Love towards western music !

Love towards western music – a journey from 1960s’  

I could recall , when I started liking  western music !. In the year 1965 , when I was studying 9^th standard , we had a “ BUSH Baron “ transistor radio bought by my father.

In those time we used to pay license at Post offices  for this and also for a valve set radio “ GE “ make of 1950s’.  It  was a thrilling experience to listen western music in the early mornings at our Mylapore house terrace ; the radio Ceylon used to transmit half an hour instrumentals of good western music . In those days  “ Come September “ , “Shadows”  & “ Ventures “  and other instrumentals were so good to listen. I go to terrace for studies and by my side I used to keep the Transistor  in full volume. At that time an uncle , Mr.C.Ramanathan , Staff reporter of Indian express , lived in our house as a tenant . He is from Ceylon and talk on Jim Reeves songs . So the passion  on liking , loving and listening Western music inspired by him  started  and it never stopped till today… !!!!

I would like to share the great singers and musicians of my times in 1960s’ , 1970s’ , 1980s’ & 1990s’.  I am not much familiar with the later singers but keep listening the old timers for ever. Another information to share is I love opera and western classical and also eastern music. When my brother Ramesh gave me a good collections of his music cassettes of western & eastern when he came from USA for the first time. Beethoven’s symphony , Bach , Henry Mancini , Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake  albums were in the collection presented to me.

Off late when my friend Suresh Kuppuswamy and my brother joined with me in college days and they too love western and Hindi film songs . Another friend Gopal and Jaggu  (both are brothers ) who live in neighborhood were good friends of ours and  they had a good collection of LPs’ and EPs’ ( long Play and extended play records ) . Gopal was Suresh’s junior in School of Architecture and Jaggu is a furniture & interior designer. Some times we all go to their home and enjoy listening in their turntable cum amplifier. Then I started buying few LPs and later Jaggu gave some LPs’ which he cannot play in his new player. So I have decided to buy a record player and whenever I window shop at Music shops and see the price tags I simply walk out! It’s a matter of huge sum in those days to invest or spend for pleasure .

At last I bought a seconds , HMV1010 ( 10+10 watts  stereo speakers ) Record Player , in a discount offer @ Rs.1050 in a shop near Ajantha Hotel. Before that Suresh , whose father had a radio repair shop “ Maxwell Radio “ near Sri Karaneeswarar temple in Bazaar road, brought  a GRUNDIG Record Changer player to our terrace DEN to enjoy listening music and do a social service to the neighbours by blasting the Hindi pops of that time, at midnight !!! Some loved  it and some cursed us ! The famous filmy songs we played are – Kati Patang , Mili , Hum Kissi Se …, Yadon Ki Barat , Juli , Bobby , Jawani Diwani and others. Abba , Dona Summer , Samantha Fox , Neil Diamond , Bony M . Shadows  and many other western pops were in  our list.

When I started recalling the names of the singers and musicians , the list extended  to beyond 50 to my memory of today and may be many more , if I squeeze my mind. I wish to bringout the pics of the album covers of the famous singers here for our viewing pleasure and enjoy the richness of western music even today through youtube and other media ( as we are blessed with internet , a modern electronic media .

And on and on and on… the list goes ….

Try to listen of your favorite old songs and cherish the past music lives as immortal songs forever !

Now I listen Bhajan’s and chant Hare Krishna Maha Mantra daily. But  the liking of listening western music is still there for soft songs and not rocks !!!

I wish to talk on books in my next  blog !.