THE city has been witnessing English music concerts bringing the roof down almost every weekend, but only to a niche audience. But in a city where a majority of them are Tamil film music lovers, the trend of Tamil pop music is yet to create waves. A western genre with Tamil lyrics that kicked off as early as 1994/95 is yet to make it big in the city and the Tamil pop singers have found various reasons behind the poop popularity of the genre.
“Though there are many mediums to popularise Tamil pop, not much publicity is given,” finds Shalini Singh, popularly known as Pop Shalini. While publicity seems to be one of the main reasons, it completely depends on the producer and the company that markets (label) the album; feels Smita who has released two Tamil pop albums titled Kalakkal and Smita.
However, the right mix of audio and video is equally important for such genres of music to be as popular as film music. “Video is very important for a pop song because the singer will be on-screen and viewers will come to know them, whereas in films the singers are always behind the scene,” believes Smita, who also adds that it takes a lot of investment from the company’s side.
While it is known that there are only a few companies to promote Tamil pop music, the quality of the music also matters during promotion. “Not many come up with quality music. Many singers come up with slipshod job that obviously will not be able to make it big in the industry. That’s one of the reasons why such music is not popular among the mass,” says Shalini, who cut her first album in 1996.
“Despite the less number of takers, Tamil pop music does have a market”, avers Gopakumar, a pop singer who launched his first album ‘Saaral’, recently.
Though Tamil pop music has been there in the city for more than a decade, it is still in its initial stages. “Pop is new and it is only in its infant stage. It’ll take more time to become popular,” says Philip George, Business Head for Southern Region, Saregama, also pointing that Hindi and Punjabi pop music have a better market than Tamil.
“Moreover pop is a western genre. Here people feel close to folk and film music. May be it’ll take more time for people to accept it,” says Shalini, adding that piracy is also a factor that’s killing such type of music.
Though pop singing might have brought a change to music lovers, it is yet to make a difference in the life of pop singers here. Shalini, who started off as a pop singer has since then moved to the film industry and has lent her voice for over 200 songs. “Because film playback singing gives a singer better identity than a pop album,” she points out, adding that unless until there is good publicity, pop music will not see the light.
While many aspiring pop singers are waiting to cut an album, the number of takers, quality of the music and publicity is all what it takes to see Tamil pop music as popular as film music.
tejonmayam@epmltd.com