Raasave Unnai Nambi

Song: Raasave Unnai Nambi
Movie Name : Muthal Mariyathai

Singers : S Janaki
Music Director : Illayaraja

 

   As with every Illayaraja song that I have written about, I went through a phase of liking this song followed by just falling in love with it after some time! I think its because the first thing that I noticed in this song is the tune and the singing but eventually I pay attention to the orchestrization and the interludes which blows me away!

 

   Janaki has an extraordinary talent to convey the emotion in the song through her voice. There are places where she is sad, afraid, happy and sometimes proud in this song. She displays all these emotions at different points in the song in a manner that perhaps no other singer can!

 

  A word of mention for the lyricist Vairamuthu who won his first National Award for this movie. The ability to piece together a song with all of the variations in emotion is a tough ask. The lyrics are simple enough, for me to understand (even though its not my native language) but still convey so much emotion without being repetitive or generic.

 

  And finally the best for the last - Illayaraja. Sometime, I listen to the interludes of a song and wonder why Raja wasted an awesome tune on the interludes. And why he chose that variation (sometimes even deviating from the main raga of the song) to get to the interlude. There is a simplicity to the interludes in this song, but not without Raja's magical touch. The interludes alone make your mind wander through a range of emotions. Again, how is it possible to do this within one song ? My other favorite portion in this song is the end of the charanam. It ends with a small gamakam which I absolutely love.

 

Ada manthayila ninnaalum nee veera paandi theru

That was in fact the first reason I liked this song and now it has become an earworm!