Legendary music director M.S. Viswanathan, or MSV, is no more. Popularly known as “the king of light music”, MSV passed away early morning on Tuesday at a private hospital in Chennai. He was 87 years old.
MSV had composed music for Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam films. He had given music for about 1,200 films and 800 of those were in Tamil. He had also worked in 30 Telugu films and all of them were musical hits.
MSV had started his career with music composer Ramamoorthy as assistants to their guru C.R. Subburaman. The duo had composed the background score for films like Devdas, Chandirani and Marumgal under Subburaman.
After Subburaman’s death, the duo got a chance to score the music for Panam in 1952. They never looked back since then.
Viswanathan-Ramamoorthy became household names and a new era started in music. They worked together for nearly 100 films and parted ways in 1965.
As an independent music composer, MSV completed nearly 1000 films. In Telugu, he mostly worked with director K. Balachander. He had worked with two generation of directors in films like Tenali Ramakrishna, Idi Katha Kadu, Akali Rajyam, Antuleni Katha, Maro Charitra and Kokilamma.
Playback singer S.P. Balasubramanyam, whose association with MSV goes back to many years, says that he lost his mentor and father figure. “My mentor, my father, my music, MSV, passed away. What penance did I not do, to be cursed not to be there to get a last glimpse of him? Why am I cursed to be in the US at this time? I and Indian cinema are orphaned. May his divine soul rest in peace… (sic),” he posted on his Facebook page.
