IFFI 50: Ilaiyaraaja mesmerises at Master Class

Legendary music composer Ilaiyaraaja was at IFFI 2019 for a Masterclass, moderated by none other than a reputed director, R. Balki (Balakrishnan) himself.

The music composer entered amidst loud cheering and clapping…audiences got up in respect for the master, and then Ilaiyaraaja mesmerised people with his conversation and his music.

“Music has power. Just put a close up of an actor without any expression. We can put expression with just music...he is thinking of his mother, his childhood, his love...these emotions can just be added with the music,” said Ilaiyaraaja.

“His music transcends time...sometimes you would want to watch it on a blank screen,” said Balki, who has worked with Ilaiyaraaja in a few of his films.

“The only fights that we have are when he wants to change a tune, and I don’t want it changed,” Balki added. “Music is a universal language...Every school should have music in syllables. If that happens, the violence will be less...there won’t be any violence I think.”

When someone from the audiences said that Ilaiyaraaja’s music makes one happy, but also sad, sometimes, because you start thinking of your love.

“Music is for being...not only for one emotion,” responded Ilaiyaraaja.

Ilaiyaraaja not only composed for a live situation in front of the audience, but even made everyone sing one his tunes.

Ilaiyaraaja is a film composer, singer, lyricist, instrumentalist, orchestrator and conductor-arranger, and has composed over 7000 songs, provided film scores for more than 1000 movies and performed in more than 20,000 concerts.