MT and Jayachandran: Two voices that represented the romantic age for Malayalis

MT, as Vasudevan Nair was popularly known, found his characters mostly from rural Kerala, especially the Valluvanad region he hailed from, and chronicled the transition in social and economic relations as the joint family system and feudalism collapsed under the weights of its own contradictions and the coming of a new urban modernity. MT’s nine novels, scores of short stories, 50 plus film scripts, and very many essays captured the transition in social time and the alienation of young men mostly bewildered by — and lost in — this transition. His idiom mirrored the nostalgia for a lost time and culture, though not always endorsing it; but the language of fiction and films bereaved the disintegration of a world of innocence, social and natural, in the face of relationships defined by transactional norms. This was a world of broken souls pining for the certainties of their rural homes while trying to find peace in the big city. His lush prose laced by a tinge of loss spoke directly to the youth. When he stepped out of this familiar milieu to retell the Mahabharata story through the eyes of Bhima (Randamoozham), the second of the five Pandava brothers, the latter acquired the characteristics of the many young men we meet in his fiction.

Jayachandran was often the screen voice of this romantic era in Malayalam. His velvety voice suited the handsome heroes of the time, among them Prem Nazir, Kamal Haasan, Madhu, and the many stars who followed them. His style was also malleable to singing all kinds of songs in an effortless manner and with exemplary diction. His 1966 debut song from the film, Kalithozhi, Manjalayil mungi thorthi dhanu maasa chandrika vannu (Bathed in the wave of mist, the winter moon arrived), with a beautiful humming prelude turned out to be the signature song of his career — those lines encapsulated the romantic bhava he would produce in song after song (Anuraga gaanam pole, Karimukil kaattile, Suprabhatham, Ramzaanile chandrikayo, Ekantha pathikan jnan, Raagam Sree ragam, Mownam polum madhuram, Kevala martya bhasha kelkkatha, Ekakiyam ninte swapnangalkokkeyum, Sharadambaram) for close to half a century. Under Ilayaraja’s baton he produced a string of hits in the 1980s (Raasathi unnai kaanatha nenjil and Kaathirundu kathirundu kalangal pohuthedi from Vaidehi Kathirunthal (1986), Thalattuthe vaanam from Kadal Meengal (1981), Kodiyile Malligappoo from Kadalorakavithaigal, 1986) and sang popular numbers such as Oru deivam thantha poove (Kannathil Muthamittal, 2002) and Kathazham kaattu vazhi (Kizhakku Cheemayile, 1993) for AR Rahman. He won a National Award and four and five Tamil Nadu and Kerala state awards, respectively. That he managed to hold his own and sing scores of songs in the age of the all-conquering voice of Yesudas itself is the ultimate testament of his genius.

The romantic age in Malayalam fiction made way for the modernists in the late 1960s – MT, as the editor of Mathrubhumi Weekly, incubated and nurtured much of it – and the relatively high-brow writers of the modernist movement such as OV Vijayan, Kakkanadan, M Mukundan, VKN, and Anand forced a transition in reader sensibilities. (MT’s best writing of this period are arguably his essays and memoir articles, written in very taut, precise prose and with a great awareness of the impending ecological catastrophe.) However, such a transformation eluded Malayalam film music, which confined mostly to the classical melody base. The musical revolution that Ilayaraja unleashed in Tamil in the 1970s and thereafter did not find an immediate resonance in Malayalam, where the refined voice held sway and defied experiments with sound that the maestro/raja in the neighbourhood had launched. One reason could be that Malayalam cinema music and listener sensibilities were too enamoured by Yesudas and Jayachandran that it could not move beyond their sound worlds.

In many ways, Jayachandran was like his peer, SPB. Both were untrained in the classical tradition but could surprise listeners (and music directors, of course) with their ability to evoke bhava and take the voice to rare realms of imagination. (Jayachandran though was trained in mrdangam, which explains his firm grasp of taala and laya). There is an exceptional ragamalika he sang for MB Sreenivasan in an MT film (Bandhanam) — Raagam Sree ragam – that fetched him a Kerala state award. SPB’s renditions in that musical blockbuster, Sankarabharanam (1980), revealed his versatility as a singer.

Both Jayachandran and SPB worshipped Mohammed Rafi but had the playfulness of Kishore Kumar in their personalities and singing styles. The classical training is evident in the songs of Rafi Saab and Yesudas, of course, but SPB and Jayachandran, like Kishore Kumar, never even once made listeners feel its absence. The romantics always found their way into the cannon. Jayachandran — and MT — were no exceptions. And they will survive the challenge of Time.

The views expressed are personal