Career
A legendary perfectionist, he established a prolific career composing film music in the Tamil film industry.
As early as 1948, M. S. Viswanathan was already working with music directors S.M.Subbaiah Naidu and C.R.Subburaman, playing harmonium and assisting them and learning musical arrangements. He was also inspired by S.V.Venkatraman and T.R.Papa. His first score was for the film Genova (1953) as the third composer as noted earlier. In the same year, Chithambaram C. S. Jayaraman, muusic comoposer and singer, engaged the services of Viswanathan-Ramamoorthy duo for the film Raththa Kanneer to assist him for the background music.Music for all the songs were composed by C.S.Jayaraman himself.
Right from the beginning, the duo displayed a flair for light sweet melodious music.The films like Porter Kanthan, Pasa Valai, Thennali Raman, Gulebahavali, Sugam Enge, Sorga Vasal, etc in the 50s created a lot attention for them.In 1956, the duo composed for the Telugu film Santhosham,the Telugu adaptation of the Tamil film Velaikaari(story by C. N. Annadurai) with N. T. Rama Rao and Anjali Devi which was a big musical hit.This was reproduced in Hindi as Naya Aadmi with music by Madan Mohan who,impressed by the duo's music, suggested to retain some of the original tunes for the Hindi version.The Hindi song "Laut gaya gam ka zamana" sung by Lata Mangeshkar and Hemanta Kumar Mukhopadhyay in that film, copy of the duo's Telugu song "Teeyani eenati reyi" sung by P. Susheela and G. K. Venkatesh, was a big hit in the North..
The winning combinations of the duo initially were mainly with the Directors T. R. Ramanna and A. Bhimsingh who produced some mega hits in the late 50s and early 60s - for which they composed excellent music and thereby reaching the No.1 slot in the early 60s. Then C. V. Sridhar, after his music composer A. M. Rajah fell out with him in 1961, engaged the duo for his films and many top hits followed. Major studios like Gemini, AVM, etc were also to engage them later. During this period, the duo also boasted of assistants of the stature of R. Govardhanam, G. K. Venkatesh, Shankar Ganesh and Henry Daniel. They also had Sathan for special voice and sound effects.
It must be mentioned that both T. M. Soundararajan and P. B. Srinivas owe their success partly to the duo and in particular to Viswanathan. Critics point out that one shortcoming of the duo was that they never introduced any new singers to the film music.
The duo composed for over 700 films during the 50s and 60s, revitalising Chennai film music. The duo parted in 1965 and since then they had composed for films individually. Both T. R. Ramanna and A. Bhimsingh were saddened by this development, but still worked with both of them,but in different films they produced and directed - which showed that at that stage equal importance was given to both.
Viswanathan and Ramamoorthy rejoined once after 29 years of separation for the film Engirundho Vanthan in 1995.
Viswanathan in his solo career continued to achieve success as he did earlier, but Ramamoorthy could not achieve as much and gradually faded away. Vishwanathan was most in demand and was the highest paid music director from 1965-1980. However, many critics pointed out that without Ramamoorthy, the likes of the lilting melodies of the golden era (50s and early 60s) when they were together were never to be heard again.
His achievements range from introducing fresher melodies with changing trends, style and orchestration approaches to incorporating various genres of what is now called world music into Indian cinema music. He has sung over 500 of his own songs, as well as those of other music directors like V. Kumar, Shankar Ganesh, Ilayaraaja, Gangai Amaran, Deva, Bharathwaj and A. R. Rahman. He has also scored music for many non-film albums and for political campaigns.
His achievements also include appearances in numerous films and television series.M. S. Vishwanathan went on to act in a couple of Tamil feature films notably appearing in Kaadhal Mannan after being convinced to do so by actor Vivek, while he also starred in Kamal Haasan's Kaathala Kaathala and Karthik's Rojavanam.
He mainly teamed up with the well-known Tamil poet and lyricist Kannadasan.
In recent times, Viswanathan has focused on composing devotional music and serving as a judge in Malayalam TV reality shows.
He has collaborated with Illaiyaraja in 'Mella Thiranthathu Kathathavu', 'Senthamizh Paatu' 'Vishwa Thulsi' and 'Senthamizh Selvan' starring Prashanth.
Read more about this topic: M. S. Viswanathan
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“I seemed intent on making it as difficult for myself as possible to pursue my “male” career goal. I not only procrastinated endlessly, submitting my medical school application at the very last minute, but continued to crave a conventional female role even as I moved ahead with my “male” pursuits.”
—Margaret S. Mahler (1897–1985)
“They want to play at being mothers. So let them. Expressing tenderness in their own way will not prevent girls from enjoying a successful career in the future; indeed, the ability to nurture is as valuable a skill in the workplace as the ability to lead.”
—Anne Roiphe (20th century)
“John Brown’s career for the last six weeks of his life was meteor-like, flashing through the darkness in which we live. I know of nothing so miraculous in our history.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)