The elixir of youth lies in the mind

Yesterday was a usual day for me. Nothing special. Went to office. Worked for a while, then asusual, chatting for sometime with friends, had lunch and so on. It was very cold outside. For the past 3 weeks it is raining here in chennai. It has never rained so much all these years in this season. May be it is an effect of global warming. This rain really brings joy to all chennai people as after such a hot summer u find chillness in air. But it has negative effects also. The drainage system is so bad here that you can find all the drainage water oozing out of drainage tanks. Even the roads are so bad that you will not find a platform for pedestrains to walk. Every year the government comes out with master plans but all goes in vain.

Before leaving for the day, i just glanced out of the window. It was dark and cloudy outside. I was worried because i did not had an umberalla or a leather jacket to avoid getting drenched. I started early. As usual, the road was pathetic. There were larget pits with water(Dont know exactly whether it is rain water or drainage water) , nice place for mosquitoes to breed. During these days we follow the ant logic. Everybody goes behind one another in a single row. If someone before us falls into some pit , then we take the other way ;-)

I use to commute to office by local train. This is the best and cheapest transport available in chennai. After 20 minutes i reached railway station(usually it takes 5 minutes but this delay was due to the impact of rain). Here to the same story, all the local trains were delayed by 15 minutes due to rain. This is a common problem in India. If it rains in some place then all the transport activities will slow down, there will be power cut and so on....

After a long struggle i reached home at 7.45 pm. My sister use to conduct tuitions at home. So all the students were there, when i went. Normally i use to chat with them for a while to relax myself. As all are school students , they have so much energy with them that they never get tired even after waking up at 6 in the morning, getting ready for school at 8.30, coming back at 5, then going to hindi tuition and then they come to our home to learn general subjects(other than hindi). After all this , they still look energetic. They never look tired. They still fight, play with each other. I was totally exhausted as i laid on the sofa. It started raining outside. On the other side my mother was arranging the clothes in the almirah(cupboard). Suddenly she called my sis and told that one of the bed sheet is not there and it may be in the terrace. She asked my sis to take an umbrella and bring it. She was not at all interested to get that as it was raining outside.

There is a girl whose name is Indhu. She is studying 11th standard and she comes to our tuition centre. Today was her birthday and she was wearing a new dress. When my mother asked my sis to get the bed sheet, this girl sprang up and she told to my mother that she will go and get the same. First we felt as if she wants to help us. We gave her an umbrella and she with another tuition girl went upstairs to bring the bed sheet back. It was almost 5 mins , they did not turn back. We were wondering what happ. I took an umbrella and went to the terrace to check what is happening. The scence that i saw when i went upstairs brought all my old memories back. They were fully drenched and they were dancing in rain. They did not wanted to bring the bed sheet but they wanted to enjoy the gift given by nature. The birthday girl was wearing a nice dress and even she had all make up done, with new watch and all. Inspite of all these she did not care about anything. I realised that it is just our mind that changes as we grow. Real pleasure in life is to enjoy each and every moment. Few years back even i was like them, not worried about even my books if it rains but today i feel as if this is a useless activity. Even i throwed my umbrella into some corner and started playing in rain. Everybody is young , it is only their mind that grows old.

Money...... Money.....Money............

To have you, everyone fight,
As you bring, darkness to light.

With a small paper you are made,
But you can make one's life to fade.

For a poor you are a dream,
Without u everybody scream.

It only depends on us, to choose,
In a right or a wrong way, to use.

So money is only a part of our life,
And only by hard work it will hike.

- Poonam Kumar

Miss u pena bakiri

Friends Circle......

These are my friends. It feels really good when we are together. As time takes everything, now each of us are far apart from one another......

Swami Vivekananda..........(sayings)

“Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life - think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body, be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success, that is way great spiritual giants are produced.”

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“We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves. If what we are now has been the result of our own past actions, it certainly follows that whatever we wish to be in future can be produced by our present actions; so we have to know how to act.”

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Happy Valentines Day

Here comes the day which is not mine,
As I don't have any valentine.
Things happened in the past which are not fine.
Rainy days for me even when the sun shines.
No girl to propose,
No aroma of rose,
No chance for my bike to give lift,
No special person to give gift.
No miss is there to miss
No experience of kiss.
No dinner in the moon light.
No chance to have the day bright.

Even though I don't fall in love
I will always bow to love.
Wishing great time to ppl who are in love
"Wish u a Happy Valentines Day"

How to Name it... by Illaiyaraja

HOW TO NAME IT? (A fusion album by Maestro Ilaiyaraaja)
A Review by Kalyan and C S Ramasami

01 How to name it? (7.22)
The glimpse of a mini-symphony that IR has gifted to the musical world ! Just like a symphony,
this piece also has three distinct parts / movements. But our raagams are used instead of the
scales of western classical music (WCM). This particular piece starts in Simmendramadhyamam
– Later on, modulates to Shanmugapriya - Then again to Patdeep and then shifting to
Shanmugapria and finally back to Simmendramadhyamam. A fantastic fusion and Ilaiyaraaja
asks both the WCM and Carnatic exponents "How to name It?”

02 Mad Mod Mood Fugue (2.03)
"Mad Mod Mood Fugue" is one fantastic short piece in Mayamalava gowla. It faithfully follows the Fugue form of WCM with 3 melodical lines in a counter-point arrangement, played by two string instruments viz Violin-1, Violin-2 and the third by a woodwind instrument in the Bass. Each of them first expresses their individual theme lines and expand with appropriate modulations and finally return back to original pitch with a grand ending. It’s an attempt to showcase the fusion of perfect Indian classical raaga with the perfect Western classic form of music.

03 Its Fixed (5.50)
Having introduced the short fusion in Mayamalava Gowla just earlier, now IR expands his horizon of fusion by straightaway getting into the presentation of a Keerthana from Saint Thiagaraja to the music World ! “Thulasi dhala “ is re-visited in an absolutely delightful and heavenly way with WCM orchestra merging in a mesmerizing way into the traditional Carnatic song. All the inhibitions for certain people towards Carnatic music will vanish away after listening to this kind of presentation and you will long for more and more such krithis !

04 The Study for Violin (1.41)
This is a short piece in Shanmugapriya. Usually a study is to test the skills of a person in
particular instrument. It will be short piece but some stepwise difficulties are in built in it! What
appears simple while listening this piece is that two violins are playing, one of bass phrase and
other upper octave phrase, is in reality is for single violin! Imagine that and listen to that song!
The whole piece is for single violin! Without giving a break of feeling the lower octave and upper
octave phrases are being played in that!

05 You can’t be free (5.07)
For a change, now it’s time for fusion of Jazz concept available in both the Indian and Western
forms of music. This is a beautiful piece in Panthuvarali ragam and the start reminds us a kind of
“Thaanam” of Ragam-Thanam-Pallavi format of carnatic music. One can feel the panthuvarali
slowly growing in them while listening to this piece and that’s the beauty of handling of this raga
by IR. With the first part of Indian jazz presentation ending, the magnificent western format takes over the Panthuvarali raagam and both the format merges in a climax ending covering the entire octaves of Panthuvarali ! What a racing finish !

06 Chamber welcomes Thiagaraja 5.35
Usually Chamber Music means a small group of instruments say 3 or 4 instruments only (unlike
orchestra) each playing one part of the harmonized SATB parts and played within chamber (not
in big concert hall like symphonies etc.). Here, the Carnatic violin ( a symbolic representation to
our Thiagaraja ) is supported by Chamber strings and our mridhangam ! The Kalyani raga is
excellently elaborated with all possible phrases highlighting the raagam.

07 I met Bach… (1.38)
This is a composition of Bach – “Bourre in E-minor”, a short piece of dance form in two parts. .
This famous piece is set in Minor scale and modulate to Major and back to Minor etc. The two
parts of Bach’s composition is played by a synthesizer sound and a bass guitar. Ilaiyaraaja has
added the 3rd part of the harmony in Carnatic way (coming in the violin). Ilaiyaraaja might have
started this as an experiment with small piece in the beginning to illustrate the hidden raagams
inside the Bach’s composition 300 years before, and prove the point that various raagams are
available in WCM also, even though they might not have named it !

08 ….and we had a talk ( 7.17)
In a way, “….and we had a talk" is the expansion of continued IR’s efforts in highlighting the
hidden raagams inside the Bach’s scales, as illustrated in the previous song. In fact this piece is
Bach's Prelude in E major to which Ilaiyaraaja has added a Carnatic line played by a Violin and
some times Ilaiyaraaja himself singing a part of his harmonized melody. This beautiful piece
starts with Aalapana in Hamsadhwani and continue to travel through frequent modulations all the way, touching various raagams like charukesi etc. The merging of both Bach and IR’s parts are in awesome perfect harmony and make us wonder who composed for whom !

09 Do Anything (5.30)
A fantastic piece with start of flute in D-minor supported by broken chords of strings and piano !
Shenoy pitching in later in absolutely thrilling folkish melody ! Nothing left out ! IR wishes to unify all forms of music and all types of instruments, through this classical fusion effort. People who are already used to his music, can easily identify and fall in love with this piece. This is a real magnum opus.

10 Mixed Feelings (7.90)
This is a Nattai /Jog based Jazz violin concerto. This was not included in the original release of
“How to Name it”. It was added in the subsequent releases. Considering the type of composition,
I took my own discretion of naming it as “Mixed feelings”.

Oops! This is poonam...........

Hi,
This is my first post. I am a person who loves music. I am a keyboard player. I play drums also. Whoever is interested to share any music related information can post there message in my blog. I will be very happy to know more about the same.