This song is not that: the Jesudas effect

I had earlier written about the experience of watching Urumi. I had not discussed the movie then. Nor do I intend to do it now. But the movie was recently in the news. Following McKennitt’s plagiarism suit that the movie has lifted two of her compositions “Caravensarai” and “The Mummer’s Dance” for “Aaro Nee Aaro” in Urumi, the Delhi High Court has restrained the producers from using the song in the movie’s upcoming Tamil, Telugu, Hindi and English makes. The court order is a first in the sense that plagiarism or “inspirations” from music from abroad or within the nation has been an established practice and has not attracted penalties.

Ideas travel across continents, routes of silk and wind unwinds themselves to these sojourners, and ideas do wrinkle. Either of aging or of gaining wisdom. No, they should not be clubbed.

K.J. Jesudas is no ordinary singer. For one, he has completed half a century of singing career. He is the epitomic Malayalee singer. Epitomic in many different senses. Epitomic in personifying all the ironies that plague Kerala. He is not your singer who dances with the troupe. Nor is he the flamboyant designer wear singer. He is draped in the whiteness. The whiteness that indicates purity very much in accordance with all the traditional notions of music. The whiteness that indicates the genius that music is supposed to carry. The whiteness with all its weight of tradition and genius that is so dear to any fascist society. Remember Benjamin, remember Krauceur. And the irony of that fascism in India’s supposedly most progressive state. That is irony number one.

K.J.Jesudas is that Christian who has sung one song each at the eighteen steps of Sabarimala, all in praise of Lord Ayyappa. Jesudas is the one to whose kirtanas Kerala wake up to. But Jesudas is also the one for whom the gates of the temples in Kerala are forever closed. Because he is a non-Hindu. K.J.Jesudas is that version of Kerala secularism who believes in the universal-secular nature of Hinduism. He is also the victim of the intricate hidden self of that universality-secularism.

K.J.Jesudas is one of the earliest singers for A.R.Rahman. K.J.Jesudas had predicted Rahman’s rise right then. While Rahman redefined the boundaries of voice in Indian film music, Jesudas remained the iconic singer to be emulated in Kerala. Jassie Gift could only be an obscenity in that industry, Kalabhavan Mani could only be substandard in that radiance. And that is the irony of the Malayalee. The weight of self obsession to the point of strangling oneself. That indeed is the ultimate self-love.

Legends has it that on many occasions the music directors will just have the lyrics ready. “Sing as you like it” they would say to Jesudas. Who are they teach Jesudas how to sing? Jesudas is that legend who said “enough of awards for me. Now give it to someone else”.

No matter how much of “lifting” has happened in Deepak Dev’s “Aaro Nee aaro”, it does not remain the same once Jesudas has sung it. For Jesudas is not just a singer. He is the Malayalee himself. He is the sandstorm, the hail and the rain of the silk route. No good remains the same as it was at its source. The road changes us all.

Not to mention that the song also has added tunes to it.

I post both the songs here.


Caravanserai by Loreena McKennitt

Aaro Nee Aaro from Urumi


Coming back to Malayalam movies. The industry is going through its worst crisis. Not even five percent of the movies produced can recover the costs. The number of exhibition halls are one third of what it used to be. According to producers, Kerala should stop exhibiting movies made in other languages. Their argument is that with the same ticket prices, one could a multi-million production instead of watching a Malayalam movie with a budget of a few lakhs. It is indeed a point, considering that the industry is not just about producers or directors, but also of the makeup man, the spot boy, the extras, the body doubles, etc, not to mention the many unknown faces behind the camera and even outside the set.

The difference between a Malayalam movie and a Bollywood movie, in terms of production grandeur can be summed up in the following clip. The movies featured are Bhool Bulaiyya and its Malayalam version produced a decade back, Manichitrathazhu. The sequence is the same. The psychiatrist and his friend sets out to trace the origins of the trauma that the female protagonist is suffering from. Now see how the two movies differ in their scale: