(by Raghav Ravichandran)
The world is in distress after the outbreak of the deadlyCOVID-19 or Coronavirus. Every time you turn on the TV or look at your mobile, we get to see news of new positive cases tested in India or elsewhere and the death toll as a result of this virus. It’s impossible to not get affected by this as it affects us at so many levels- be it personally or professionally.
In times like these, we need something to hold on to that would give us hope, bring us joy and keep us calm. The need of the hour is something that can take our minds off all that’s happening and just take our minds away from this uncertainty. It can be spending time with your loved ones, watching your favourite movie, anything. For me it’s listening to AR Rahman’s soul-stirring composition ‘Aye Sinamika’ from ‘Oh KaadhalKanmani’.
Not many songs leave you with a myriad of emotions- happiness, joy, sadness and yet at the same time that leave you grasping for breath. That’s the power of this beautiful melody. Right from the start of the song, the music will calm you down. Very few songs in recent times have that quality even after the song gets over. But ‘Aye Sinamika’puts you on a train to calmness right from the word go!
Karthik holds a special place in my heart, as lot of the songs he has sung for Illayaraja, ARR, Harris Jayaraj, Yuvan Shankar Raja and Vidyasgarremain my favourites for various reasons. His voice has that rare quality of making time stop when you listen to the song. A voice so serene and beautiful that can just make you forget everything- a quality that greats like SPB, Hariharan have.
The song in itself has a special place in my heart for various reasons. It reminds me of my best time in my life- one year at Singapore. Couple of years back, when I caught up with few of my MBA mates, we got down to talking and fondly reminiscing our golden time at Singapore and one of my close Nanbas mentioned that ‘Aye Sinamika’ reminds me of our MBA days- filled with joy, happiness, golden times when everything was so good and also of the pain of leaving the country that shaped and defined us to become better people.
Every time I remember our time at Singapore, this gift from ARR-Karthik gives me company. That’s the instant connect this serene and simple melody has on me as a listener. I will be personally indebted to this song, everything about this song- right from the tune, the singing and the beautiful way it was picturised! Trust the master Mani Ratnam to do justice to such a precious song.
In such uncertain times, this song constantly reminds me and helps me to be calm, focussed and not get too worried about things that are not in our control. It gives me the positivity to approach this situation and go about life normally and not get too flustered with it all.
I am sure there will be a favourite album or song that will help you forget everything that’s going around you and just let that song take you on its journey. Listen to that and be thankful for all that’s there than worry about what is and will not be there in the coming days.
Okay on that note, let me get to hearing Karthik help me with guiding me to acing another day professionally and personally. Thank you ARR and Karthik, will always be indebted to you!!
Baradwaj Rangan 
deepakm1989
March 25, 2020
For me soul soothers will be Idhu Enna Maayam from Oram Po, Aagasatha Naa Paathuten from Cuckoo and Nallai Allai from Kaatru Veliyidai.. Anytime when I get stressed I listen to these on loop.. 🙂🙂
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Odiyan Hater
March 26, 2020
Karthik is a #me too guy
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KayKay
March 26, 2020
Karthik:
The Good: Those dulcet tones which can inflect certain phrases for maximum feel good effect
e.g one of my fav Karthik numbers is from Laysa Laysa called “Aval Ulaga Azhagiye” I’ve provided the link to the song below, right after the 1st charanam see how he inflects the Pallavi. That slight modulation of “A-a-val”.(around 2:45) Lovely
The Bad: Said this before, but his voice is too “light”. Doesn’t help that I’m not the biggest fan of tenor vocalists. I tend to gravitate towards the baritones, like SPB, Kishore and Yesudass. But even among the tenors, my pick is the far more versatile Haricharan.
The Ugly: Echoing Odiyan Hater, seems the guy’s a creep
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Priya Arun
March 26, 2020
Oh! I love this song. There was a time when I heard this song on repeat for a few hours non-stop. (It also happened at rather special few weeks of my life). Love the variants he does with “Nee Ennai Neengaadhey”. Thanks for reminding me of this great song. Will listen to it again. Like you said, just for old times’ sake.
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Voldemort
March 26, 2020
Deepakm1989 – was about to comment on Nallai Allai. Stumbled upon it very recently, and boy, what a beauty it is!
*Oligalin thedal enbadellam mounathil mudigindrathey ….. * That whole stanza is a beauty.
The below are, off the top of my head, my list of recent Tamil songs, which are totally soothing –
– Onakkaga poranthene from Pannaiyarum Padminiyum
– Innum konja neram from Maryaan
– Nenjukulla from Kadal
– Vaan Varuvan from Katru Veliyidai (the visual treat doesn’t hurt either)
– Visiri from ENPT
– Mazhai Kuruvi from CCV
– Hey Mr. Minor from Kaviyathalaivan
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shaviswa
March 28, 2020
I like the tune of this song and also the way Karthik sings. However the low quality lyrics is a huge turn off. Sinamika, tsunamika….yuck.
This is one of those films where I felt Rahman should start working with better lyricists.
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Madan
March 29, 2020
KayKay: Agreed and maybe Raja agrees with the both of us these days as he barely seems to use Karthik these days. Although…he has started using Sid Sriram instead! Yikes!!
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Madan
March 29, 2020
I don’t mind tenor voices though I do feel they work better in Englich saangs rather than Tamil or Hindi (that said, Rafi was pretty much a tenor with an unusually good low range – very evident if you hear how effeminate his speaking voice is). I would speculate also that Sukhwinder is probably a tenor. The problem with Karthik (which makes him worse in some ways than Sid’s over earnestness) is he is too slight, not just light. Always in cruise control, like he is just ‘above’ getting, you know, involved in the song he’s been signed up to sing. Maybe that’s not his intent and he is brimming with passion inside but it doesn’t come out in his singing unfortunately. The saving grace is at least he is extremely competent and quite accomplished technically. Listen to Naresh Iyer murder Sundari Kannal and you will be thankful for Karthik.
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shaviswa
March 29, 2020
@madan would you consider SPB’s as a tenor voice?
And I thought Rafi’s was actually counter tenor. He does hit some exceptionally high notes for a male singer.
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Madan
March 29, 2020
shaviswa: No, pretty much a baritone, but not with much lower range (compared to say Kishore, not even gonna touch Yesudas).
Rafi could be a countertenor too, who knows, but that would then make his lower range even more ridiculous. It’s possible. There are sopranos who get to the lower 3rd octave, so a countertenor going deep into the 2nd octave is possible as well.
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shaviswa
March 29, 2020
@madan Yes. SPB’s lower range is limited. That was why I felt his could be a tenor voice. I just love Kishore Kumar’s lower range songs. He renders them a lot better – especially the melancholic songs where he oozes that feeling into it. One example will be – O Saathi Re. Every time I hear that song, it gets me really really emotional.
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Madan
March 30, 2020
The reason SP’s lower range is limited could be that (a) he probably didn’t work on it to find a way to expand it as he seems to have been a fan of Rafi from the get go and must have spent more time practicing Rafi songs and (b) he was singing very high pitched songs for KVM, MSV up until Raja lowered his pitch a little. Actually not just Raja but also Rajan Nagendra. So this must have pushed up his register over the years. In recent years, I feel his lower range has depleted a little while his high notes are intact.
If you take Rafi’s voice too, for a countertenor/high tenor, his high range isn’t THAT high. It sounds blasphemous to say this in an Indian context but he only used his chest voice and as a result, his highest note is a B flat in the fourth octave. Which is not very difficult to hit for a tenor. I am a tenor and I can get up to C5 with some difficulty (and the high notes of Rakhwale quite comfortably). My spoken voice isn’t as high as Rafi’s so had he learnt to use a mixed voice, he would have had half an octave more of range easy. Of course, for the film music of that time, it wasn’t necessary and for a long time, there was a puritanical notion that notes not sung entirely with a chest voice are false/impure, some such nonsense. I hear SPB slightly mixing on stuff like the scat vocalise of Vaanengum (Moondram Pirai).
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Amit Joki
March 30, 2020
I’d really like to know about these things. I for myself have no problem in singing songs sung by Aniruth and Sid Sriram without breaking a sweat. I cannot perfectly sing songs sung by Yuvan without breaking up. Which voice would mine be?
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Madan
March 30, 2020
“I cannot perfectly sing songs sung by Yuvan without breaking up. ” – When you say breaking up, you mean your voice cracks? Which songs specifically? By the way, it need not be a register/pitch issue but too much power also.
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Jayram
March 30, 2020
Another Kishore lower range song I love a lot is Koi Hota Jisko Apna. When he hovers around the low notes and finally hits the low Sa (A/B flat), it is full of pathos. I am able to hit those notes with ease due to my high school choral training and constant listening of baritones/basses like Kishore, Hemant Kumar, Yesudas and the king of them all, BMK.
One Rafi song I can’t get enough of is Meri Awaaz Suno which is one of the rare (mostly) lower range songs which brings so many emotions when I listen to it. When he starts the 1st and the 3rd charanams with the low Sa (C), one can feel the pain in his voice. I need not say more about the rest of the song.
I think I would classify SPB as a tenor, though I can easily recall him singing in the lower range in the beginning for songs like O Papalali and Jagada Jagada (both from Geethanjali). And then there is Nachina Fuddu Vechani Beddu from Indrudu Chandrudu.
Madan/shaviswa/others, where do we place Manna Dey and Ghantasala in this equation?
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Madan
March 30, 2020
“Another Kishore lower range song I love a lot is Koi Hota Jisko Apna.” – One of the first songs I think of to exemplify Kishore’s lower range. Another favourite (from that perspective) is Teri Duniya Se Hoke Majboor. Jeevan Se Bhari is another. Pyaar Humein Is Mod also has a rich low note, showing his voice had barely aged even by Satte Pe Satta.
Manna Dey is still a baritone, I think, but bit higher range than Kishore. Maybe a low tenor. Cannot comment on Ghantasala, simply haven’t heard enough to judge. I wish there were these range compilation videos for our great playback singers the way there are for many rock/pop singers up on Youtube. Would be much easier to gauge range and fach of the singer from that. I would be interested in doing it myself but the one time I attempted such an upload for one of my favourite female singers in rock, I had so much difficulty escaping copyright restrictions I felt it wasn’t worth the effort (wouldn’t have been, rather, but for the fact that many fans of the singer did see the video and hopefully found it useful).
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Jayram
March 30, 2020
Thanks Madan. I nearly forgot about Pyaar Humein Is Mod Pe Le Aaya. That rich low note is impeccable. And it fits Amitabh to the tee!
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Madan
March 30, 2020
Jayram: Yes, I think Kishore’s voice probably suited Amitabh even more than Rajesh Khanna. RK’s diction was a little soft but when Amitabh spoke, it felt exactly the same as the sound of Kishore singing for him.
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Amit Joki
March 30, 2020
Madan: Have you heard of Kambathu Ponnu? I have trouble transitioning to “Adadada manja sevappu” part. Also, I can’t seem to be getting the first “Vandeeeeeeeeee Maataram” in Thai Manne Vanakkam.
I guess it is because I start at a high pitch normally and when the actual high pitch comes, my voice breaks. That doesn’t seem to be the case when I start with a low pitch but the non-high pitch notes don’t have the punch. They kind of fizzle out.
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KayKay
March 30, 2020
“Although…he has started using Sid Sriram instead! Yikes!!”
Hahahaha I detect someone who’s not exactly on the Sid Express.
Sid Sriram’s current reign atop the playback scene has a parallel to Hariharan’s in the ’90s.
Two very,very, accomplished singers who get to suffuse their songs with their technical virtuosity (Hari with his Ghazal stylings and Sid with his Carnatic inflections) and I can’t shake off the nagging feeling that like Hari, Sid’s time as Go To Singer will be as brief.
Don’t get me wrong. A mark of a good singer is how your rendering virtually single-handedly rescues an otherwise thoroughly mediocre song, and this example of a song from Jasmine perfectly illustrates my point. Average tune and cringe worthy lyrics salvaged purely by Sid’s singing
But I do agree, there’s an over earnestness to his phrasing. Or maybe it’s sour grapes on my part. As a natural baritone, hitting some of his scales is beyond me 🙂
As for Raja, for a composer who spent the better part of 2 decades rarely offering chances to new singers (sure a Deepan Chakravarthy here or an Arun Mozhi there would creep in temporarily but Isai Ngani rarely broke out of his SPB/ Malaysia Vasudevan/ Mano/ Yesudass comfort zone) he later had no qualms about latching on to Flavor Of The Month singers like Hariharan then and Sid now
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KayKay
March 30, 2020
shaviswa, SPB is a baritone for me. Much more of a tenor when he started out singing and sounded like a Ghantasala clone but as he developed his own singing identity, he lowered his pitch but I will agree that he probably didn’t get too many songs at a lower register.
Some of Raja songs where SPB comfortably sang at a baritone level were “En Kanmani Un Kadhali” from Chittukuruvi, “Mudhan Mudhalaga Kadhal Duet” from “Niram Maratha Pookkal” but my pick of SPB at his baritone-y best is this gorgeous number in Hamsadhwani Raaga, especially pronounced when juxtaposed against Jency’s nasal vocals
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shaviswa
March 30, 2020
Kaukay
Yes – Mayile Mayile is an excellent example of SPB’s baritone. Thanks for reminding me of this.
But yes. Most of his songs are at s higher pitch. And this is probably because Tamil film songs are typically at a higher pitch and being able to sing at that is a basic requirement for singers.
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shaviswa
March 30, 2020
And Sid Sriram is actually very very good when he sings pure Carnatic music. His films songs grate the ears though.
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shaviswa
March 30, 2020
@Jayram AFAIK Ghantasala is a tenor singer. SPB’s initial days were like he was an imitation of Ghantasala. He changed and adapted over the years and by the time he started to sing for Raja he had developed a style of his own and had lowered his pitch.
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Jayram
March 30, 2020
Now that I think of it, I’d probably reclassify SPB as a baritone.
Another delight from Kishore da: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkNA-Ec3NqQ
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sai16vicky
March 31, 2020
@KayKay:
Sid Sriram’s current reign atop the playback scene has a parallel to Hariharan’s in the ’90s.
I agree with their strong classical backgrounds but Hari was a monster in the 90s and Sid Sriram (with all due respect) is nothing close. I mean would someone believe that ‘Nila Kaigiradhu’, ‘Tamizha Tamizha’, ‘Malargale’, ‘Chappa Chappa’, ‘Viduthalai’, ‘Romeo Attam Pottaal’ and many many more gems were sung by the same singer. Just look at the astounding variety; I recall an interview with Rahman where he said he used to record anything that Hari sang in the 90s because it was all good. In fact, if there was one singer who was the best-of-many singers, it was Hari. Unfortunately, some of his personal habits intruded his career.
Sid is definitely a good singer and one of the best in the current lot (both in terms of singing/classical training). However, the kind of songs he has picked/gotten so far (except Thalli Pogathey here, Kadallalave there, ENPT songs) have been not that extraordinary. But one could also say, there is no one to Sid as Rahman was to Hari 🙂
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Madan
March 31, 2020
“Hahahaha I detect someone who’s not exactly on the Sid Express.” – Actually I don’t mind him. He is more versatile than Hari. After listening to Adiye, I would have never imagined he was a trained Carnatic vocalist capable of doing kutcheri in Margazhi Mahautsavam. I think my irritation fundamentally stems from…
” he later had no qualms about latching on to Flavor Of The Month singers like Hariharan then and Sid now” – Yeah and this time, not only him, but everyone has latched onto the Sid bandwagon. Guys, not like he’s the greatest thing after sliced bread. There are other good singers too like Haricharan and Satyaprakash, give them opportunities too. I think Sid has potential if he works to overcome his boyishness which may be exactly what makes him so popular now but which people will grow tired of quickly and then, composers will simply jump to the next big thing. Right now, just the experience of hearing that boyish tone in song after song is grating. And Raja most definitely shouldn’t have used him for a mass song on Tameezharasan :D.
By the way, your observation about Raja’s change in approach just shows that he has less work on his hands now and has more time to think about options :D. Back in the 80s, he had too many films on hand to veer from the SPB/Yesu/Mano/SJ/Chitra formula.
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Madan
March 31, 2020
I am an outlier on this but I find Hariharan a little overrated. He is accomplished, certainly, but he doesn’t have discipline of which sangidis to select and which not to use. If I compare him with Yesudas, who was a real powerhouse in Carnatic kutcheris, the latter didn’t use songs as an opportunity to show up what was the most complex sangidhi he could sing. He only used intricate sangidhis when the song had the scope for it (e.g. Thoongadha Vizhigal).
I don’t think Sid has that problem of oversinging songs from a technical perspective. It’s just that one thing, of showing more emotional restraint, which would benefit his style a lot.
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Madan
March 31, 2020
@Amit Joki: “I have trouble transitioning to “Adadada manja sevappu” part. Also, I can’t seem to be getting the first “Vandeeeeeeeeee Maataram” in Thai Manne Vanakkam.” – So…the common denominator in both passages is the singer/composer in this case have sung that high note in a sort of shouty way. That is kind of a trademark of their singing style. But it’s not, technically speaking, the best way to sing that high. Lot of professional singers have these quirks; when we sing these songs ourselves, the best approach in general is to start from a technically sound place and then try to work to something closer to the effect they have produced.
So to start with, I would suggest trying to sing those notes in a relaxed, soft tone. Please understand, I am not saying you should whisper. OTOH you should use your full voice at all times; whispery/airy sound while singing is bad for the voice. Take something like the sound SPB produces when he sings “Chinna thagaram kooda thangam dhane” in Kadhalikkum Pennin Kaigal (Kadhalan). You need more of that SPB sound and less of the Udit sound from that song, as such. So try to bring that sound up into these “Manja Sevappu/Vande Mataram” high notes and see how it goes. Another example. @ 0:23 in this video, when he sings “You became”. This is not dissimilar to the way Sid Sriram approaches high notes when you think about it.
Merkondu doubt irundhal you can write in @ madwiz@gmail.com.
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