Tuesday, July 19, 2005

Very Happening Weekend

First I must thank all the good wishes that are coming in. Through email. And the comments here.

And I went for a show with Rahman Anna. The call came out of the blue. This was a charity show in Karaikkal. For the children affected in the Tsunami. NDTV was also involved.

Mom left on her work and this was basically the first time I went on a show out of town without mom.

Rehearsals happened on Sunday. And I met Sivamani sir for the first time. And before the rehearsals began full swing he played on the drums. It was a super treat. Its like the rhythm just flows on and on and on. Such innovation, such brains and such creativity. My God!

So first I was to sing Sakkarai and Kannathil Muthamittaal. And then songs got added much to my glee. I finally got to sing Thottal Poo Malarum, Vennilave, Telephone Manipol, and a prayer with Rahman anna, Hariharan Sir, Karthik and Madhudhree. We sang a bit of Shakthi Kodu. :)

Rahman anna said this was the first of his shows in this year.

We travelled from here to Pondichery on sunday evening, stayed there overnight and left from there to Karaikal. Another 3 hour journey which I will relish. I travelled along with G V Prakash, Rahman anna's nephew, (to enlighten, the kid voice of chiku buku chiku buku) now he is composing too. I sang a jingle for him a year ago. I guess brilliance is also in the genes. :) And Naresh Iyer. He is a find from the [V] Super Singer contest. And from what I hear, he is a singer to look out for. I met him on this show. And George. He has sung in Boys and Enakku 20 Unakku 18. He is great fun.

This was also the first time I came to know closely how to it is to rise up to an occasion. Songs that I have heard some hundred times but didnt have the lyrics to. Vennilave. First we were supposed to sing Tamil and then Hindi and then finally landed up singing the Tamil version on stage. I made frantic calls to Aditi to get me the lyrics and the poor thing sat here and kept giving me the lyirics on the phone. I had written it on a piece of paper. Then I lost it. Then I called her up again. And then this was the first show for which I didn't doll up. I totally didn't have the time. I went on stage with work slippers. Which I noticed mich later. If any hi funda magazine had covered this, I would have been on the pages of "how not to present yourself for a show" And then to top it, I lost my mom's phone, and my ear ring. Which Hari sir noticed and asked me where my ear ring was. I became a totally worked up and started sobbing. Then Hari sir was like ok loosen up and in less than a minute of my boo hoo, I had to go sing Thottaal with Hari sir. And he was like "cheer up baby". Collect yourself. You have to grow up he said. Mom cant be there to do all the stuff for you all the time. My God. Baby I am. But I learnt. Idiots like me have to learn the hard way I guess. And I have also been selfish. Its because of my incompetence and disorganisation that mom has not been able to attend to her work.

Rahman Anna opened the show with his song from Desam. The Tamil version of "Yeh Des Hai Tera". And he also sang Anbe Aaruyire from "A Aaah", S J Surya's movie. Sooper it is. Another rocking album it is going to be releasing tomorrow.

When the show was over, Sivamani sir said, because you lost something here, take it that Sani bhagwan has taken all the bad stuff away from your life. All your bad karma is gone with this. And may you come to the stage that you can buy 2400 phones. I felt very, very touched when he said that. I guess Rahman anna also came to know that and he asked me to cheer up.

I was not able to take any pictures. Except that I took a very short video before the concert and have a short clip of Rahman Anna singing.

From this show I learnt that I have a very long way to go and that I have to grow as a musician. Rise up to occasions and be good also.And I have to connect to God more. I want music to flow through me. I have so much to learn. And that knowledge happens a lot from the Sangat that you keep. This is Sahavaasa Punyam. Our generation does not have that advantage mom used to say. They learnt a lot from listening to elders speak, converse, learn from their intellectual gatherings and discussion. And whatever little I get when I go on a recording and a show like this, I lap it up. Expanding your horizons, really thinking out of the box... people keep saying about this but when it comes to doing it, thats when you realise, that you are generally wasting a lot of time. Keep growing, keep learning, keep evolving, continuously recognise and rectify one's flaws. And also that you learn from people both young and old. All this I learnt from this show and the recording that I did for Mangal Pandey.

The return drive was with Rehana aunty, Prakash and Naresh. Had dinner on the way. I also took a lot of pointers from Rehana aunty. Then I think I was just dozing and waking. And reached home at around 3 in the morning.

A very wonderful experience in all.

For now the mood and the song looping in my Player - 'Al maddath Maula'

"Tera Deewana hun Maula tera Parwana hun Maula sun
Ae Mere Maula Ae Mere Dhaata
Mujhko tu Manzil Bataade Muhjko tu Rasta Dikhade sun
Ae Mere Maula Ae Mere Dhaata....... "

44 comments:

PreethZzZ The Original said...

WOW, sounds like a great weekend apart from the phone and the earring. But its ok those are things you can retrieve, from that now you have an experience you can treasure for life.
You are sooo lucky, I really wish I could persue my creative interests and talents in such a grand scale. Anyway keep up the great work and all the best for the future. Keep singing your way to success..

PreethZzZ The Original said...

Could u check out if you could post the video of Rahman singing? Thx...That would be just awesome!

Ram Viswanathan said...

Chinmayi

This was a perfect learning weekend for you.. sounds like lot of fun..

and Congratulations on your Hindi debut.. that too through AR Rahman..

Go Girl..

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Preethi: Putting up the video, I dont think so. Maybe screen shots!
Ram_V: thanks :)

Ganesh said...

Chinmayi looks like you had busy weekend. BTW let me know how you like my audio blog

Arvind Srinivasan said...

Chinmayi,

Awesome :-) is the only word i can think of right now. I guess all your hard work is beginning to pay-off high time now.

As you said, continuous learning and evolving is all we can hope and wish for.

Kudos...great work :-)

p.s A aah tomorrow ? MAN this is jubiliant july for ARR fans i guess !!!!

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Ganesh: Heard your AB. its good.
Arvind: good termn.. jubilant july!! And I think Godfather is also coming soon! and I think we shouldnt relaly only hope, we must work on that.. and that way we will get somewhere.. dont you think?

Ganesh said...

Thanks Chinmayi
Means much to me hearing that from a pro.
The quality of audio is not good since its phone call recording.
Google's audio blog works that way, you have to call a phone number and record your message so its all mono and quality wont be good like direct feed.

Aravind jubliant julya, Unnoda reviewellam supera irukkumunnu nenikaren lets see, I have stopped writing review,
apparam makkal en songsa keechituvanga.

Sriram said...

Escoos me Baby girl,
why cry over ishmaal ear-ring? Learn from me. Me has lost one chain, three rings, two bracelets, watches(no counts).. and me never feels bad ;).. (Oh, BTW, most from my own earnings :D).. now, the weekend should have been a blast.. but what is this about work slippers! tsk tsk... would have been fun! but still, does the singer matter? isn't the voice the one thing that REALLY matters? And me sees that you cleverly left me out of your reply in the previous post. me is mad!!! (Ok ok, me is kidding.).. Peace!

Aravind said...

Chinmayi,
Oh... that's a great weeked u've had!! A one with some great experiences and real learnings!!!

BTW, will u be performing in ARR's Bangalore Concert in October! Me looking forward to it!!

Jegan said...

First of I would like to thank you for sharing the experience you've had over the week end...You gave so much of yourself to your portrayal of the Karaikkal charity show. You showed us (at least me ) that life is defined not by limitations but by possibilities. Thanks again and keep up the great music!!!!
BTW, the next time you see Hariharan express my wishes and regards to him: my fav male singer. Hope you had fun singing with him..

Jegan said...

Touching and Heart-warming
Scenario been felt;
No more tsunamis, no more,
May all missing be found,
May all lives be safe,
May Music prevail!

Chez said...

Seems u had a great weekend... even w.out HP6... :-)

As Sriram said, why feel bad for an earring.. i have no count of how many of my fav things i've lost or broken.. jus think its time to get a new fav earring.. and as u rightly said, parents can never be with us lifelong..

hmm.. when was the last time i saw my parents face-to-face?? so.. grow up dear girl.. :-)

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

ganesh: you're welcome!
aravind: I dont know about the Blore concert man. Actually I didnt even know there were a seies of shows happening until I went to this one. And I came to know he is performing in B'lore only yesterday.. I wonder which world I am In!!
Jegathpriyan: U'r welcome :) Will convey to Hari sir. Maybe will ask him to check out my blogspot. Only that I dont have my email ID.
Magnus: Whats Hp6? Slightly bulbed I am .. Yeah grow up......... slightly tough!!!
Sriram: nice.. the baby girl thing.. and te excoos me.. took me a few secs to get what it was..!! :)

ILA (a) இளா said...

Chinmayi,
This is the first time visiting your blog. It is very rare to see a celeb. Blogging in India to share the experience. All the very best for you Future and I like to hear to some songs of you. I have collected some from your web and listening now. Even though it is very late to know about you and As Rajni's Style "Late but Latest".

Deepa said...

Hi Chinmayi,

This is the first time i am visiting ur blog...great place to learn the lessons of life u learn as u learn them.
I always wanted to know how young achievers like you feel about success and life...i am blogrolling you.
and u know what? my classmate,Lakshmi was ur neighbour when u were a kid .

All the Best for ur bright and musical future!

indolentcreature said...

wow that was quite an adventurous weekend with all the thrills, endearing confusion etc. nice post chinmayi. it has a lot of food for thought too!

Anonymous said...

Hi,

Dont worry. You will get a Nokia 6260 soon :-) You can bog from that itself :-)

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Ila: Thanks for coming by...
Gangadhar: Thanks!:)
Deepa: Thanks for B rolling me.. and Lakshmi from where???
Shank: yeah man.. :) totally
commonfriend: ARR anna is a world celeb I think !! Of curse they connected with him and HOW!!
Ferrari: oh didnt know you could blog from the phone! I have a Sony Eric P900.. can i blog from this?/

JVC said...

congratulations.excellent post on your karaikkal trip. do write more like this.

Jegan said...

In the USA one can call the local number provided by blogger to post audio blog.. I am not sure abt India..
check this out:
http://www.audioblogger.com/

Ganesh said...

Chinmayi right now google audio bloggin is possible only from US as of now. Unless you want make a international call :)(the quality is not good also ,as you can see from my audio blog)
But I would like to suggest you to record your audio blog.
Upload the audio file to your personal website and give us the link we can download and play it or can also stream it how about that ?

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

j V cruz: will do when I get more trips like this!
Jegathpriyan: dont think there is a service like that here
Shekhar: thanks :)
Ganesh: sounds like a good idea..

IBH said...

hey good one there...with all these in store for u and more,I wwhen I get to back to india i was having high hopes that we can meet ;) a blogger meet...:)

what say? at a popular thai rest u had reviewed earlier :)

ILA (a) இளா said...

Can I add your blog to my Fav.?

Sriks said...

congratulations..
You gave great voice. I wish I could record with you one day :)

Subbu said...

Hi Chinmayi,
Nice to know about your charity show. As you mentioned about your cellphone, a friend of mine lost 3 cellphones in a year :0, first he lost Motorola,Erricson and then Nokia. We used to make fun of him saying "Give fair chance to other cellphone manufacturers also :)".That was just for fun.

Eager to see the video of ARR. Post it soon.
-
Subbu

Arvind Srinivasan said...

Chinmayi,

Actually 'work' -'hard work' is the basis and then we should hope for continuous learning for evolving into a more mature player in the field :-)

Audio blog :-D nice, would be good to hear some explanations coming that way.

Actually, your mom can back-up some of her articles via audio bits - that would be truly fulfulling ! :-)

Anonymous said...

Hi chinmayi
congrats on your hingi debut!! and ur 'Al maddath Maula' is amazing...

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

IBH: It would be great ... actually I wish I could meet everyone in one spot!!
Ila: sure thing ;)
Sriks: Sure dude... hope so too :) all the best
Subbu: I dont think I will post the video.. Because it was also filmed by NDTV. AND I dont want to fall into copyright issues!! And You know what, in these four years of my career, it so happens that 95% of all my shows were for charity!!!
Arvind: I told mom to audio Blog.. it will be like a lec-dem on the virtual world!!
VJ: My 'al maddath maula'???

Narayanan Venkitu said...

I read about the concert in the NET yesterday ( Luckilily nobody mentioned about chinmayi's costumes etc.!! Just kidding) and at the end they had mentioned about how the pesonal security guards of ARR had a tough time controlling the crowds.

Thought you'd write a little bit about it...That's ok though. ( Were you caught in the melee?)

Fantastic write-up though....Glad to know that a trip for a noble cause went well.!

I saw the songs of the new Surya Movie in www.raaga.com today. Have to listen to it tonight.!

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Narayan: Definitely he was guarded.. He is national treasure. The point is the Guards went into a frenzy themselves I think. So they had to take anna to safety before the crowds broke in. You see the stage was a makeshift one and we performed right on the beach.
And the cheers that I get for Kannathil Muthamittaal are still the same.. I am and was surprised actually..
Which website was this?

Narayanan Venkitu said...

I am sorry I don't know where I read it.! I checked but couldn't find it.! But...it is somewhere there.!

I am glad you are all ok.! Yeah, ARR is a national treasure indeed.

The Nenjil Song - Every time I watch it in DVD I go speechless.
The filming/music/voice/lyrics ..!
Great song indeed!

Anonymous said...

Do you have GPRS facility in your mobile phone?
Who is the service provider? Hutch?

I will fish out the link and get it for you. You can post from mobile :-)

P.S. Am talking about normal blogs here, not audio blog ;-)

Directhit said...

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1436111,00110005.htm this is the article narayanan sir is talking abt!! i go into a trance almost everytime i here KM song......... i love ARR......... now listening to Ah Aah songs... i liked Mangal more though........

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Anoop: thanks.. I had googled and found that link out also..
ferrari: Airtel... I have GPRS

Deepa said...

Oops! I forgot to mention that...Lakshmi from Triplicane...

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Deepa: I need a little more prodding.. its slipping my mind now! Can u ask her to tell about something we did together? I distinctly remember two girls who were my neighbours then.. vaishnavi and bhargavi I think.. other than that, the people in my building.

Anuradha Sridharan said...

Hi Chinmayi,

My favourite song of yours is "Sandippoma" from ennaku 20 unakku 18. Keep up the good work. Glad to know that you are singing many songs for Mr.Rahman. His songs are my suprabatha and lullaby.

Keep singing and writing.

Cheers,
Anu

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Anu: thanks.. nicely put.. suprabatham and lullaby!!

Ram said...

Chinmayi,

For a long time we all knew you as the "Oru Deivam Thanda Poove" girl... but now, you have surely widened your horizon and your talent seems to grow on all of us! Great songs in Mangal Pandey! I am sure that you will become a great star in Bollywood as well.. but unlike Trisha, I hope you will stay true to Tamil fans! ;-)

Ram

sathish said...

Chinmayi, it was nice geting introduced 2 u thru kribs on Saturday. hope u do remember...
all the best and congrats for ur 1st show with rehman. i always wanted 2 meet Sivamani but never got a chance.
hope u wld be here in bng when rehman is on his world tour...

Anonymous said...

Hi Chinmayi,

This is the first time am posting a comment in your blog. Though I read your blogs for past 2 weeks. I came to know about your blog from my A.R.Rahman groups. Its great to see that Chinmayi has a blog. I liked your voice right from Snehadhi Snehadhi anbulla Snehadhi... my aunt never missed that title song. First of all I would like to thank you for giving more info about Rahman sir. Why don't you join our group... we will be really greatfull to have you there. My best wishes with you always... I liked your Nenjil Jiljil from Kannathil... I would say still thats your best.

Chinmayi Sripada /Chinmayee said...

Ram: staying true sure I will.. Hope time and tide support this too !!!
Sathish: Yes I remember.. But I dont know if I will be part of Rahman anna's Blore trip
Prakash: I think I joined a group. And thanks for dropping a comment. :) Yes Snehidi did me a lot of good.. it was a good preamble to KMI.