Ilaiyaraaja
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Ilaiyaraaja (born Gnanathesigan) is an Indian musician, composer, arranger, conductor, orchestrator, multi-instrumentalist, lyricist and playback singer popular for his works in Indian cinema, predominantly in Tamil in addition to Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi films. Regarded as one of the most prolific composers, in a career spanning over forty-nine years, he has composed over 8,600 songs, provided film scores for about 1,523 feature films in nine languages, and performed in over 20,000 concerts. He was one of the earliest Indian film composers to use Western classical music harmonies
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Ilaiyaraaja (Tamil: இளையராஜா, IPA: [ɪləjəɹɑːdʒɑː]) (born June 2, 1943 as Gnanadesikan) is an Indian film composer, singer, and lyricist. He has composed over 4,000 songs and provided background music for more than 800 Indian films in various languages in a career spanning 30 years. He is based in Chennai, India. Ilaiyaraaja was the most prominent composer of film music in South Indian cinema during the late 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s. <a href="https://www.last.fm/music/Ilaiyaraaja">Read more
Key facts
- Musical artist<! See Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians >.birth_name
- Gnanathesigan Daniel
- Musical artist<! See Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians >.image
- Ilaiyaraaja at Merku Thodarchi Malai Press Meet (cropped).jpg
- Musical artist<! See Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians >.caption
- Ilaiyaraaja in 2017
- Musical artist<! See Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians >.birth_place
- Pannaipuram, Madras Presidency, British India
- Musical artist<! See Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians >.years_active
- 1976–present
- Officeholder.embed
- yes
- Officeholder.education
- Trinity Laban
- Officeholder.spouse
- Jeeva Rajayya
- Officeholder.children
- Karthik RajaBhavathariniYuvan Shankar Raja
- Officeholder.office
- Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha
- Officeholder.constituency
- Nominated (Arts)
- Officeholder.nominator
- Ram Nath Kovind
- Officeholder.term_start
- 7 July 2022
via Wikipedia infobox
~26 min read
Encyclopedic overview
18 sectionsContents
- Early life
- Initial exposure to music
- Career
- Session musician and orchestrator
- Film score composer
- Non-cinematic output
- Live performances
- Musical style and sensibility
- Honours and legacy
- Personal life
- Legal issues and controversies
- Discography
- See also
- Notes
- References
- Bibliography
- Further reading
- External links
Ilaiyaraaja (born Gnanathesigan) is an Indian musician, composer, arranger, conductor, orchestrator, multi-instrumentalist, lyricist and playback singer popular for his works in Indian cinema, predominantly in Tamil in addition to Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi films. Regarded as one of the most prolific composers, in a career spanning over forty-nine years, he has composed over 8,600 songs, provided film scores for about 1,523 feature films in nine languages, and performed in over 20,000 concerts. He was one of the earliest Indian film composers to use Western classical music harmonies and string arrangements in Indian film music.
In 1986, he became the first Indian composer to record a soundtrack with computer for the film Vikram. In 2013, when CNN-IBN conducted a poll to commemorate 100 years of Indian cinema, Ilaiyaraaja secured 49% of the vote and was adjudged the country's greatest music composer. In 2025, he became the first-ever Asian, as well as Indian film composer to compose, record, and perform live a full Western classical symphony in London. He also composed and orchestrated Thiruvasagam in Symphony (2006) - the first Indian oratorio.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Ilaiyaraaja” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.