Venue: The Music Academy - Chennai,
Date: June 5, 2010
Time: 7 PM – 10 PM
The music evening has been dedicated to Maestro.Ilayaraaja on His birthday occasion. It has been a new attempt of concert at this Chennai music hall. Certainly, it should be a new experience for all the musicians who have performed in this program. The 3 hours birthday musical tribute for Raaja sir should be one of the unforgettable moments not only for Him, but also for all His enthusiastic fans. In the 3 hours, almost 1-1/2 hours, audiences have witnessed the greatness of Orchestration for Raaja sir's non-film album - "Nothing But Wind" & a hand full of His Film songs.
In that particular 1-1/2 hours, the aforementioned south-indian music hall was filled with array of String orchestra with different parts of tremolo, melodies, accompaniments. Strokes on Double-bass, mind blowing melodies blown out from C flutes {sharp & bass}, D flute, Key-flute & et al., More of three-beat cycle drumming on acoustic drum kit with dense bass effect, fingering on major & minor keys with regularity, sportive chord progressions, chord punches, sudden key changes & high standard of some required melodies on both the Keyboards, chords played on Electric guitar with high electric effect & funky wah-wah through sustain Pedal, running bass chords in bassline & slaps not only through fingers, but also through elbow of the bass guitarist, which converted the show to a mere Rock concert at some places & last but not least vocal harmonies of 2 part choir.
After a few seconds of 7 o'clock, show has been started with His popular cine devotional song - Janani Janani, which was rendered by Bhavatharini. Raaja sir, Lyricist Vaali & north indian composer Uttam singh have lighted the Kuthuvilakku. After the brief narration all about the album "Nothing But Wind" by actress Rohini & accompaniment of Bhasky, the live concert was started.
Singing Self:
Following the four counts by the orchestra conductor & ace-violinist - Prabhakar, string orchestra started playing their notes with high perfection & after 45th sec with a mere silence, music conductor of this show - Prabhakar itself played the articulation part of solo violin, which is uncommon in any orchestra. Subsequent to the heavy strike on bass drum {originally on Timpani} Naveen's breathe on the flute, which came out as original melody of this piece with excellence. Nearly at 7th minute, the fusion of rock elements of high energetic drumming with dense bass by Geo, fingering of veteran Alaap Raju were well received among audience with huge applause. Raaja sir’s high excellence of this composition has influence of Vivaldi & Mozart’s melodic line.
Song of Soul:
Navneeth Sundar {ranjith} who himself an upcoming composer was on one of the keyboards, played uniquely on tip of his fingers {His un-usual style of playing}. Youngest musician of this troop, Leon played running chords other keyboard. Free fingering of Donnan on lead guitar brought the retro ambiance. Besides the skilled outcome of melody by Naveen, Alaap Raju’s bassline chord progression & arpeggios dominated rather than the Geo’s soft drumming of triple beat cycle. Haricharan’s replication of the lead melody was adding ice to the cake.
Mozart, I love You:
This music piece is considered to be Raaja sir’s experimentation of flute opus with waltz array of string orchestra & an Indian raga with different movements. It is not only treat for ears, but also the proficiency of string orchestra wherein musicians’ quick gesture of changing the score sheet & simultaneously glimpse on the conductor’s hand movements were more like treat for audience eyes.
Nothing But Wind:
The title track of this album has allotted less work for the Flutist who appears at the last 2 minutes only. Little Leon has taken care of the birds’ chirping, ducks quacks, frog ribbit, nature ambiance, sounds of train, flight & rocket under guidance of Navneeth who has played the lead melody, brass arrangement & an organ piece on his keyboard. Haricharan has sung the aalap & mystic vocal harmony. Naveen’s flute melody at the end of this piece was more like a cadenza. This piece comprises melodies, harmonies, sounds of nature & ends up with a solo flute piece refers that music is nothing but wind.
Composer's Breath:
It is considered to be an important music piece of this album, which was played for nearly 17 minutes. It contains heavy different movements & pattern of string orchestra with articulation through flute, running chords on keyboard, counter Pan-flute melody was made on keyboard by Navneeth while Naveen was kept on changing the C flutes {sharp & bass} to D flute & again back to the C flutes. Instead of triangle {in original piece}, Geo played cymbol & Aalap Raju’s bass guitar count was alike 1,2, 1, 2, 3, 4 makes 2/4 + 4/4, still shows the count of ¾ whereas melody goes in the measure of direct ¾ time. Interestingly, after 12th minute the fusion of Indian melody through flute & rock elements of slaps on bass guitar with soft drumming was well received among audience with heavy applause, which was a famous music piece used to play on Chennai fm {Priyavin priyamana neram} during ’93-94.
Ace violinist Prabhakar who has re-written the score of this album on listening to its cd, also conducted the orchestra with highly dignified manner. And musicians on the orchestra were par excellent who have made a highly profiled outcome of those valuable music pieces.
To be continued…!
always
~~Raaja rules!
