This post is for two 'maadars' known as Kupps Mama and Kutti

Mastero Illayaraja, Illu as I & my friends fondly refer to him, is one of the greatest music directors ever to score music for Indian movies spanning many languages (Tamil, Telugu, Hindi etc). When compared to other music directors in this music scene, including ascendent stars like A.R. Rahman, Illu's music has that unqiue DNA or signature that indicates to the listener that this music can only be Illu's and no one else's. My great friend K, a fellow Illu enthusiast - sometimes I think our friendship began the instant I discovered a casette tape of Illu's album "How to Name It" in his hostel room - holds that Illu is the only composer ever who could sythesize and transmute,begining with one measure of Tyagaraja and one measure of Bach, into objects of marvel.

While many listeners of Indian film music would be no doubt familar with numerous hit songs Illu compose music for, I think his work on background music for the movies is equally (if not even more) great. In fact there are some Indian movies (for people who accuse me of having become a 'firangi', yes, there are Indian movies I like and enjoy!) whose motifs in my memory are indexed by the background music scores Illu composed for them.

So I present you some of these (YouTube doesn't allow mp3s, but then I discovered Bolt!). You would need Flash installed in your browser to listen. Simply hit play on the tracks below. Also note that there is some fun dialogue interspread with the music that you may enjoy if you understand Telugu.

The first three tracks come from the Telugu hit, 'Geethanjali'.

"I luuuav you"

"Searching for Geetha"

"Question for Granny

This track is from "Mouna Raagam", originally made in Tamil, and later dubbed into Telugu as well:

"A Man Is Shot"

This one from "Saagara Sangamam", a movie for which Illu won one of his three National Awards:

"Let's Take A Photo"

"After The Storm"

Okay, finally I can't resist linking to the epynonymous track from "How to Name It":