Tansen revisited, ballyhoo baton, passionate pen, and Vivacious Voice.

Tansen revisited, ballyhoo baton, passionate pen, and Vivacious Voice.

When I was in my tenth class, we had ten essays in English language (subject?!), in which three essays namely ‘The Jackdaw’, ‘Prodigal Son’ and ‘Don Quixote’, considered to be very important, and in the public exam, question papers will surely contain any one of these essays. Hence, teachers used to train the students even starting from the 9th class by giving these essays as home work. I never liked this kind of training, but not to get the cane in my palms, I accosted with this training. But, when I came to the tenth class, I started to love one essay which is about a great singer of Moghal time, Tansen. There were many reasons for my love over the essay “Tansen, the singer”; one important reason was the way my class teacher expressed that lesson. He, an innovative teacher, took that essay by quoting two songs from Tamizh movies; one is “Isai kettal” from Thavapudalvan sung by the veteran singer TM Soundrarajan, and another is the song “Megam Kottatum” from Enakul Oruvan sung by SP Balasubramanium.

Megam Kottatum song was composed by Raaja and penned by Vairamuthu. No need to say anything new about this combination, they combined together and worked for only for a mere 5-6 years, but the songs of those days are still ringing in our ears. Whenever Raja music is for ecstasy, then Vairamuthu pen usually dancing with zeal. The ecstatic chromosome of Raaja and enthusiastic chromosome of Vairamuthu combined together and gave birth to many musical kids, which got eternal life in the music world. The main reason behind this success formula is very simple; THEY KNEW THE VALUE OF TEAM WORK.

well, a ballyhoo baton is ready, a passionate pen is ready, now it’s time to give a vibrant effect, for that, what you need, ofcourse a voice, Vivacious voice, whenever you think of an energetic voice, you will end up with a bubbly name, SP Bala. This song is an epitome and instance of how to sing a stage song for a dancing sequence.

In this song, the way SPB coherent his voice with Raaja’s baton is quite amazing. In between the song, SPB gives vibrant effect with his usual “ya aha haa”, which increases our footstep, and searching for an umbrella to dance with Kamal who sang another version of this song, but the voice of SPB gives complete coverage of a lively dancing number. I’ll rate this song equal to SPB’s “Engaium Eppodhum” from Ninaithale Inikum under the baton of the legendary MSV.

Vairamuthu always gives importance to the lyrics, and it always represents the life an artist, especially the singer’s. In this song also, he gave some apt words to SPB like “Vanambaddi OOyadhu”, and “En Aatathil Minnalum Thoorukume” to the dancing dynamite Kamal, and “Rasigarin Aarvathai Paarkiren, Avar Paadhathil En Thali Saaikiren” to the Maestro, without his era, I can’t even imagine the Tamizh Film Music, but to the above all, the pertinent poetic finishing lines say it all,

“Isai Endhan Jeevan Enbeneeeee”,

These lines are not only for the fizzy SPB, energetic Kamal, efficient Vairamuthu and the Maestro, but also fans like us, they always eagerly waiting for this kind of music from a combination, me one among who while listening to this combination's songs, usualy forget about food and drinks, sometimes his dresses.

-S.Balasubramanian (www.prodigyhub.org)