Another wonderful article describing the creation of a song. Particularly liked rAmanna gAri notes on G making his entry towards the end in the songs, "bRndAvana candamAma" and "pADavEla rAdhikA". Before I proceed any further with my comments on rAmanna gAri "What goes into making of a song?" post(s) I would like to reply to his "Misc" post asking whether anyone was caused an inconvenience because of his (provocative(?) - was this in regard to the comments on current day song making techniques) posts. I, for one, thoroughly enjoyed his posts. And I presume so did the rest of you. But then, how come the posts are not evoking the response rAmanna gAru thought they would (Am I reading you right here, rAmanna gAru :-))? Personally, I feel that it is not easy to respond to such posts. For me it takes considerable amount of time and thougt to reply to posts replete with information. Firstly, it takes time to assimilate the information. Well, that should not deter me from sending a reply. But then, I sometimes feel I have insufficient knowledge to participate in a discussion. Furthermore, I am more comfortable assimilating knowledge than disseminating. Dissemination does take concerted effort and time maybe thats the reason I am comfortable being a silent reader. These could (possibly) be the reasons why I am disinclined towards participating in a discussion. Let me be the so called "intelligent" being and generalize this concept to others (Do pardon me if you feel such generalizations are unwarranted). Maybe we are all of the same mental constitution here. If we are, then we should probably shed our feelings of inadequacy and indulge ourselves in the act of unbridled dissemination :-). What say you? Enough of my didactic writings :-). Let me get back to the "What goes into making of a song?" posts. The list of "Songs based on Classical rAgAs says that "aakASavIdhilO" (mallISwari) is in the rAgAs: bhImpalAs, kaLangada, kIravANi, hamsAnandi. I thought the third stanza (kaLLu mUsina gAni) was in mAyAmALavagowLa. Well, kaLangada is a janyam of MMG. But, what is it that differentiates kaLangada from MMG. Is there anybody who can help me out with this? Maybe the person who classified this song can help me. rAmanna gAru wrote about song associations in one of his posts. I was humming the the first stanza of "aakAsavIdhilO" and somewhere in the middle I jumped to the song "kaLLumUsukuni vaLLu choosukoni kAlam gaDapaku telugODa" and it turns out that, that song is in abhEri. Did I not associate the songs right? Well, it turns out that abhEri is the karnATic counterpart of bhImpalAs, which is a hindustAni rAga. After all, my faculties of Association have no rust in them :-) > Using an instrument also has some influence on the MD to compose a song in a > particular rAga. Examples are: > > 1. tushAra sItala sarOvarAna in sAntinivAsam is composed in hindOLam. The > singing character uses sitAra and hence G might have decided to compose in > hindOLam. > > 2. manasE andAla bRndAvanam in manchi kuTumbam is composed in > hindOLam. Again the singing character uses vINa and hence kOdanDapANi might > have decided to compose in hindOLam. I found the above observation particularly interesting. Does it mean that hindOLam is more of an instrument-based rAgam than a voice-based one? > Using a singer just for a small line gives a diffent dimension to the > song. The first song I noticed was composed by G in "peLLinATi pramANAlu" > and the song is "bRndAvana candamAma" by leela. G comes at the end of the > song with a small line "andamella nIvE Anandamekada nAdE..". In the movie, > it is the best way the hero lets the heroine know that he is > interested (you can call it love :-))) in her. What a subtle way of > expressing the love? Similarly, in "iddaru mitrulu" S.R did compose the > song exactly the same way in "pADavEla rAdhikA". G comes at the > end and sings "praNaya sudhAgItikA". I do not see these kinds of > exchanges in the new movies. :-(((( This reminds me of something that happened a few years ago. Let me recount a small anecdote to you. Several years ago, one day we (rAmanna gAru and I) were listening to "pADavEla rAdhikA" (that was the first time I was listening to and *registering* the song). Just as the song started, rAmanna gAru told me that G would enter the song towards the end of the song. I waited for the end to come, just to listen and see how his part of the song would be. At the end, G sings just one line, "pADavEla rAdhikA, praNaya sudhA geetikA". Its probably G's unique intonation and microtones that G's voice produces (in comparison to the female voice in the song) that adds icing to the cake. I probably might not have appreciated the song as much if it were not pointed out to me that G would enter the song towards the end. Another song in which G is used for a short time is, "vinipincani rAgAle" (MD: S. rAjESwara rAvu). He comes only in the initial AlApana. This song has very interesting interludes. The entire song (based on mOhana) is in white keys except at one place in the interludes. S.R uses kOmal ga at one place and the effect of the usage hits you well (trust me:-)). Comments and suggestions are welcome. ratnAkar. --