

Tamil

1978 Sigappu Rojakkal1989Karakattakaran
1981 Tick! Tick! Tick!
1990 Mannan
1983 Moondram Pirai
1991 Thalapathi
1985 Muthal Mariyathai
1992 Guna
1985 Sindhu Bhairavi
1997 Kadhalukku Mariyadhai
1986 Mouna Raagam
1999 Sethu
1986 Punnagai Mannan
2002 Azhagi
1987 Nayakan
2007 Ajantha

Malayalam

1982 Olangal
1992 Pappayude Swantham Appoos
1983 Sandhyakku Virinja Poovu
1996 Kaalapani
1984 My Dear Kuttichathan
1997 Guru
1985 Yatra
2000 Kochu Kochu Santhoshangal
1986 Poomukhapadiyil Ninneyum Kathu
2001 Friends
1988 Moonnam Pakkam
2003 Manasinakkare
1989 Adharvam
2005 Achuvinte Amma
1991 Ente Sooryaputhikku
2006 Rasathantram

Telugu


1983 Mantrigari Viyyankudu
1988 Rudraveena
1983 Sitaara1988Swarna Kamalam
1983 Saagara Sangamam
1990 Jagadeka Veerudu Athiloka Sundari
1985 Swathi Muthyam
1992 Abhinandana
1987 Anweshana
2007 Anumanaspadam



Kannada

1978 Maathu Tappada Maga
1981 Geeta
1981 Nee Nanna Gellalaare
1981 Janma Janmada Anubandha
1981 Shikaari1981Bharjari Bete
1983 Accident1984Pallavi Anupallavi
1995 Shivasainya
1996 Nammoora Mandara Hoove
1996 Gulabi
1997 Bhoomigeeta
1998 Hoomale
2003 Usire