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There is a difference in YSR's songs from others if you hear the orchestration part (I don't think he blindly follows as HJ does) and for vocal parts he does IR's kind of recording.Quote:
Originally Posted by kiru
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//dig
There is a difference in YSR's songs from others if you hear the orchestration part (I don't think he blindly follows as HJ does) and for vocal parts he does IR's kind of recording.Quote:
Originally Posted by kiru
But i really fail to understand why the overall listening experience of ARR songs is much elevated, recording-wise.Undoubtedly it is not just the recording theatre but also the sound engineers involved.ARR now owns another studio, which, it is believed that he built by with huge investment. International artists such as John McLaughlin and also artists such as Guitar Prasanna, Ustad Zakir Hussain have praised this studio a lot, having recorded their recent albums there. Rahman is allowing others to use it, so Probably ilaiyaraaja can use that studio.Quote:
Originally Posted by kiru
Coming to the recording,Ilaiyaraaja had some of the best recording in 80s.But i think in 90s, or 2nd half of 90s, the recording suffered a lot.Or probably, the new wave of sound and recording made his stuff look inferior. Also, the recordings done in Bombay were different from that done in Chennai Then post-2000 era, it picked up. Now we have album which have very good recording and some fall flat. The malayalam film Sooriyan is an example.
Also i think there is not much difference today, between the recording styles of IR and ARR.I mean,now it is a norm to record things in bits and pieces and mix them up. Ilaiyaraaja is an exception only in recording vocals, which he does in 1 go.But instruments,he does mix later.Like in the case of Mumbai Express.Guitar prasanna recorded a piece for some other album and Ilaiyaraaja edited it..changed it and added many elements to it, long after the Prasanna's recording happened, and used the final stuff for theme music of Mumbai Express.
LIstening to the techno sounds in some of IR albums..such as Dhanam,it is clear that the style of recording is not much different from ARR or HR or YSR.
But a lot has to do with sound engineer. ARR had one of the best sound engineers in India, H.Sridhar, who passed away yesterday morning, unfortunately. And all said and done, we must credit it to ARR for bringing out a new sound, an international sound to Indian Film Music.This was accepted by KarthikRaja too(Filmfare Magazine, 1997), that giving a new break-through sound to Indian film music is the biggest contribution of ARR.
The bottonline is, IR needs to come out of Prasad recording studio and look at other avenues as well, apart from Bombay and Budapest. There is no dearth of state-of-art equipment now,in Chennai.
raagas, Mr Judge, et al,
My post was a generalization. For eg, I have not listened much to YSR in the last few years. I guess he does try to straddle between ARR and IR in style as well as recording. In the case of IR, he might have resorted to mixing in sounds, because of the available current technologies. THis is the reason, I gave the example ("like the way they do in Manikantan").
Please dont mistake me, even though ARR is my favorite composer after IR, I still like the better recorded songs of IR, over ARR's best. There is a real 'acoustic space' in IR's songs recorded with the vibrato of natural instruments i.e. the naadham, I guess they say in our languages. To reiterate, ARR songs most always have the vocals behind the instruments, with IR it is the instruments behind the vocals. I hope you will agree with this generalization atleast if you listen critically. To take this generalization further, IRs orchestration is to provide harmony to a main melody that is the reason it has to stay behind or come in during breaks (fills). The style is also different from Indian classical music where taalam cycles are introduced to add complexity (actually, I feel ARR is similar to IR in this aspect), instead a steady cycle is used, over which the strings play harmony to vocals or violins or flute complete a sentence made by the vocals. In my opinion, it takes a completely different ear to listen to IR or ARR. When it comes to totally melody based songs, there is quite a bit of convergence (for eg. chinna chinna aasai).
I agree that many of IRs songs lack in recording quality, but I wanted to point out the difference in style so that we can appreciate the better ones from IR.
(BTW, the comparison is only to bring out the differences in composing style and I dont mean to start a flame war here :-). Maybe I digressed but to me it is the total package )
Enaku orey oru sandhegam, if not for consumer listening experience, what else are you recording for? :roll:Quote:
Originally Posted by kiru
I would disagree here. I feel this is one among the basic difference between IR style and ARR style. You are right in pointing out that ICM has taalam cycles and ARR does incorporate it. A good deal of IR's songs have steady rhythm which can possibly make the listener lose interest (songs like Oh vasantha raja being some of the glorious exceptions). If you listen to H.Sridhar's interview posted in ARR forum, he mentions abt ARR improvising backgrounds in his songs. Thats one reason why ARR's songs generally feel more energetic and also why they are not palatable on first listen.Lots of time-signature changes within a track, tune shifts, uncommon structure etc., a la Metallica in a way.Quote:
The style is also different from Indian classical music where taalam cycles are introduced to add complexity (actually, I feel ARR is similar to IR in this aspect), instead a steady cycle is used, over which the strings play harmony to vocals or violins or flute complete a sentence made by the vocals.
I completely agree with ragas. IR had great quality in recording during his early 80's songs. If he wasnt interested in gizmos he wouldnt have gone for Stereo sound in Priya right? And he didnt hide his excitement abt the equipment as well. Listen to songs like Malayil yaaro and Sempoove from siraichalai... arent they sweet on ear? :huh:
One thing I always hate is the quality of his chorus.. How does he have the heart to spoil his wonderful creations with such cheap sounding chorus :banghead: Poove poochoodava is such a beautiful song, but the chorus in the beginning (jingle bell tune) is :banghead: Or even the chorus in Aayiram thamarai mottugaley... it sounds so bad to the extent of sounding like a self mockery :roll:
It is an underestimation to say that ARR simply introduced pop sound. ARR simply introduced the natural progression of how Indian film music is recorded. Not only did he have compositional skill, he also knew how to use the recording and mixing processes to create an aura of sound, an atmosphere, for each song. It is not just about what notes are played and sung, it is also about how they are presented.
IRs overuse of synth makes his music these days often sound very artificial. His strength is not in using synths, loops, etc., unless sparingly.
While I agree that there are many Illayaraja songs where the rhythm is steay, especially in the charanam, but there are equal number of songs where the rhythm is pretty tricky. Infact from a complexity point of view, when it comes to rythm, I don't think Rahman's rhythm have the same sort of complexity as Raja's rhythm. Would suggest people to read Vicky's blog where he analyzes how Illayraja uses various rhythmic cycles like mishra chapu etc and also how he uses different 'edupus'. Rahman's rhythms are very catchy no doubt but when it comes to the overall complexity I would say that Illayraja's rhythms are far ahead. Just listen to 'Lovely Lita' from the Telugu movie Shambu to have an idea of what I mean. And I am not even talking about how wonderfully the bass guitar always adds to this complexity. That's probably a different subject by itself.
S.Suresh
Suresh, you are right. I think IR is better than ARR but probably less so than the older master. Actually, I wanted to mention the nadai/rhythm changes rather than taalam here. My bad.
I have to agree with Thamizh though on the bad quality of the chorus in IR's songs. Apparently, ARR had to introduced good quality backup singers to match the good looking extras in Shankar's movies ..just kidding :-)
Yes, ARR gives quite a bit of rhythm variations but I dont think he does this along with the vocals. He does this in the interludes mostly. Compares this with IR's interludes which most times have no rhythm instruments.
Anyways, I will qualify my generalization based on the type rathan than the composer. Rhythm based compositions have rhythm instruments highlighted/placed in front of the vocals, whereas melody based compositions the instruments are placed behind the vocals.
Thamizh, if you want energy in IR songs ..I just heard naan thaanda ippa devadaas, aahaya gangai, aathu mEttula ..etc these are rhythm driven, which variations and all the energy. For melody - aazhak kadalil theEdiya muthu (really miss kannadhasan).
BTW, film music is surely for consumers. But IR's music is not really optimised for consumer equipment. He could not have done this because people were listening to his music over AM radio and only optimization he did was just boost the vocals a bit. The rest of the stuff were done with whatever he thought was the right levels. For eg. the dynamic range in IR's music is big i.e there is a big difference between the softest sound and the loudest sound. In the case of POP music, the rule of the thumb is to maintain a level constantly (which is usually high).
Anyways, I started talking about this, because we need to appreciate the different styles of recording. I suggest people who are interested in music to invest in audio equipment as well. You will be amazed to hear good recordings of IR at a reasonably good volume reproduced with full range speakers and good electronics. It feels like the instruments are there in the room. Very transparent, probably due to direct mixing without much manipulation on the computer.
Hi Kiru,
What you say is true. In many Rahman songs the interludes have some nadai variations in the rhythm but generally the vocals are backed by a constant beat.
I have heard SPB say that the tabla player for MSV, who also plays for Raja, used to do a lot of variations while playing for the song and MSV would encourage it. Whereas in case of Illayaraja he had to play exactly what Raja had in mind and was not supposed to improvise. IIRC this tabla players name was Prasad and he is supposed to be a very respected musician in the film music circles. He was a judge for the SPB 'Ennodu Paatu Padungal' once.
Your post is quite educative on the recording techniques. In many cases of Raja's songs, I do feel the bass is very soft and you have to strain to catch the bass. That sometimes pains me because Raja's bass work is great. In most of the songs of the current composers you can see that the bass level is quite high and is very much audible. In the more recent songs of Raja I have found the bass levels a bit high but the earlier songs always had lower bass level. Any particular reason?
S.Suresh
I've never heard any of IR's music on vinyl, but I have a couple of Oriental Records CDs of his music which do sound quite good. Very natural, for the most part.
Are we discussing anything related to "IR's new albums" here ??