A good lyric is as important as good music, says Siva Ananth

For those who are not aware, Siva is the executive producer of Madras Talkies and is also the writer of Sachin Tendulkar’s biopic, Sachin: The Billion Dreams and the co-writer of Mani Ratnam’s Chekka Chivantha Vaanam. He has now made his debut as a lyricist in Mani Ratnam’s Vaanam Kottatum and the songs have gone on to become chartbusters. “Being a lyricist was not in my bucket list. I never thought that writing songs was my forte and I still don’t think it is. However, I am huge fan of music and I have my list of favourite song writers like Maruthakasi, Kannadasan, Vairamuthu, Udumalai Narayana Kavi and Eric Clapton among others. I believe that the lyric of a song is as important as music because a good lyric instantly strikes a chord with the listeners,” he tells us.

Siva says that to him Vaanam Kottatum happened at the spur-of-the moment. “One day, the director of the film Dhana, Sid Sriram and I were discussing on creating a good album that should sound different. Sid came up with tunes that worked for Dhana and our boss (Mani Ratnam), for the song Easy Come Easy Go. Sid hasn’t worked in the Tamil film landscape predominantly and boss asked me to sit with him on how to go about the lyrics for the tunes. I have done this before by sitting with the music directors and connecting the dots in the lyrics. I initially penned the Sevvizhi Venn Kadal lines and showed it to boss. He immediately asked how will I put them together as a song. Then it was organic, I wrote the next couple of lines, which led to more lines and, finished the song, like how a batsman sometimes doesn’t realise that he has connected the ball well on to the bat. We later showed it to our boss, who asked me to write other songs too,” he explains. Poova Thalayia and Yaarumilla Kaatukulle too were lauded for the lyrics by netizens. “As a producer, I want my film to have a good album. As a lyricst, I understood what the film is and who the characters are, which gave me the freedom to choose my words,” he adds. There are rumours that Siva has also finished penning a couple of songs for the magnum opus Ponniyin Selvan. Prod him and he replies with a smile, “Okay. If I am the lyricist, you would know when boss makes an official announcement. I can’t comment on that.”