"M.S.Shankar's Supremes" was a popular light music troupe in Chennai in the 70's and 80's, started by their lead drummer Shankar, and my uncle Devanathan who was the lead singer and accordion player. In 2007 the troupe revived its music and did a couple of shows- after twenty five years or so. One of them was in September 2007 at the Madras Music Academy, for an event put together by the Indian Telugu Association to felicitate veteran Telugu actor Chandra Mohan. I performed with them at the event, and one of the songs given to me was E Shwasalo. I heard the song and decided it was impossible to do it- given Chitra's pitch and the complexity of the swaras at the end. I somehow managed to pull it off there and got some good feedback too. (I imagine though, that people were probably just being nice to me :P)
I find a lot of similarities between this song and
ThaththiththOm from Azhagan (what I recorded some three years ago). To start off, its the same team - Keeravani (aka Maragathamani aka M.M.Kreem) and Chitra. Also, both are classical/ raga based and both have very complex swaras at the end and both conclude with slow, soft lines. I have no words for Chitra's singing and this is yet another song that reinforces the belief in me that she is not human! I don't understand how a human voice can have this much breath control and flexibility and ease at such high notes. Like
Murali was saying, music directors seem to have used Asha's, Lata's and Chitra's voices like a violin!
I stumbled upon a very good karaoke track for the song recently. Although am not exactly a huge fan of this song, I decided to try recording it just for kicks. So here it is. Obvious disclaimers apply :P
Also, this is my first song in Telugu, a language I don't know, so I apologize for any goof-ups in diction.
Song: E Shwasalo
Movie: Nenunnanu
Music: Keeravani
Lyrics: Sirivennela
Singer: Chitra
