 The voice of Chennai
You hear his voice everywhere. It has that sonorous, rich timbre, and the words come out perfectly enunciated, clearly articulated. Whether it is a corporate film or a music CD with a commentary or a documentary film, there's no getting away from P C Ramakrishna. He is the voice of
Chennai.
There was a time some years ago when I thought I was getting tired of that voice. Not a single multimedia CD ROM could you view or an awards ceremony at the Music Academy could you attend without listening to PCR. And I believed he was beginning to overexpose himself. There was creeping in a monotony in his delivery. Soon, he would fade out, I was sure, replaced by younger, fresher voices.
I could not have been more wrong. Ramakrishna is still around, doing as many voice-overs as ever, maybe more than before. The voice has only got better. It is no longer monotonous, for Ram is a smart man, who has managed to reinvent himself. His voice sounds different in different productions, adapted to the medium, the occasion, the purpose. I was listening to his voice in a corporate video, and it was so subtle and understated, I almost missed recognising it. It sounded different, but by some ingenious device, he had adopted a voice that seemed to merge beautifully into the presentation. Today, P C Ramakrishna is a man of more than one voice.
He is also a man of many parts. He has trained in Carnatic music, having played the mridangam with some proficiency and even considered a career in it, before joining the Kotharis as a management professional back in the sixties. He has had a long, enduring affair with theatre, and is today a pillar of the Madras Players. He has been a member of the Madras Youth Choir, along with his wife Hyma. He played cricket at the university level, bowling rather useful leg breaks. Over the years, I have always found in him an excellent, and empathetic conversationalist in subjects close to my heart and cricket is one of them. I remember that we both thought a few years ago that Subhash Gupte was a greater leg spinner than Shane Warne was or would ever be. I have revised that opinion after following Warne's subsequent exploits with joy. I wonder what Ram feels on the subject now.
In the recent past, I have had the opportunity of watching Ramakrishna at work at close quarters. In charge of a theatrical production on behalf of Madras Players, he has been tutoring, mentoring, inspiring a bunch of young actors and giving the director of the play tremendous moral and physical support. His tireless assistance has included deputising for absent actors of whom there are more than one on any given day of rehearsal. Watching Ram at these sessions has been an eye-opener for me: his attention to detail, his sense of commitment to the play, his patience with the youngsters, his unconcealed enjoyment of their youthful exuberance and his readiness to appreciate good performance, have all shown him in a light I had not known before. The more I see him, the more I am convinced that he should spearhead an academy at Chennai on the lines of the National School of Drama.
V Ramnarayan
vramnarayan@gmail.com
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