Singing for a Cause

The Hindu, Friday Review, June 1, 2001

The PORTLY figure, with an ever-expanding girth, hides the intrinsic musical talent mastered by few.

Looks are truly deceptive, for he manages to match steps adroitly with the best in the business during his occasional foray on to the silver screen.

Yet, people remember him as the man who captured the imagination of a nation with the song “Shankara” in “Shankarabharanam”, and catapulted into the hearts of millions of Hindi-speaking homes with “Tere Mere Beech Mein, Kaisa Hai Yeh Bandhan” from “Ek Duje Ke Liye”.

S.P.Balasubramaniam needs no introduction when it comes to the world of music. Epitomising the cause that music is one language, which permeates all human barriers, he comes across as an intense individual who still feels that the best is yet to come.

With a personal dislike for fans’ association and a burning desire to learn as his career progresses, this engineer-turned-singer, who started his singing career in 1966 with the Telugu film, “Maryada Ramanna,” has sung more than 30,000 songs in 8 odd languages.

The maestro was in Hassan recently along with Manjula Gururaj, another leading playback singer, and his troupe, to perform for a fund-raiser for Gujarat earthquake victims.  The function, organized by the district administration, was originally scheduled for February, but was postponed because SPB had suffered an ankle injury in a road accident shortly before the programme.  The limp was pronounced when he performed on the stage, but true to his word and commitment to fans, he endured it with a professional smile.

The Hindu caught up with SPB, who readily obliged to answer a few questions before heading for the venue.  This show was ninth in the series of others – in Tamilnadu, Andhra Pradesh and a few in the Middle East – with the specific purpose of raising funds for the Gujarat earthquake victims.

Asked why he took the trouble of coming to Hassan in spite of the injury, he said, “It is a responsibility, and courtesy to the people who have given funds and to the organizers”.

On his choice of language for any show, he said, “Music”.  If you know the language, every language has its sweetness.  As long as you do not know the other languages, you feel that it is not good.  He noted that it was up to the singer to realize the beauty with which the music is embedded or entwined with the lyric in a song.  Being choosy about language or complaining about its difficulty only defiles the soul and the essence of music, the ‘language’ with which a singer reaches out, he said.

Despite lack of planning in life which he claims, SPB believes in taking things as they come.  “Things just happened.  If something happens in the journey of my life, I pick it up.”  He adds, “I have no goals in life.”  But, for a strong believer in destiny and nemesis, doing good to others and being good from within is of paramount importance.  “People take credit for success but turn to God for solace in failures.  I planned to become an engineer, but destiny willed that I become a singer”.

Observing that he wanted to continue with engineering if he failed to make a mark as a singer, he said, “God never gave me that chance”.  Adding wistfully, he said whatever has to happen will happen.  A clean conscience and a heart is must for a performer of creative arts.

“The end result of this pursuit, the quality, definitely relies on the personality.  Good thinking is often reflected in the quality of work,” he submitted humbly.

On the SPB phenomenon, he said, “It just happened”.  This is a question that I put to my conscience, he observed.  Being born a singer itself is a great boon from God.  Being a successful singer and earning the love and affection from crores of people is definitely a greater feeling, he admits.

On how he managed to balance his acting and singing career, he said it did not clash with his first love, singing, after his family.  Stating the two to be offshoots of the same profession, he said, “I act before a microphone as a singer and before a camera as an actor”.

Yet, he would not take up any job that he was not comfortable or did not enjoy doing.  He said the two did not clash as both the acting and singing schedules were decided well in advance.  “I am on the look out for a good role where I can fit in and accept one such offer irrespective of the language.  Besides, I do not act in too many movies in a year, two to three at the most.”

SPB said artists’ talents should always play “second fiddle in a person’s life”.  It should never become the sole consideration.  People must learn to appreciate goodness wherever and in whatever form they see and perceive its inner beauty.  “Art is God’s form; one must just go and appreciate it,” he observed.