Ghost voices - starting with giants TMS-Sivaji

[kvr...@gmail.com]

Since I know very little and my tamil / malayalam collection is
minimal, I would like to know about 'ghost voices' in Tamil and later
malayalam . An obvious point to start out is TMS - Sivaji ; TMS -
MGR ; AMRaja- Gemini, PBS - Gemini. SPB - Kamal, SPB - Rajnikant, SPB
- others., and so on and so forth. Nothing like starting in 50s, 60s,
70s and moving back and forth. what say? So the first one I would like
to talk about is - but obviously - about two giants of TFM Sivaji and
TMS

TMS - Sivaji is a combo made in heaven .I bought a 4 cassette pack
which was released immediately after Sivaji's death and my knowledge
is confined to that - albeit a good starting point I suppose.

TMS is truly the ghost voice of Sivaji. The song ' vasantamullai
poley vandu' has a brief dialogues by Sivaji saying 'paada venduma'
and immediately followed by TMS begining the song. The effect is
electrifying ! And of course the way in which Sivaji 'sings' right
down to his adams apple bobbing up and down while he is 'singing'. I
read in his autobiography that since he was from the old drama
background where everyone had to do everything including singing AND
acting, thats what gave him this supreme power to 'emote' and 'sing'
the songs on screen.

Ramesh

[Priya Raju]

The interesting thing is, how TMS - a Saurashtra, whose ancestral place is Gujarat - came to be the most identifiable voice of the Golden Age of Tamil Cinema. That's unity in diversity :-)

The amazing part is how, from the way TMS rendered the song, Tamil movie enthusiasts can figure out whether it was for MGR or Sivaji.

One of my favorite ghost voice pairs of yester-years is the vamp Vijaya Lalitha (Vijaya Shanthi's aunt, I think) & L.R.Easwari. "Palinginal Oru Maligai" is a classic example of this pairing.

Regards,
Priya

[kvr...@gmail.com]

On Nov 19, 4:52 pm, "Priya Raju" <priya.suku...@gmail.com> wrote:
> The interesting thing is, how TMS - a Saurashtra, whose ancestral place is
> Gujarat - came to be the most identifiable voice of the Golden Age of Tamil
> Cinema. That's unity in diversity :-)

>>> Thhis is one of those "long settled in tami nadgu but originally from Gujarat" kind of situations? sort of 'Shivajirao Gaejwad" and all that ? Truly amazing. I heard about this only as recently as this year when Archie (Archisman Mozumder) told me about this ! (I have already sent an invitation to him)

>
> The amazing part is how, from the way TMS rendered the song, Tamil movie
> enthusiasts can figure out whether it was for MGR or Sivaji.

>>> true. And with a 'proper' Tamil name as Sounderarajan, who would have expected anything else OTHER than such perfection. To me Anbe Vaa remains an excellent TMS-MGR all round album.

>
> One of my favorite ghost voice pairs of yester-years is the vamp Vijaya
> Lalitha (Vijaya Shanthi's aunt, I think) & L.R.Easwari. "Palinginal Oru
> Maligai" is a classic example of this pairing.
>

>>> dunno about this song but me thinks LRE sufffered somewhat like
Asha in HFM because of her association as 'the voice' of vamps and
'side characters' rather than mainstream 'purer than pure' heroines
who usually emoted to P. Susheela (corrections welcome). That apart,
I think LR E was an excellent singer with great range and control in
any pitch or register.

Coming back to the original post, I still have spool tapes (no player
of course) in which TMS sang some songs - filmi or not I dont know -
which went as 'ullam urugudaiiya, muruga' in a roopaka thaalam.
Devotional I think but as a child - and even now - I found it a
brilliant example of devotional music without any histrionics - pure
devotion. (yes he did go high when he said 'kan kanda deivam ayya' but
it was not 'shouting' - if you know what I mean - as ocured in some
70s songs , usually associated with Shivaji (Gnana Oli, Uyarnda
manidan and the mothe rof all shouts ' yaarukkaaga' from vasantha
maligai). So too he had another long song - filmi i think , because it
"sounds" like shivaji - which was about the various avatars of
Vishnu; 'tirumal perumaikku' .

Vishu - are you asleep:)

Ramesh

[Priya Raju]

The Saurashtra community settled in Tamil Nadu a couple of centuries back, I think. Many of them have integrated well & still maintain their culture, speak their language etc.

Rajinikanth is Marathi. When Anbumani Ramadoss idiotically stated that Rajinikanth is unacceptable because he isn't a Tamil - Raj Thackeray crossed swords with him. Because the Minister prevented a Marathi Manoos from getting ahead :-)

"Palinginal" is a copy of "Frenesi". Here is a link to the Music India Online album of the movie "Vallavan Oruvan", which had "Palinginal".

http://www.musicindiaonline.com/music/tamil/s/movie_name.5617/

[Priya Raju]

Correction. Anbumani Ramadoss thought that Rajinikanth was unacceptable as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, because he isn't a Tamil. Dumb statement, that angered many in Tamil Nadu. We don't care where a person comes from, as long as they do their job.

[sethu visvanathan]

dear kvr and all,thanks for the pricking and here i am awake again!.the issue is, frankly i have lost touch with the 60 and the early 70 s song.and propably my serious listening of these was in early 1990s .so have to rake my brains that little extra to let out the details.unlike others this is short in supply for me!. i meant the memory not the brains!!.thanks for not jumpin into conclusions!.

                                   as regards LRE,thought her talent were completely wasted by using her clubs and vamp type songs and the ha ha ha humming songs as i say!.inspite of i cld remember some belters of her.the 1 st one is vaarayo thozhi vaarayo fm paasa malar .one more is chithira povvizhi vaasalile from idhayathil nee.cant fathom why some of the great mds of those era made her famous thro the vamp songs!.

As for tms-sivaji combo,simply put they were made for each other.my altime fvrt of them are 1.maasila nilave nam fm ambigapathy and yaaradi nee mohini fm uthama puthiran.(hrd somewhere that waheeda rehman appears as one of the group dancers in this song!!!.)

cld also recollect the film bhale paandiya .athikkai kai kai .amazing lyrics and melody.ths is an unending intersting topic.so hope to dig in and dish out more rgds.visu

"kvr...@gmail.com" <kvr...@gmail.com> wrote:

[sethu visvanathan]

dear friends,sorry to take a detour out of this topic. am saddened by the demise of the face of villain in tamil cinema the one and only M N NAMBIAR who died today at age 88.easily one of my fvrt villains,(the other of course is raguvaran),who  instilled fear in me, as he did for many of the children,in KUDIYIRUNTHA KOIL starred by mgr and  madam!.and,dont know whether pran did match him in raam and shyam!.its a diff matter that even dilip cldnt match mgr on screen presence as compared to the original.(sorry,cant kindling controversies!!).

though very pious in his personal life,he has the distinction of visiting sabarimala for more than 50yrs!,his onscreen villainous abilities was havoc.the chetan team of mgr,mn nambiar and msv was entertainment at its best.may his soul rest in pace.rgds.visu

Priya Raju <priya....@gmail.com> wrote:

[K.V. Ramesh]

                                   as regards LRE,thought her talent were completely wasted by using her clubs and vamp type songs and the ha ha ha humming songs as i say!

>>> True. As I said its sort of the Asha effect in HFM - except that Asha got ahead with the help of OP, RD and then some. LRE probably didnt have a godfather or something - anyone who knows anything, please confirm. It could be that it was easier to typecast someone. And lets face it - we have this penchant in India for sticking to the purer than pure/ whiter than white type of cooncepts . So bad girls/ vamps got LRE  while sati savitiris got PS.

 

.inspite of i cld remember some belters of her.the 1 st one is vaarayo thozhi vaarayo fm paasa malar .

>>> I remember that one. Also has mantrams coming in the interlude along with nadaswarams and thavil. 

 

As for tms-sivaji combo,simply put they were made for each other.my altime fvrt of them are 1.maasila nilave nam fm ambigapathy

>>> FANTASTIC SONG! In 'those' days to compose such a long and complex song - starts in 4/4 - aadi thalam; 2nd para is 3/4 - roopaka thaalam and third concluded with 7/4 or mishra chaap . And it works! Great singing between both TMS and Bhanumathi (?). 

 

and yaaradi nee mohini fm uthama puthiran.(hrd somewhere that waheeda rehman appears as one of the group dancers in this song!!!.)

>>> My mother also told me the same thing - that Waheeda could be spotted in the song. Is Helen one of the main dancers?  Also many people assume that Waheeda is Hyderabadi but she is actually Tamil ! 

cld also recollect the film bhale paandiya .athikkai kai kai .amazing lyrics and melody.

>> Yes great lyrics . But for me the Crown Jewel in that movie and belonging in any top 10/ top 5 collection of TMS-SG is the classical - shudha danyasi  Priya? - based - 'Neeye unakku vandu'. Great emoting on screen by both Sivaji AND MR Radha and of course fantastic singing. I bought the VCD just for this song - the movie must have been good then but is now seriously dated . Still it has some nice songs. The sarcastic 'yaarai eppo vaippadu' lyrics are still so contemporary - unmai solli nanmaiya seidu puzhakka mudiale!

 

ths is an unending intersting topic.so hope to dig in and dish out more rgds.visu

>>> Keep digging in the corners of your RAM!

 

I am attaching the fantastic song 'neeye unakku'

Ramesh

[sethu visvanathan]

dear kvr,here comes something from my RAM!.i have ben hugely impressed by this song from the film padithal mattum pothuma yr 1962.music by msv-tkr.the song is naan kvignanumillai nalla rasiganumillai.frankly cant x actly say what impessed me the most.the singing by tms or the nonchalant emoting by vc ganesan!.the other songs from this film are pennonru kandein and thannilavu theniraika by PS.amazing songs to say the least and vcg playing a rustic was even more amzing.one amongst the many P classics from the director bhimsingh.am sending the mil link.rgds.visu

http://www.musicindiaonline.com/music/tamil/s/movie_name.5109/
"K.V. Ramesh" <kvr...@gmail.com> wrote: