Matthappoovu from Michael Madana Kamarajan- Cover

Here's a cover of a lesser known song composed by Maestro Ilaiyaraja and sung by Chitraji. I recorded this two years ago but didn't get around to posting it here.

Lesser Known Gruhabhedams: 2X4: A Typology of Gruhabhedams| Rasikapriya, Dharmavati, and more

Here's the last video in the Lesser Known Gruhabhedam series:

Lesser Known Gruhabhedams: 2X3: Hindolam vs. Hamsanandi

Meghame Meghame - Cover

Lesser Known Gruhabhedams: 2X2: Charukesi vs. Gowrimanohari

Lesser Known Gruhabhedams: Season 2

Decided to make a second round on Lesser Known Gruhabhedam. Here's the first one in this second set:

Lesser Known Gruhabhedams: Lalitha and more

Here's the fourth and the last one in the Lesser known Gruhabhedam series.

Lesser Known Gruhabhedams: Lalitha

Here's the third in the Lesser known Gruhabhedam series.

Medley of Evergreen Hits - IndianRaga

Raga Behag has always been a personal favorite and I absolutely loved working on this with these fabulous musicians - check it out!

Lesser known Gruhabhedams: Rageshri

First of a series of videos on relatively lesser known gruhabhedams in classical/ film music.

malargaL kEttEn - Cover

Here's a cover after a while: malargaL kEttEn from the film OK Kanmani. A beautiful melody by AR, it was rendered inimitably as always, by the one and only Chitra. I've tried to "Behag-ize" it a bit more than the original. Disclaimers: no karaoke track here, just a drone; and this was recorded on an iPhone (and enhanced a bit with GarageBand).

Gruhabhedam and Ilaiyaraja - again

Gruhabhedam as a musical phenomenon can never cease to amaze. Gayathri's (of Ranjani-Gayathri duo) brilliant, awe-inspiring Music Academy lec-dem on the topic has recently generated a lot of interesting discussion in the Carnatic music circles, and prompted me to write this long-pending post.

But this post is not about Gruhabhedam in Carnatic music. It is about Ilaiyaraja. Again. (Here and here are articles I've written on Raja and Gruhabhedam in the past.) In my view, just like in Carnatic music, there are good and bad ways of doing Gruhabhedam in film music. I'll get to the bad at the end, but here's the good - or rather, the really, really good. The song I have in mind is aasai adhigam vechu from the film Marupadiyum: http://mio.to/album/Marupadiyum+%281993%29

Gruhabhedam in Sindhubhairavi has been handled exquisitely by stalwarts in Carnatic music - check out this piece by Tanjore S. Kalyanaraman for instance, and then there's of course Lalgudi's legendary swarajathi. But this song - aasai adhigam - is a brilliant case of gruhabhedam from Sindhubhairavi in the film music context. It seems like an innocuous song at first glance but on closer listening you see the beast unleashed in the first interlude and go on to wreak havoc till the end. What a masterpiece! Let me say at the outset that this is not a traditional gruhabhedam involving two "ragas" per se. The song is predominantly in Sindhubhairavi but what it morphs into via gruhabhedam is not really a raga: it's more a scale, or rather parts of a scale - the major scale, roughly speaking.

UPDATE: See this video where I discuss this song.

It starts out in straightforward Sindhubhairavi and continues to be so until half of the first interlude. Then at 1:35 you see it happening. There's a departure from Sindhubhairavi and you hear a more fun and upbeat few seconds there from 1:35 to about 1:42. For a long time I didn't think it was anything special - it just seemed to be a normal change of notes/ modes/ moods. But on closer inspection I found that those notes should really still just sound like Sindhubharivai - 1:35 - 1:43 the notes should be nnnn rr rsss... Why do they sound different? Because there are background chords there that have changed the shruthi! If you listen closely you'll hear a pa-sa bass in the background that makes the nnnn rr rsss sound like rrrr mm mggg. And that's where it starts - taking the Sa of Sindhubhairavi as Ga. And then there's a superbly seamless transition back to Sindhubhairavi around 1:43. And then back to major scale (ish) again in the charanam from 1:53 - 2:09. And then back to Sindhubhairavi at 2:09. What's this man made of?

The charanam beginning ("chinna poNNu naa...") sounds like gpgss... ns rr npp... Why? Again, because he's made us subconsciously move the shadjam. The corresponding Sindhubhairavi notes for that line would be sgsdd... pd nn pgg. But we don't hear it as Sindhubhairavi because of the way Janaki sings it - long, plain notes, and a landing on the da of Sindhubhairavi on the word "naa" making it feel like sa. Here's a short demo I did, singing these lines as in the original, and in a slightly different way if we want to retain Sindhubhairavi. With some very slight modification to the rendering, the feel can be changed back to Sindhubhairavi: with some small gamakas and highlighting the pa. (The singing isn't great - Janaki's shruthi is insanely high for me and the corresponding lower pitch too low.)





So it looks like by simply highlighting the pa and not fixating on da, you get a Sindhubhairavi feel rather than the "fun-n-frolicky" major scale feel. But why remain in plain old Sindhubhairavi when you can come up with genius stuff like this? The second interlude again goes back and forth between major scale (ish) in the instruments and Sindhubhairavi in Janaki's humming. I think for me this song will go down as one of the most incredible gruhabhedams done in film music.

There's of course a lot more the song has to boast about: the tune, the singing, and the instruments all brilliantly capture the state of mind of the woman singing it in the movie and the context couldn't have asked for a better song.

That was about the brilliant stuff. And as promised, here's the bad stuff:
Ilaiyaraja fans, please forgive me but I think nanna neenu gellalare - the 80s Kannada song - is a particularly mundane way of doing Gruhabhedam: 2nd song here. It could serve well to initiate someone into the very basics of Gruhabhedam but beyond that I find it quite shallow and in-your-face. It is too overt and the mood doesn't change along with change of ragas and I find the song to have little musical value. In fact I think the ragas don't change really - all that's happening is that the singers are mouthing different swaras.

Edit: While I think the song is musically flippant objectively speaking, friends have made me realize that it is unfair to evaluate it in a vacuum, stripping it of its context - I acknowledge that the song is set in a particular milieu and reflects the image of the iconic "Dr. Raj" of the 80s. And the context/ film in which this song occurs was probably flippant to begin with. Hat tip to Chaya Rao and Madhusudhan Rao.

Anyway - this was just an e.g. to illustrate a specific point. Needless to say there's simply way too much awesomeness to take from Raja's music - and that's that.

yaaradhu sollamal nenjalli povadhu

9 years of Octaves! Despite the overwhelming presence and influence of social media, microblogging, and social music sharing platforms like Soundcloud, good old blogging still feels like home. Shame that I haven't been able to devote much time to it lately, but hope to update this space more regularly in the coming months.

Here's a cover song after a while - the evergreen and lilting yaaradhu sollamal composed by Shankar-Ganesh from the 1983 film Nenjamellam Neeye. The original is by none other than the formidable Vani Jayaram and of course, this doesn't come even close. I'd learnt and recorded this over a decade ago for a few friends, and got reminded of it today when Youtube suggested the video for me. Thankfully I couldn't find my old recording (I don't know if I can bear to revisit it now - it was probably one of my silliest renditions) but decided to put myself through the bitter-sweet experience of attempting it again. Part of me kept wondering if I could do any justice at all to Vaniji's impeccable voice and masterly rendition. Anyway, greed got the better of me and here's the result.

Ilaiyaraja live in San Jose

I know this post comes very late - I just didn't have the time to sit and write about it, and moreover, for a while after it was over, I was in a stupor and was unable to put anything of what I felt in words. Nevertheless, I thought I should say something about the concert here for the record, since it was easily one of the most cherished musical experiences I have ever had. On March 1st I witnessed a dream concert: "Maestro" Ilaiyaraja was in San Jose with his entire team of amazing musicians. From Chitra to SPB to Hariharan to the no-name stars in the orchestra, the show was nothing short of magic. Four decades of musical brilliance came alive in the 5-or-so hours. The orchestra was impeccable, the singers masterly and fervent, and the man - Raja - himself, stood there truly like a king, bursting with all the years of well-earned and rightful pride and authority. It was an unforgettable evening and I was so emotionally charged - like all the other die-hard fans I'm sure - that I had a "hangover" for almost a week after the concert. I would be doing injustice to the concert if I start talking about any one or two songs, and it would be impossible for me to write in detail about every song. Still, I'll just go ahead and say that pottu vaiththa kadhal had me at the edge of my seat from start to end and sundari kannal and thenpandi chemmaiyile brought tears. If you closed your eyes, you'd think it was the original casette playing (but with the recording boosted up and digitized to modern standards). The rushing violins in sundari kannal were transfixing and the trumpets just so grandiose. Chitra, my idol was her usual adorable self, and SPB was giving us some glimpses of Raja's genius by narrating some anecdotes during composing and having the orchestra play for us some short, isolated bits to highlight the strength of those particular sections. Mano was jovial and entertaining and was a true sport when Raja pulled his leg about his Thamizh years ago when he was learning Shenbagame (although I wonder who *wouldn't* have been a sport with Raja), and Karthik had a great stage presence. The four women who were part of the chorus and also had some solos/ duets each were amazing too. Unfortunately I don't know their names - except for one of them, NSK Ramya. Overall, wonderful evening and the heart felt heavy as it came to an end. Some people were put off by Raja's quirks - they felt he was being too arrogant and not respectful of the people who had paid a lot to watch him. Well, some of his comments were indeed uncalled for - like when he asked "idhu dhaan neenga vaazhara latchanama" or something to that effect when people were whistling/ loudly cheering to some of the songs. But then he's extraordinary, and for all the years of joy he has given us, I don't think I have anything to grumble about and will take anything from him in return for his out-of-the-world music.
We've always known this man to be superhuman, but seeing him live, listening to him sing, pray, pour his heart out, love, cheer, and also admonish, scold, and rant was truly something else. An evening I'll remember for a long time to come.

Another playback song

Here's a glimpse of another song I sang a few lines for in a Telugu film "Chinna Cinema", composed by Praveen Lakkaraju with lead vocals by Srinivas Josyula.



I also sang a couple of lines for a montage song in the same film: https://soundcloud.com/plakkaraju/chinna-cinema-montage-song

Quite excited that I get to share credits with SPB on the same album! Probably the closest I can get to the legend.
Listen to all songs here:
https://soundcloud.com/jaya-venkata-pratap-lavu/sets/chinna-cinema-mp3

Basketball, Meri Jaan

"Basketball, Meri Jaan" is a short (~5 min) film/ documentary made by Veena Hampapur of UCLA. It's about how her mother, Yashodhara, who immigrated to the US 30 years ago, rediscovers her lifelong passion for professional sports and builds for herself a strong, special connection with the local sports community.

I'm happy to have played a small role in the project: Veena has used a short clip of the alap in this recording of mine as the background music for a scene in the film.

The film is now doing the rounds at many a festival including the LA Asian Pacific Film Festival, San Diego Asian Film Festival, and the Asian Americans in Media Film Festival. I wish Veena and the team the very best. I'll probably share a link to the film once it's done with the festivals and officially released online. In the meanwhile, do "like" them on Facebook if you wish: https://www.facebook.com/BasketballMeriJaan

Song for documentary on Shri S. Rajam

Today, Chennai saw the release of a DVD production on the life and works of Shri S. Rajam, renowned painter and Carnatic musician. It is directed by Lalitharam and Kaanthan Balakrishna Shastri, the music is composed by Murali Venkatraman, with lyrics by Hari Krishnan. All of their efforts are commendable and I urge you all to buy the DVD from kalakendra.com. Since Rajam was an unabashed proponent of Vivadi ragas - which back in the day were considered ominous for some reason - Ram requested Murali to compose most of the songs in Vivadi ragas as a tribute to the man. Here is a song that I have sung in the raga Maararnjani.

I had to fight hard with the beastly self critic in me to post this but oh well, here it is anyway, for the record.



The rest of the compositions are wonderful, in ragas including Gamanashrama, Suryakantham, Gangeyabhushani, and a Gruhabhedam from Mohanam to Kamaprabha; and sung by some amazing singers including Adithi Devarajan, Karthik Nagarajan and Murali himself and are all available on youtube. Please do check them out as well.

Vatapi - debut playback song

Happy to share that a song I recorded - Vatapi Ganapatim - for a Telugu movie for Praveen Lakkaraju of New Jersey is now out! I recorded this exactly a year ago and after many anxious and exciting moments, the song has finally seen the light of the day. Also happy that the song features Shankar Tucker on the clarinet. So here goes:

http://www.raaga.com/play/?id=343161

Click here to listen to all the songs in the movie.

And click here for a video of the music director Praveen and lyricist Sreejo talking about their experience with each song in the movie.

Thanks very much to Praveen for the opportunity.

And thank you Octaves - you know how big a role you've had in this.