Srivathsan Nadadhur
At the risk of sounding adulatory, it’s still fair to say that composer Mani Sharma is one gem from Telugu cinema that we don’t celebrate as much as it should. Scroll up his discography and you would realise that he belongs to the rare breed of music directors who finds innovative ways to lend a melodic appeal even to the massiest of tracks within the commercial stream. He’s utilised his mainstream projects to his advantage and has never felt crippled by its must-haves or obligations. There’s little surprise that he’s been nicknamed ‘Melody Brahma’ by many – it’s because of his ability to sense an opportunity for a classiness that most of his counterparts conveniently ignore. While many viewers of this generation recognise him through his impactful background scores, it’s not a bad time to recollect one of his very enjoyable albums that didn’t receive much love owing to the film’s commercial failure – Balu ABCDEFG, featuring Pawan Kalyan, Shreya Saran in lead roles.
The singer lineup itself is so diverse that it adds to the allure of the album – Mahalaxmi Iyer, Shreya Ghoshal, Hariharan, KK, Chithra, Sujatha, Kunal Ganjawala to name a few. And before you merely go gaga about the names alone, it’s important to realise that they get tracks that explore their range within a conventional six-track album. There’s a typical hero introduction song, a couple of fast-paced duets, a soul-touching melody, a flashback song that establishes the protagonist’s past and a typical masala number to sum it up. It’s a sort of a soundtrack that pleases everyone involved with the filmmaking process – the fans, the director, the producer and also leaves something for a music enthusiast to cherish as well.
Inthe Inthinthe, sung by KK, is an unlikely intro song – an extremely catchy number with a terrific musical hook. The lyrics don’t merely go gaga over the protagonist’s supposed greatness but is memorable for what it suggests – your eyes may be tiny, but they needn’t necessarily restrict your vision or the way you look at the world. There’s a gentle folksy touch at the end of the charanam that gives it a foot-tapping quality. Lokale Gelavaga is a case where the melody is slightly hurried, there’s an intensity to the orchestration and yet, the singing by Chithra and Murali is feather-light. It makes for a delicious combination with the busy violin interludes, the Westernised utterances of the pallavi lines.
Athi Methani is one of the most interesting tracks in the album – it’s a zone that Mani Sharma truly excels at, balancing his personal taste and commercial appeal. The soft dance number can lit up a lazy evening (the kind of space that his disciple Thaman recently showed his flourish with Butta Bomma). The tune is simple and catchy but there’s a lot of style and freshness the composer brings with the instrumentation and the choice of singers (Mahalaxmi Iyer and Ranjith). Chandrabose’s use of words like ‘ammi’ ‘abbi’ as the closing phrases create a unique rhythmic effect. There is a lot of whistling, the pallavi actually feels like a clickbait – it has all the trappings of a fast-paced number, though it’s the later stanzas where you witness the vintage melody-maker in Mani Sharma.
Neelo Jarige Thanthu is an easy favourite and is the quintessential element to every Manisharma album – a soul healer melody where he’s given full reins to unleash his potential. And it’s a space where has often entrusted its responsibility to singer Hariharan – the many successful examples include Hey Satamanamannadile (Mruga Raju), Chinnaga Chinnaga (Tagore), Siggutho Chichi (Stalin), Yamahanagari (Choodalani Vundi). There’s an amazing amount of measuredness in Hariharan’s singing here, the tonality feels perfect and it’s not at all surprising that his voice is as refreshing as his co-singer Shreya Ghoshal’s. Sirivennela’s lines like ‘Pratiroju nadirathirilo chestava snanalu, vollantha chematalu padithe thappavuga channillu’ reflect his youthful zest. Need we say any other reason to listen to this?
Anuj Ganjawala’s textured voice is what essentially uplifts a song like Hat hat jaa – where the hero is being established as this ferocious henchman in non-Telugu land. Like Yeh Mera Jahaan in Khushi, it’s a rare Hindi number in a typical commercial Telugu film that’s brash and on-the-face. It’s the kind of a song that you should listen when nothing in the world is going your way, it’s an energiser of sorts. Singer Sujatha can be more than a handful in a massy number too, proves Kannu Kottina. The lyrics are tasteful, all thanks to Sirivennela. Listening to it in 2020 would probably remind music lover of the times when a massy song needn’t always have explicit references and women being treated as sexual objects. While Sujatha invests all her energies into the song, Udit Narayan charms with his casual enthusiasm. Balu ABCDEFG is a worthy example to prove Mani Sharma’s value in the mainstream film circuit.
