As Tejas says, " I need to go through the ups and downs to experience life!" so willy-nilly, at the studio we've been on a roller coaster ride set off by the recession. The new financial year has been somewhat bleak, but then where in the world hasn't it been.

Our motto when down, sing! So we are at it. We have compiled many many songs, in Kannada, Ram's "Avva", "Kaalam Badil Sollum" in Tamil with Suresh penning the lyrics, his ongoing Vachana project where he's recorded about 6 tracks, some songs just out of the blue... Like my English tracks...Suresh liked "Take away" so much that he's writing Tamil lyrics for it!

Harish has been trying to cope with my increasing demands to drop in and sing almost everyday, hope they don't chuck him out of his job!

RKP has been recording and we were featured in Time out as a Karnatik musician's home(studio) away from home! Check it out here!

Chaitanya kept all his friends on Facebook posted as to when the recording of songs for "Suryakanthi" were on. With none less than Ilaiyaraja sir. And we read that he was soon leaving for the shoot.

His editor Hari called a couple of days ago and wanted 3 songs edited for the shoot.
I asked if he was sure, imagine taking the scissors to the great maestro's songs! What if he came looking for us?
Hari soothed me with "Permission ellam vangiaachu". So we carefully went over the 3 songs, and tried to keep all the progressions, the layering and the stacking of music intact and still managed to edit the songs down to about 4 minutes each from around 5.30 minutes. Someday we might get an anonymous note, "I know what you did that Friday!"

Too much time away from blogging! But well...!
We are through with the recording of all 8 songs for e Preeti. We've got so many great new voices to work with and we really enjoyed the whole process. Now just to wait for the shooting schedules to be complete.
Z kannada had a couple of shows for which we made the titles, Komedy Khiladigalu on Komedy Express and Z Healthline.
Mirchi show promos came along too.
The nicest thing was 2 albums from Ram, "Avva" and "Kaalam badil sollum". I too have 4 and a half songs ready in a compilation. Heard that S P Charan really liked those tracks! Even the half track!

I was shaken to hear that maami was no more. There was no mention in any paper here, or I missed them totally. A friend's friend told me.

My first meeting with Maami was in 1988. I had heard the Karaikudi bani on tapes. It made the veena come alive to me. No other bani, however sweet, however technically more superior or closer to the vocal style had impressed me as much. The clear, affirmative style of plucking and fingering remain unique to the Karaikudi bani.

When we shifted to Madras, I did a little bit of research and came up with Maami's address. Walking distance from our own Warren Road flat. Amma and I set out one evening and walked up the stairs to the first floor flat. Maami was taking classes. She asked me to play a piece. I don't even remember what I played or how I got through it. She said, ok, she would teach me. My first lesson was the Hamsadhwani piece "Vinayaka". The initial classes were all about the fingering. I remember my finger would simply get cut when I tried out the famous Kariakudi "sprutam".

After a couple of years, she gently told me that I had to go on and move forward, get some kutcheris. I was all set in life, just learning. But I did get into a Tamil Iyal Isai Manram competition and won the first place. That awarded me 4 music concerts.
After that, I had to move out of town to Bangalore. My learning was sadly disrupted.

I still cherish the veena I went to purchase with Rajeswari Maami. We made a trip to Saptaswara Musicals in Luz street, Mylapore. She sat down on the floor of the shop and tried out some veenas. She picked the one I still use. Her handwriting is in my music book. She used to pen some of the kritis I was to learn.

I never had an opportunity to return and look her up though I caught her programmes on TV. I kept promising myself a trip soon.

Thanks maami. For all the great music and for being kind enough to share it with me. You might not have known it, and it might not have mattered to you, but I remain deeply grateful and affectionate. Your thoughts and music will stay with me.

Z Kannada introduces a new T-20 cricket type format to their comedy show "Komedy Khiladi" at 10 pm. We were busy composing an anthem for it. Harish of the band F6 and winner of the :Oh la la" show in Chennai, came in to sing.
Mr Narayanaswamy, one of the producers of "E preethi" came in too on Saturday. He heard all the 5 tunes for the film and went away happy. The other producers in the US had heard them and liked them too.
Need to get in all the singers and finish the songs for the shoot.
Chitra Iyer came to sing the salsa number. The track sounds cool. But more work to put into it yet.

Z Kannada has been airing Komedy Khiladigalu for sometime now. On the 100th day, they went all out to revamp the show and celebrate. Bharat asked us to work on the title track. It was fun syncing to the title montage video. We finished that in about 2 days and it sounds great. The show's at 10 pm weekdays. After that comes the news at 11 pm. The signature tune for regional and national newscast also comes from us!

So too the Kasturi newscasts. Work's fun!

Joe, (yes, our drummer) introduced us to Praveen David, guitarist. I called up and asked if he'd play on our track. I'd heard he'd learnt flamenco style playing and was also Konarak Reddy's student. On the 17th August, we set up the nylon stringed guitar of his. We caught up with Priyabharati (the director of the film) via ichat and spent the day happily listening to the magic of nylon!
Next thing we need is a trumpet section and bass and we can start looking at the singers. We need four of them on this track. Chitra Iyer is on an Australian tour and returns somewhere around the beginning of September. We can start with her vocals.

That's the way our station promo for Big FM begins. With their new catch phrase "Chamkaisi, chindi udaisi" taking off, Big asked us to do station promos with these words included in the lyrics. Lots of good feedback on the 2 promos we did for them.
Check out the snap with our official "stompers"! For the "E Preethi" stepping song, we got Gokul, Balu's cousin, Ram and Balu to stomp for us. Nothing like authentic sounds! So they went, 1, 2, 3... stomp, 1, 2, 3...stomp! The lyrics still need to come in. Priya meanwhile sent in some lyrics for the rap portion of "Onde nimisha". Will record that tomorrow.

The head of the Chitrapur Saraswat Muth came in to record some shlokas. Mr Yeshwant Mulki, a very well known arranger, who has worked with Lata Mangeshkar, Salil Chowdhary, Jaidev, Lakshmikant-Pyarelal, came in to arrange the music. We worked over 2 days and a night with the group.

We finally got the lyrics of the next couple of songs for "E Preethi". The very day after Jayanth Kaikini dropped off the lyrics, we got Asit to sing "Onde nimisha". Everybody who's heard it simply loves it and has been asking when the film will be out. Priyabharathi is counting down to her shooting schedule in the States. And soon we will be gearing up for the re recording. Praveen David came in to lay down the flamenco guitar tracks for the other song " Say ole".

Meanwhile, we've been working on a couple of jingles for some builders and a cancer care global institution. We got Deepu to record flute and violin out in Chennai.

Ram's been busy too with his Tamil album. Suresh, the lyricist has been busy coming up with songs every week. Ram wrote Kannada lyrics for one of the tunes. And also got to do a music video with it. Will put it up in a bit, after the final edits are through.

Joe, our drummer, has been coming in to rehearse and work on our live act! Well it's been fun.
Indira, my friend, called and told me about visiting Dastkars, travelling folk painters and musicians from West Bengal. I immediately fixed up a recording. They came in and also showed us their beautiful paintings.

We started work March 10. Since then, we've turned out 5 show promos-("Pori Tapori", "Balcony Badshah", "Bombat Bhama", "Mirchi Talkies" and "Dr Love") and 3 station promos for Mirchi. This, in addition to 2 more show promos already on air, "Blockbuster Budhwara" and "Munjane Raaga".

It's been a song working with Jimmy. He's articulate and imaginative. He wanted a new hip sound and that really excited us. It gave us a broad platform on which we could enthusiastically do the stuff we always wanted to. Thanks Jimmy!

Bhaskar sir, the G S Bhaskar of "Nagamandala" and recently "Accident" fame, whose encouragement and kind words have always been with us was with us yesterday. He heard our first song for "E Preethi". He patted me on the shoulder and said, "I haven't heard such a rich song in a decade!" We will soon start work on the rest of the songs for the film.

We finished making music for 2 corporate films last week and finished 3 spots today.