Rasarushi Kuvempu

Rasarushi Kuvempu is a biopic , releasing sometime soon.

I think it has been overdue for a long time and was surprised why no movie on Kuvempu's early life and his inspiration and motivation was ever made till this date. Anyways , was very pleased when I got to know this, during my usual search for new music releases.

Kuvempu is considered one of the greatest poets of 20th century Kannada literature. He was much more than a writer.

I never had the inclination or awareness to understand Kuvempu , neither read any of his works. My source of knowledge on this great writer and human being , have been through his songs. I have always liked the passion in the words of songs like " O nanna chetana , agu nee aniketana " or " Baa illi sambhavisu indenna hrudayadali nityavu avataripa satyaavataara " and one of my all time favourites " Tanuvu ninnadu manava ninnadu ".

I hope everyone watches this movie and will inspire people to read more about Kuvempu. In this day and age where local culture and its richness is slowly eroding , it is important to refresh the rich heritage left behind by such great thinkers like Kuvempu.

Ending the post with analysis of one of his works composed to a brilliant song by Mysore Anantaswamy , gives a hint of Kuvempu's greatness.

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Baa Illi Sambhavisu - Analysis

Baa illi sambhavisu indhenna hrudayadhali nithyavoo avatharipa sathyaavathara
mannaagi maravaagi migavaagi khagavaagi bhavavadhi bavisihe bhavavidhoora

The poet says God is in different forms of nature on this earth. Soil, beasts, birds, trees etc. And is inviting God to take the form of his inner soul.

manthanake marathanake migathanake khagathanake
munnadege kannadha guruve baara
koodi bandhenna nara roopa chethanadhi
naarayanathvakke daari thora

This could be seen in two dimensions. He is talking about the evolution. First came soil, then animals etc., and finally human beings. Now I am in the final stage as a human being. Take the form of my inner soul and show me the
route to salvation.
Another way of looking at it is, "maNthana, marathana" etc., being the qualities of human being. "maNthana" - down to earth, swanthike etc., "marathana" - growing big and guiding others, "migathana" - cruel, the bad side of us, "khagathana" - being free etc., With all these qualities, we are formed. Show me the right qualities to be retained and those to get rid off to reach my final destination - salvation (narayaNathva)

andhu aramaneyalli matthe seremaneyalli
alli thurupattiyalli illi kirugudisilali
desaha deshadhi vesha veshantharavanaanthu
vishwa saarathiyaagi leela rathavanenthu
chodhisiruveyo anthe srusti lola

The poets gives examples of different forms of God who is driving this entire world. Andhu aramaneyalli - Lord Rama, matthe seremaneyalli - Lord Krishna, alli thurupatti - Lord Jesus, illi kirugudisalali - Shri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. In these forms, you drove the entire world. And just like you did that, drive me towards salvation.

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C Ashwath

One of the doyens of that unique and special flavour of music Bhavageete , C Ashwath , is no more.

I have always loved Bhavageete in kannada, since good old doordarshan days. There used to be music videos , like this one
www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oUSphxJO1Y,
simple ones with meaningful melodious bhavageete as the background captivated me and boosted my interest in all forms of music.

C Aswath along with Mysore Anantswamy were my favourites. The music is always simple with emphasis on the lyrics and Bhaava. All those brilliant words and feeling in them were brought to life effortlessly by these two.

I was proud that in this age of western musicians ( all credit to them ) hogging all limelight with one after another concerts in Palace Grounds, Bangalore.. one of the biggest concerts was "Kannadave Satya" , an evening of Bhavageete , organised by C Ashwat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpXg6T3B_XE

I hope artists like Ratnamala Prakash, B R Chaya , Pallavi Dattu keep the flame alive of this beautiful , unique form of music.

For me atleast it is end of an era.

TED

I bumped into a video recently and because of that discovered TED.

TED India - Pranav Mistry


" TED: Ideas worth spreading " is a non-profit user community bringing together people from 3 worlds - Technology , Entertainment , Design. The more I found out about this community , the more I am drawn into it.

To start with I think it is a brilliant idea to bring together best of the brains for different walk of life. TED conferences are excellent watch and leads to a lot of healthy discussions on burning topics around the world.

I leave you with 2 more clips.

Devdutt Pattanaik

Hans Rosling

Are Huzoor .. Wah Taj Boliye !!

Its been a long time since my last post, but I couldnt have asked for a better topic to write about.

Last week a colleague of mine sent us a link ( http://www.barbican.org.uk/music/event-detail.asp?ID=8961 ) which said "Zakir Hussain - World-renowned tabla virtuoso returns". We decided to go to this concert , discussed at length about how much we loved this Ustaad and just about forgot about it afterwards. I being me , thought of seeing the maestro live never left my brain.. so I resurrected the idea again and convinced couple of people to join me.
We booked tickets without any delay and waited eagerly for Friday evening.

Ustaad Zakir Hussain , needs on introduction I am sure. I have always enjoyed all his performances that I have watched in TV.He brings in something extra to all his performances. Who can forget the flowing hair from "Tajmahal Tea" advertisement - if you didnt know already my title comes from Ustaad's dialog in the ad).

Anyways.. we set off early from work and strolled casually towards Barbican centre. The auditorium ( its actually much more than that ) , looks typical victorian building from outside. Moment we stepped inside, it took my breadth away. There is something about this place , that oozes art. We collected our tickets , and got into the auditorium.

Lights dimmed out and Sitar strains started slowly. Ustaad took to the mike , paying tribute to demise of Sarod maestro Ustaad Ali Akbar Khan. It was impromptu I think , but the performance that followed , tugged our hearts and I thought it was a honest tribute from one musician to another. Ustaad and Nilaadri Kumar on Sitar gave a brilliant performance.

After a 20 min break, the actual concert started. What followed afterwards for about 2 hours was out of this world to say the least. Manipuri dancing drummers were rhythmic , athletic and graceful , Saarangi , tabla combo and Sitar Tabla combo was mesmerising. Doyra by Uzbek performing was enthralling and the finale were all 6 performers came together was brilliant.We didnt want it to end and couldnt get enough of this variety performance.

The whole program re-emphasised my belief in the sheer variety of Indian Music. I believe performers like Ustaad Zakir Hussain , Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, Ustaad Amjad Ali Khan , Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia have done and are doing a great service in continuing the age old tradition of keeping our art forms alive. They have also not shied away from improvising and jamming up with western musicians , thus spreading our music to the world as well as keeping the yougsters intrested.

I can only say " Wah Ustaad Wah ".

Gulaal

Touted to be the best movie till date to come out of Anurag Kashyap , Gulaal is a powerful cinema.  Come to think of it , this was expected. Anurag Kashyap has given us Black Friday , No Smoking , Dev D, none of which are your run of the mill bollywood flicks.

At the outset , the story is about independence movement spear headed by KK in a fictional state. First half runs through briskly and requires complete attention , otherwise risking missing out on complex character relationships. Also another risk is missing out on powerful dialogs and songs with contemporary lyrics from Piyush Mishra.  This man is a powerhouse of talent , and bloggers are already going mad about how much we have lost in not getting to see him earlier.

Its important to get the context to completely understand the complex intertwining of politics, love , deceit , disenchantment. It seems Anurag was in lot of anger after trial and tribulations he had to go through to get Paanch released ( looks like it is going to release in 2009 ) and he had been listening to Pyaasa  song "Ye duniya agar mil bhi jaaye to Kya hai". All of that was poured out to a story and Raja Choudhary ( Dileep ) chipped in to provide the context ie Rajputana movement and added to that Piyush Mishra's music score. End result is a compelling watch.

Although I was bit letdown by 2nd half and especially the climax, there is no taking away the impact it has as you walk out of the theatre.  Gulaal is a must watch for any lover of pure cinema.

Go watch it today and make sure you listen to all the songs , if not for their tune but for their lyrics.

Sample this rejig of "Sarfaroshi Ki Tamanna" , which sadly is not part of the soundtrack. Hope Anurag releases a CD of just the dialogs.

Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamare dil me hai
Dekhna hai zor kitna bazu-e-kaatil me hai
Waqt aane pe bataadenge tujhe e aasmaan
Hum abhi se kya batayen kya hamare dil me hai

Oh re Bismil kaash aate aaj tum Hindustaan
Dekhte ki mulk saara kya tashan, kya chill mein hai
Aaj ka launda yeh kehta hum to bismil thak gaye
Apni aazaadi to bhaiya laundiya ke til mein hai.

Aaj ke jalson me Bismil ek gunga gaa raha.
Aur behron ka wo rela naachta mehfil mein hai
Haath ki khadi banaane ka zamaana lag gaya
Aaj to chaddi bhi silti englison ki mill mein hai

Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamare dil me hai…
….kya batayen kya hamare dil me hai

Bhavageete

Literally meaning "emotion poetry" is a form of light music , unique to Karnataka and it seems Maharastra. 

I first fell in love with this form after hearing a couple of beautiful compositions by late Mysore Ananthaswamy. He had been a pioneer in this form of music along with Kalinga rao and C Ashwath.

Lyrical qualities of the songs are outstanding , which is quite obvious considering the fact that notable poets whose works are composed to music include Kuvempu, D R Bendre , Gopalkrishna Adiga , K S Narasimhaswamy , G S Shivarudrappa, Nissar Ahmed, N S Lakshminarayana Bhatta etc.

The essence of peotry is not lost , which is how it should be. I believe Bhavageete is quite close to Ghazals in form , although the content covers a range of emotions in Bhavageete is vast. 

My favourites till date include "Ede tumbi haadidenu" , " tanuvu ninnadu ", " baa illi sambhavisu " , and all of Mysore Mallige compositions.

This is one form of music that hopefully will never be lost amidst all the competition from local film songs to western music imports. 

Allah Rakha Rahman

One more milestone for maestro , one of many many more to come. I get a feeling it means a world to him to be able to represent India and our rich musical heritage in the western world. 

I still remember the day when I first heard Roja songs. Chinna Chinna Asai was an instant addiction. Refreshing melody , great picturisation added to the beauty of the song. I had been a big fan of Ilayaraaja , but Roja's sounds were new and fresh. It took a bit of time to figure out the music director for the movie. I have this habit of finding to all possible details about a music score , starting with Music director, singers etc .. so it didnt take long to get the people behind the music score. Added to that this was my favourite director's movie , so I had to know everything about it.

Anyways, with a great beginning came great expectations. People wanted to write him off. Rahman refused to be bogged down either by praise or criticism. Music scores that followed proved everyone wrong, be it for huge hits like Kaadalan , Kaadal Desam , Gentleman or lesser fortunate ones like Kizahkku Cheemayile or Pavithra. Rahman's music was just getting better and bigger and versatile with every movie.  Songs like Urvashi or Chikku buku railey from Kaadalan or Mustafa Mustafa from Kaadal Desam were anthems during my Uni days. His romantic numbers were fodder for all the budding romances in College .. Ennavale or Anbe were just the right kind of songs to fall in love with.

And then Rangeela happened , that catapulted him to the larger audience. Who can forget Rangeela Re or Kya Kare kya na kare. There were also beautiful songs with not so beautiful lyrics from dubbed movies like Hum Se Hai Mukabla ( Kaadalan ) etc. Again people were wanting to write him off saying he will not make it big in Hindi and meet the same fate as other artists from down south like Ilayaraaja , SPB , Kamal Hassan. 

Trust Rahman to prove all his detractors wrong. Soundtracks to come out were again melodious and long lasting with Dil Se , Pukar , Taal just to name a few. Then came a slew of patriotic movie scores with The Legend of Bhagat Singh , Swades , Mangal Pandey and Bose The Forgotten Hero topping the list. I personally feel Rahman is the best when it comes to rousing patriotic feelings to the level of turning one into a jingoistic person. I get goose bumps when I listen to Desh Mere , Swades or Desh ki mitti. 

Chartbusting VandeMaataram , I believe is another milestone for the maestro. VandeMaataram, clarion call of our freedom fighters , got a re-birth because of Rahman. 

I am sure maestro is far from finished. 2008 was a fantabulous year that showcased the true talent with unmatchable variety that only Rahman can compose. 2009 has started with a bang with Delhi 6. 

Jai Ho!