The Hindu : Front Page : All set for launch tomorrow

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jun 29, 2005

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Front Page

All set for launch tomorrow

Ramya Kannan

The fruit of joint labour of the maestro, Tamil Maiyam, musicians from three continents and donors.

THE MAESTRO SPEAKS: Ilayaraja addressing a press meet in Chennai on Tuesday. — Photo: S. Thanthoni

CHENNAI: The stage is set for the launch function of Ilayaraja's Thiruvasagam in Symphony on June 30 and the guest list includes the country's top politicians, bureaucrats, mediapersons and film stars.

Thirty months in the making, Thiruvasagam in Symphony is the fruit of the joint labour of maestro Ilayaraja, Tamil Maiyam, musicians from three continents and donors from all over the world. The launch comes as the culmination of years of persistence, hard work and literally, as Fr. Jegath Gaspar of Tamil Maiyam would have it, scrounging for money.

The funds for this project were raised by Tamil Maiyam, amounting to production cost of Rs. 110 lakhs. Of this, Rs. 35 lakhs came in as donations, while Rs. 75 lakhs was borrowed from individuals and banks. The organisation hopes to make this money with cassette and CD sales alone, with the audiotape priced at Rs. 50 and the CD at Rs. 150. Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Jaipal Reddy, has agreed to launch the album in Music Academy on Thursday. The first copy will be handed over to Carnatic vocalist Balamurali Krishna. A visual documentation on the `Making of the Thiruvasagam' will be released by Jayakumar, joint secretary in the Union Ministry of Culture and handed over to Ilayaraja's Carnatic music guru, Dakshinamurthy Swamigal.

Film stars Kamal Hassan and Rajnikant are expected to participate, Fr. Gaspar told presspersons on Tuesday. Ilayaraja said with the Thiruvasagam in Symphony, he has attempted to straddle Western classical and Carnatic music. The audio CD comes with Tamil renditions of Thiruvasagam, accompanied by English translations.

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