The Man Who Never Got the Memo
On YouTube, there is a behind-the-scenes video of composer Ilaiyaraaja recording his symphony ‘Valiant’. At one point, he looks at the performers and says, simply: “We are going to work more and more. I am 82 years old man.” Not with pride. Not with wonder. Just a fact — the way you’d describe the weather. That moment stopped me. Ilaiyaraaja grew up in a small village in Tamil Nadu, in sheer poverty. No family connection to music. No exposure to western classical traditions. No obvious path to anywhere remarkable. And yet, somehow, he taught himself the grammar of multiple worlds — Indian classical, western classical, jazz, funk, folk, fusion — and went on to compose music for over a thousand films. And in idle moments, he composed some outstanding non-film albums spanning fusion to experimental to oratorios. There is a reason composers like Bach, Mozart, Beethoven or Schubert are spoken of in…
