Playback singing was introduced in Malayalam cinema with Nirmala . T.K. Govinda Rao and Sarojini Menon were the singers chosen to give voice to the actors in this film. Before Nirmala , the actors did the singing by themselves. There were 23 songs in Balan , the first talkie and all the songs were sung by the actors. Since, they did not have the technological facility to shoot and record voices separately the song sequences were copied directly from the studio floors. Acting and singing were a simultaneous process. It is a known fact that all tunes in Balan were copies of old Hindi songs. The selection of these tunes was done by harmonist Ibrahim and K.K. Aroor, who also played an important role in Balan . Another disadvantage was that it was not possible to listen to a song after it was recorded as the negatives on which the songs were impressed were sent to either Bombay or Calcutta to be processed. So, perfection in recording of songs had to be compromised. Moreover, most of the producers were not willing to spend more to improve the quality of the recordings of songs.
There were 16 songs in the second Malayalam talkie Jnanambika (1940). All of them were penned by Puthankavu Mathan Tharakan and set to tune by Jayarama Iyer. Sebastian Kunju Kunju Bhagavathar and C.K. Rajam were the ‘singing stars’ in this film. A sardar was the sound recordist of Jnanambika . He was not satisfied by Rajam’s rendering of one song and demanded that she sing it once again. She continued acting and singing but the sardar seemed to have some problem or the other with her singing. He kept repeating that Rajam sing more loudly and clearly. Rajam must have acted and sung that one song nearly 13 times. She became so tired that she fell unconscious.
The idea of playback singing in South Indian films happened by chance. Sreenivasa Kalyanam (1934), produced and directed by A. Narayanan for Sreenivasa Cinetone was the first talkie to be produced completely in South India. Before this South Indian films were made in studios at Calcutta, Bombay and other cities like Kolhapur and Pune.
The songs in this film rendered by the actors were amplified through the use of a microphone which was hung on an iron rod. These were days when sound and picture were recorded on the film track while shooting. The orchestra troupe used to ‘hide’ behind bushes or other properties like a cupboard placed on the sets so that they did not come into the focus of the camera. Sometimes, the person had to move along with the actors in the song sequence. The members of the orchestra also had to keep moving with the musical instruments slung around their necks.
P.S. Sreenivas Rao, a noted Carnatic singer, played the role of Lord Vishnu in this film. He was also involved in the composing of music. He was on the studio floor singing a hymn. He felt that the orchestra had gone out of tune and suddenly shouted for a ‘cut.’ That word was also recorded along with his song. Director H.M. Reddy did not observe this error nor was it noticed at the editing table. The première show of Sreenivasa Kalyanam was held at Crown Talkies, Mint Street, Chennai. The viewers noticed the error and were stunned to hear an English word in a Tamil mythological. They questioned this; there were vociferous protests, and the screening was stopped. It could be resumed only after a technician was brought from the studio and the English word removed. This incident was an eye opener for directors. They began to think of a system of playback singing, which could reduce such errors. And this was introduced very soon.
