Raaja Gopuram - Nyaana Thangame - Part-2

(Continued from Part-1.....)

Data of Song:

Period : September (?) 1984, Afternoon Session
Studio : Prasad

Song Recorded: Nyaana Thangame
Film : Raaja Gopuram

Sung by : Ilaiyaraaja
Lyrics by : Not known

Situation in film : Not known

Raagam : Maayaa Maalava Gowla

Instruments used : Keyboards (Viji), Lead Guitar (Sadhaa), Bass Guitar, Rhythm Guitars, Shenoy (Subaan), Dilrooba, Mandolins, Flute (Sudhaakar), other Rhythms like Xylophones, triangles, etc and group of Percussions-mainly tabla, and folkish dafla etc.

Voices : Sundararajan for track and a lady is humming in interlude! Then IR sings the actual song

(Initial approx 20 audio clips, explains the track recording that went on, and later IR starts singing the actual song!)

At Recording Console : Emy, the sound engineer and IR.

(myself standing all the time in the corner of that console room where one of two tall big speakers was standing, and I was inches away from the speaker, the sound of which was mind, heart and body blowing !

After that listening, no music systems in this world will give you that quality of listenings!

Of course, my poor tape-recorder could not absorb that much sound, like famous Salangai Oli Kamal’s camera, as he says! That' may be another reason for the poor audio quality)

Scheme of the Song

Just small brief about the Scheme of the Song :

The Prelude starts with the stormy, windy, thundering special effects, then the shenoy straight away plunges you with a deep gloomy mood, the ending of which is supported by the folkish mandolins-uklee type instruments

The Pallavi is the catchy and effective tune and tabla-dafla duo rhythms supported by beautiful bass guitar & echoing xylophone rhythms.

The first interlude starts with melodic humming of “Aarari Aari Aaro” by a lady, followed by melancholic flute pieces and ended with flute-mandolin duet.

Charanam continues the theme of the song effectively covering all the ranges of the raagam, again supported by the bass guitar, xylophone combination faithfully following the entire charanam in the background

The shortened pallavi is repeated

The 2nd interlude starts with Guitar-Dilrooba duet, which will unnerve you with its melancholic melody, followed by Lead Guitar melody with Keyboard fill-ups.

The Charanam again repeated followed by the full Pallavi recitation.

Scheme of Recording :

The Scheme of Recording is as follows:

Initial rehearsals of Preludes, Pallavi, Interludes, charanam,Voice parts etc

Then the track recording starts with individual instruments checking, special effects checking, again prelude, interludes etc

Then the actual Take starts.

Improvisation in each steps tirelessly, effortlessly continue as per the instantaneous instructions from IR.

Takes after takes to consolidate each of the section continues, and finally track recording is over.

By this time the Lyrics arrive and IR starts rehearsing for the lyrics part matching his tune.

Some confusion, mix-ups of voice track plus instrument is realized and again corrections done.

Then IR starts his takes of the actual songs, Pallavi, Charanam-1 and 2 etc.

Again Improvistaion in his own expressions of songs, Modulations of voice etc.

And the recording ends !

The approximately 70 minutes of the tape recording represents the actual 6 hours plus time spent on this song including the various breaks, tapes synchs and replays etc.

Finally the film and song both went unnoticed.

But not anymore with you people who listen this 70 minutes of 70 MB audio files now, and will remember the same for another 70 years !

Since, initially I was in the recording hall as usual, I COULD NOT RECORD SOME OF THE INITIAL PORTIONS. In fact I never had the faintest idea that I will record that.

But fortunately on that day I had the recording set. And I made that Instant Decision !

Later I derived the courage and entered the console room and asked the permission of IR to be there, which he nodded with his approval.

Again after spending some more minutes, I asked permission to record the proceedings there which he approved with hesitation.

(Like the story of Camel which asked for the space for its tail in the tent...and then occupied entire tent!)

So, the first clip starts with rehearsal of humming in the first interlude ! Though some portion was lost initially, Better Late than Never !

All other trivia, I will write later then and there, as listening to the recordings is more important now !

Here we go !

( To be Continued.... in Part-3 )