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Chords'N Notes
Into the Light
Music Today, CD, Rs. 295
There’s a boom in the music industry. Everyone now speaks of a new sound, new experiments and new dreams. But now, even the “new sounds” are beginning to sound similar. Even in the past, we have had musicians and composers influenced by Western forms, but now more than ever before. Particularly in the genre of fusion, a lot of cross-cultural experiments are being done, not just in terms of borrowing musical idioms, but collaborating with Western musicians and ideas. “Into The Light” by U. Rajesh joins the Indo-Western fusion line of albums. Rajesh has composed for the album along with Anil Srinivasan.
It is quite evident in “Into The Light” that Rajesh believes in the genre of fusion and as he himself admits in an interview is “constantly engaged in an effort to evolve newer, more inclusive musical languages.” However, it’s not as if he doesn’t know the dangers of the genre but he has his answers ready. “Over the years, many people have misused the name fusion. Fusion does not mean that I try to play Western music on my mandolin or that someone else plays Carnatic on his guitar. It is the interaction of two pure forms to create something new. It is like mixing two colours to get a totally new colour.”
Some of the tracks are well-known Indian melodies such as “Annapoorne” by Muthuswamy Dikshitar, while the other numbers have been specially composed for the album by U. Rajesh along with Anil Srinivasan as the pianist. Annapoorna has a soothing piano track. It is at once understated and stately. Since there aren’t too many instruments, and with the mridangam kept subtle, it creates a nice mood.
While there are traces of film music, there are very typical Rahman kind of inflexions too in the compositions.
Sunrise, particularly… reminds of the sax bit in the film “Duet”. “Rainwalk” apparently was composed when it was actually raining. It’s got a probing introspective feel to it, with some real intense phrases on the mandolin.
In all, it’s an average album with some brilliant sparks. I think I preferred Anil Srinivasan’s enterprise with Sikkil Gurucharan better. It had a lot of silence and was more profound.
DEEPA GANESH
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