Well written article.
While picturization may not be in sync with the words : "Dravida
UtKala Banga" ... the Songs with Many of the great singers still gives me
the goosebumps. Today in my opinion patriotic songs are synonymous with ARR..
The moment you think of any patriotic song ..the fist name and music that comes
to one's mind is ARR. Such is his involvement in producing those enchanting
albums that concentrate on patriotic music.
May 'HE' climb higher and
higher the ladder of success.
CheersMahiya
--- On Sun, 8/17/08, Vithur <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
From: Vithur <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [arr] Happy Independence Day - Musical Montages
To: [email protected]
Date: Sunday, August 17, 2008, 5:54 PM
While we are on the topic of montages, it would be worthwhile to
visit two contemporary efforts by AR Rahman - Vande Mataram and Jana Gana Mana
, both conceived and presented by Bharatbala.
Watching the Jana Gana Mana video is like revisiting your ancestral town after
twenty years. The same faces, but aged and tired. The same Bhimsen Joshi, the
same Hariprasad Chaurasia, the same Lata Mangeshkar, but with many more lines
creasing their faces. Some cherished old faces missing, notably Pandit Ravi
Shankar, Ustad Allahrakha and Ustad Zakir Hussien and many new additions like
Bhupen Hazarika, Hariharan, and the most pleasant surprise - Asha Bhosle.
Interestingly Asha Bhosle was completely missing from all the videos of the
earlier era, a sad reflection on how late in life this great singer actually
got her due. Finally the nation sees the legendary Mangeshkar sisters singing
together on the same platform in the same frame. And the biggest surprise, they
even pause for a microsecond and smile, yes smile at each other! (A historic
occasion given all those rumours over the decades that sibling rivalry prompted
the sisters to sing all duets looking
in opposite directions).
The new age montages highlight the sharp difference in the eras. These videos
are shot like epics. They are marked by sweeping locales, jazzy camera angles,
glossy finish and flamboyant, larger than life orchestration of all the
elements. Quite typical of our times. Yet despite the grandeur, they somehow
seem to be missing something somewhere. They are missing the feel of 'real'
India that the old montages had to offer. In the videos of yore, the locales
were lush and real. The prosperous fields of Punjab, the stunning Taj Mahal,
the boatman on the Hooghly, the Calcutta metro, the Dal Lake these were the
visual elements that made us intimate with the living and breathing India. The
moonscape of Ladakh in the Jana Gana Mana video on the other hand is impersonal
and forbidding. It has a stark beauty, without doubt, but that is not a
representative of 'dravid, utkal, banga' that our national anthem alludes to.
The visual montages used in Vande Mataram look
more out of central Asia than they do out of India. The video just does not
get 'it', in my opinion.
Ofcourse, the disclaimer is that I am an old fogey when it comes to aesthetics
and I tend to automatically put myself in reverse gear. Older an effort the
better it is. However, I must admit, that when Lata Mangeshkar starts to sing
Jana Gana Mana my hair stand on the end. I am extremely thankful to YouTube and
it's denizens for uploading these valuable videos and giving me a chance to
revisit cherished childhood memories again. I leave you with the videos and I
hope you will enjoy them as much as I did.
Jai Bharat!
http://desicritics. org/2008/ 08/17/053136. php
--
regards,
Vithur
ARR -- The Sweet Cube always
