Thooli Adidudho

"Thooli Adidudho" is a beautiful lullaby for baby Krishna, composed by Vijay. It was in 2009 that we first started work on this. After many a roadblock over 4 long years, I finally decided to publish this here. The orchestration couldn't be finished, nevertheless, just the simple backing track that Vijay Narayanan has created carries the song through so very gracefully. Thanks Vijay, for trusting me with this lovely melody. Hope I've done some justice. Thanks Vijay. N for the track, and thanks Karthik Nagarajan for rendering it with me - you've done a beautiful job as always.

Oh, and Octaves completes 7 years! Thanks people, for visiting. Thanks for keeping this going.

Composer and lyricist: Vijay S. Aiyar
Backing track: Vijay Narayanan
Vocals: Karthik Nagarajan and Sindhuja Bhakthavatsalam



Lyrics:

thooLi AdidudhO, kaNNA thookkam dhaan varudhO
lAli pAdidudhO, mannA thAyin thaen manadhO
neela vaNNA, bAla kaNNA, neeyum thoongida thAyum aengida
thooLi AdidudhO...

pArkkum pArvai pARkadal, mazhalai mozhi pullAnkuzhal
kannam rendum kanirasam unthan uthattil vadivadhu madhurasam
ulagin seyalgaL unakku theriyum
uRangum pozhudhilum nadaththa theriyum
mAyavA, manadhu mayangida

nyAniyE nee thoongida thAlAttu geetham pAdinEn
nALaiyE un geethaiyai indha ulagum vizhiththida pAdu nee
nyAniYE nee thoongida thAlAttu geetham pAdum thAi
nALaiyE un geethaiyai indha ulagum vizhiththida pAduvAi
uRangum vizhikkuL ulagam suzhala
yugangaL siladhundhan kanavil malara
thooyavA, thazhaikkum thavamena

thooLi...

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.

poo vaasam- with Karthik Nagarajan

Octaves turns three and I couldn't have found a better song for today.
Its usually hard to pick out a single favorite song for anyone, but I think if I'm asked to do that, its very likely that I'll pick poo vaasam most of the time.
I usually say that once a composer picks a good raga, half the job is done- for the beauty of the raga itself takes care of much of it. But this song, despite being in one of THE most beatiful ragas (vivahapriya/ shudhdha sarang) stands as a wonderful composition in its own right. I'll be ever so thankful to Vidyasagar for creating such an outstanding melody. Everytime I listen to it, I feel so much thought and care has gone into making each and every bit of it. And of course, can't forget the beautiful lyrics!

Not to mention everything else associated with the song: anbe sivam, one of the classiest and brilliant movies in Tamil cinema- and one with which I really relate to; Kamal Hassan- what an absolute genius... and of course, Madhavan who's adorable in this.

For this song, I could only think of Karthik's voice... and when I heard his recording, I was just amazed. His parts can really pass off as the original, I would say. (I totally loved Vijay Prakash's rendition by the way!)
I've been wanting to do this song for long but never found a good karaoke... So thanks, Karthik for the patience to fix the karaoke track to make it sound as good as the original, and of course for all the efforts in mixing.

This one's probably the most fulfilling cover I've done till date. Here's hoping that you enjoy it too.

And as this blog completes three years today, many thanks to friends, fellow bloggers and well meaning critics who have kept it going through all the hits and misses :)

Song: poo vaasam
Film: anbe sivam
Music: Vidyasagar
Lyrics: Vairamuththu
Singers: Vijay Prakash/ Sriram Parthasarathy (two versions), Sadhana Sargam

Mixing of this version: Karthik Nagarajan

Sonnaalum with Karthik Nagarajan

sonnaalum kaetpadhillai is one of those mesmerizing songs that I call "black holes" - once you start listening to it, it just sucks you in deeper and deeper till the point of no return. What a brilliant song with two of TFM's very best voices- Harini and Unnikrishnan. When it comes to female singers in TFM, the two that I simply adore and worship and Chitra and Harini (who to me is "Shreya of the South" ). While I've sung a quite a few of Chitra's songs, I've sung only one of Harini's so far (manam virumbudhae), that too in the good old days when I hadn't started recording digitally. I'm so glad I finally got to do one more.

Welcome Karthik Nagarajan- with whom I've sung this song- to the world of audioblogging. He's an incredibly talented singer I got introduced to, through a common friend. Do visit his blog that he's started recently to listen to some more of his songs.

Many thanks to Swati and Anil.B.S for the karaoke track. Anil had created this track for Swati and Ali who did a beautiful Hindi version of this song sometime back. Do listen to that one too,here.

So here is our version, up for you.
This song goes out especially to my dad- he totally loves this song, lyrics and all, and listens to it with the same involvement that he has while listening to a Carnatic concert :)

Song: sonnaalum kaetpadhillai
Movie: Kadhal Virus
Music: A.R.Rahman (ONE AND ONLY!)
Lyrics: Vairamuththu
Singers: Harini, Unnikrishnan

This version mixed by: Karthik Nagarajan