Illayaraja

He is regarded as one of the finest music composers in India [4][citation needed] . Ilaiyaraaja is also an instrumentalist, conductor, singer, and a songwriter. To date, he has composed over 4500 songs and provided film scores for more than 950 Indian films in various languages in a career spanning more than 30 years,[5][6] particularly being acclaimed for his background scoring for Indian films. His songs and background score played a very crucial role in the success of many films. He remains one of the most popular composers to have emerged from India.[7][8]

Ilaiyaraaja has been a prominent composer of film music in South Indian cinema since the late 1970s.[9] His works are mainly in Tamil, but has also scored music for numerous films in Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Hindi and one in Marathi.[10] He integrated folk lyricism (in Tamil) and introduced broader Western musical sensibilities into the South Indian musical mainstream.

A gold medalist in classical guitar from Trinity College of Music, London, in 1993, he organised a full symphony and thus became the first Asian to compose a full symphony performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London's Walthamstow Town Hall, which is not released yet. In 2003, according to a BBC international poll, people from 155 countries voted his composition "Rakkamma Kaiya Thattu" from the 1991 film Thalapathi fourth in the world's top 10 most popular songs of all time.[11] He was also nominated in the Best Indian album Music Awards category[12] at US based Just Plain Folks Music Organization, which is the largest grassroots music organization in the world, and stood third for his "Music Journey: Live in Italy".[12]

In the 2000s, he composed a variety of non-film music, including religious and devotional songs, an oratorio, and world music, while shifting his focus to Malayalam films. He is usually referred to by the title Isaignani (English: Musical Genius), or as The Maestro.[13] He has won four Indian National Film Awards; three for Best Music Direction and one for Best Background Score[14] and is a recipient of the prestigious Padma Bhushan Award from the Government of India.

He also received the NTR National Award in 2004.[15] In 2012 he received the Sangeet Natak Academi Award for his creative and experimental works in music field.[16] In a poll conducted by CNN-IBN celebrating 100 years of Indian cinema in 2013, Ilaiyaraaja was voted the greatest music composer of India with a maximum of 49%.

In 1975, film producer Panchu Arunachalam commissioned him to compose the songs and film score for a Tamil-language film called Annakkili ('The Parrot').[32] For the soundtrack, Ilaiyaraaja applied the techniques of modern popular film music orchestration to Tamil folk poetry and folk song melodies, which created a fusion of Western and Tamil idioms.[33][34] Ilaiyaraaja's use of Tamil music in his film scores injected new influence into the Indian film score milieu.[35] By the mid-1980s Ilaiyaraaja was gaining increasing stature as a film composer and music director in the South Indian film industry.[9] He has worked with Indian poets and lyricists such as Kannadasan, Vaali, Vairamuthu, O. N. V. Kurup, Sreekumaran Thampi, Veturi Sundararama Murthy, Chi. Udaya Shankar and Gulzar and is well known for his association with film makers such as Bharathiraja, K. Balachander, Mani Ratnam, Sathyan Anthikkad, Priyadarshan, Fazil, Balu Mahendra, Vamsy, K. Vishwanath and R. Balki.