A justification that's still not convincing any Rahman fan. He still gets away making baselsess blanket statements. I respect his reviews a lot, but these articles about ARR just go to prove that he cannot get over his personal preferences of Ilayaraja and MSV. Sad, but true. Its like saying, Bardwaj Rangan is a genius but he is able to get his readership across because he is at the right place at the right time. Otherwise I guess he would be restricted to his circle not because he is not a genius but because the time was not right.
Overall, as a Rahman fan, I agree the times are different and *maybe* a little more helpful to new music. I just don't understand the hue and cry about this. Why can't Ilayaraja, if he is as big a genius as Rahman is, make use of the same times and ride the wave? My take is this: In the case of Rahman, it's not new music that's being appreciated it's the original music that's being appreciated. Not to say that his precedents churned out banal music, but it's Rahman's originality that's being celebrated throughout. Originality coupled with melody is what is driving Rahman all the way. And Rahman has delivered time and again - consistently. It would be rare to find a rank bad composition among all his compositions. It is this pursuit of perfection that is being rewarded. Why cannot people just accept that Rahman has achieved what no other Indian has been able to despite wishing and hoping and dreaming to get there. And at some point that has to be attributed to the man himself and his greatness above his precedents. This denial does not worry me, but has me thinking if I am making the same mistake of giving too much importance to my personal preferences, as Baradwaj Rangan has, without looking at facts. The facts, anyway, point to a conclusion that's not contrarian to any of my views! Love, Adi. 2009/1/31 Prakash Balaramkrishna <[email protected]> > > > http://www.desipundit.com/baradwajrangan/2009/01/31/between-reviews-the-right-place-the-right-time/ > > *FEB 1, 2009 - WE HOPED FOR ONE OSCAR NOMINATION,* and he ended up with > three. How else can one celebrate the awesomeness of AR Rahman's achievement > than by appropriating the season's catchphrase-cliché: *Jai Ho*! I'm also > happy for Resul Pookutty, a name I've been noticing in the titles of most > prestige productions of late, and especially ecstatic for that genius > wordsmith named Gulzar. Yes, please note that I said "genius." I'm making a > point of explicitly mentioning this because when I last wrote about another > genius – Rahman (and his Golden Globe achievement) – I'd made a case for his > success being a result of his being, at all times, at the right place and at > the right time, and quite a few readers misread this as taking away from the > composer's genius. > > That's the last thing I wanted to do – for the Tamil film industry has been > blessed with at least three incontrovertible geniuses in the musical front. > I do not have to affix the tag of "genius" before the names of MS > Viswanathan, who came first, or Ilayaraja, who followed, or now Rahman – you > only point out things that need pointing out, and calling these composers a > "genius" is like declaring that the sky is blue. We've had several > hit-makers, musicians who've churned out songs that were on our lips for a > month or two before getting consigned to the trash heap of memory, but this > Trinity – so to speak – has left a mark on how Tamil film music will be > perceived by posterity. If that's not genius, I don't know what is. > > With the right-place-at-the-right-time thesis, I was simply alluding to > the *circumstances *that allowed Rahman's genius to shine through to the > extent that it has. My primary point is this: he arrived on the musical > scene when the country was expanding, when the world was shrinking, and when > he could be exactly who he wanted to be without worrying if enough listeners > would *get *his music. During the age of MSV and Ilayaraja, Tamil film > music was for Tamil Nadu and the Tamils scattered worldwide. Very few > non-Tamils had a clue what this music was all about because the film > industry, the music industry, the country, and indeed the world, was split > up into isolated pockets of locally consumed culture. > > The audience for the music of those older composers was a vertical > cross-section of Tamil Nadu, percolating from the cities downwards to the > tiny little outposts whose names are familiar to us only through the films > of Bharathiraja. And it is a mark of the genius of MSV and Ilayaraja that > they were able to incorporate so many sounds and so many genres into their > music – to pick examples out of a hat, think MSV's big-band stylings in > *Ninaithathai > nadathiye *or Ilayaraja's seamless assimilation of Carnatic and folk music > in *Thanaa vandha sandhaname *– while still satisfying what you'd call the > least-common-denominator listener, the Tamil equivalent of someone from the > North who tapped his feet to massy Laxmikant-Pyarelal numbers. > > But Rahman is a product of a different generation, the kind that never > existed earlier – the global Tamilian, if you will, and by extension, the > global Indian. And when it came to the kind of "sound" of his music – rooted > yet not specifically so, Indian yet not alienatingly so – he had the > extraordinary latitude of not having to depend on that top-down model (of > listeners *inside *a state). He could, instead, get the same numbers of > listeners (and perhaps more) thanks to a *horizontal *model, spread out > across the surface, the cream, the upper crust of the state, the country and > the world. He can, today, afford to appeal only to the equivalent of the > consumers of multiplex movies – because even if there aren't enough buyers > for his kind of global music (think *Hey, goodbye nanba*) inside Tamil > Nadu, the numbers are more than made up for by music enthusiasts across the > country, and around the world. > > Today, Rahman need not concern himself about the pan-Indian viability of – > to take an example from his excellent soundtrack for *Delhi-6* – the > Sting-meets-Steely Dan ethos of *Rehna tu*. This is a global sound that is > not going to find favour in the interiors of an India whose films (at least > from Bollywood) have increasingly oriented themselves towards the tastes of > upscale urbanites – and Rahman wouldn't have been able to put out such a > tune, say, twenty years ago.. (Even if he wanted to, the director would have > balked.) Such phenomenal freedom – to do exactly what one wants to do, and > to be accepted and celebrated for the same – is surely a factor of the age > Rahman is in. > > The generalisations inherent in an analysis of this nature – and in a > newspaper article of this size – obviously preclude exhaustive examples. > When I point to Rahman's "multiplex music" and his predominantly urban > consumers, I understand that he's as capable of crafting, say, the > semi-classical *Manmohana *or the rousingly earthy *Valayapatti thavile*. > But I suspect an interesting trend will emerge if we move away from the > cities and conduct polls on the kind of music the people in the interiors > are really swaying to. I doubt, for instance, that they would have the > patience or the inclination to subscribe to the famous dictum of needing > repeated listenings to get someone's music – but the fact that Rahman > doesn't need to factor these considerations into his compositions, that he > can just be *himself*, is a blessing, and this is what I meant by this > (yes) genius being at the right place, at the right time. > > > -- "You are what your deepest desire is; As you desire, so is your intention; As your intention, so is your will; As is your will so is your deed; As is your deed, so is your destiny" -The Upanishads
