Music is a must for me. I’ve had my own walkman since I was in 3rd Standard, a precious little gift from papa. Perfect discretion was exercised when I needed to use it then. Parents felt constant hearing first would damage my ear-drums (A reason vociferously told by my mumma, and she tells that to me till date!) and second that it would affect my studies! None happened.
I obeyed their orders to the tee like a good girl! And as I grew up, and my father believed I had understood what is important and not, what are my responsibilities and not, I was allowed the freedom to full rights to my walkie!
It was my constant companion especially when I did my Maths and problems in Science, the fact that I topped left little excuse for my mom to shout at me for listening to music while studying. A habit that stuck till I gave my final paper of MBA!
Papa somewhere understood my love for dance and music, mumma could not fathom why I needed to carry that walkman everywhere I went. My elder cousin sis ( More like a real one, we lived in the same building, both only children and that did not give us much of a choice but to stick around with each other despite the age difference of 8 years!! Over the years I think we have grown close, but we still love to fight! It’s still fun!!) added to my woes by saying that she just wants to show off! Well I did think it was cool because then not many carried it around like a glue 24 hrs and that made me different;-) That sis of mine is one hell of a mind-reader and it was often irritating when she would be vocal about it to my parents! It did not make things easy for me!
Papa’s nicest gift was a small deck and speakers in my room. It was my little dream to own one and he had it placed the day my SSC exams ended, just as he had promised! It is 10 years old now and still occupies its place in my room and still is in excellent shape. I’ve given my building neighbours a harrowing time when I would play it at full volume. It was never intentional just that I enjoyed it and often mum would be banging on my closed door asking me to lower the volume. I simply enjoyed the drama!
Another precious gift came from my jijajee( yup same didi’s hubby), a disc-man, another of my prized possessions. As for the inputs into the players, a collection of audio cassettes was built that only expanded as I grew up and now they are slowly getting replaced by mp3s and audio CDs. I also thanked the mobile phone companies and the inventor who thought of including the radio facility in the phone, today I cannot do without it, the radio I mean! The phone I could do without easily! I wish a hundred times in day it would just stop ringing!!!
Music never restricted me to a particular era, I love the 60s music, the romance was so clean and the songs so melodious. I love RD Burman who brought hip-hop into Hindi film music. AR Rehman an all time favourite that got me hooked to Tamil music. Kandukondain Kandukondain and Alaipayuthe are absolute must haves in your collection if you are a Rehman fan. Having South Indian friends helped understand that genre of music better. The 80s were a slack period but music picked up from 90s, with pop songs becoming a rage, things were finally looking up. Shankar , Ehsaan Loy and Shantanu Moitra are my current favourites.
Bryan Adams rocked, ABBA and Beatle’s collections began to grow, The Corrs were a must have and a must listen to. John Denver & Eagles soothed your mind. You swooned to songs of Eric Clapton and tapped your feet to Elvis. Generations passed their songs onto the new ones such that oldies remained immortal and never faded away. Over time songs kept on adding to your collection which were exceptional, just got to listen to, cult songs, nothing like this one…the list was endless.
I’m not an expert on music but the next blog chapter will carry my favourite songs, a few years down the line when I return to that post I want to see how much of that list would’ve changed:-)
That’s the beauty of blogging, it takes you into a nice trip down the memory lane; and with that blog on songs, there will be fine music running along with it in my mind!