Tunes with all the warmth and pure emotion of a mother’s embrace

Director M. Mohanan enlists the skills of composer Shaan Rahman for the musical side to Aravindante Athidhikal—a heart-tugging Malayalam family drama starring actor, filmmaker and singer Vineeth Sreenivasan. The soundtrack features movingly melodic ballads, as in the classically inspired “Aanandhame” and the jazz-tinged “Endhe Kanna”, but it’s “Kanne Thaai Malare”—building on Vineeth’s whispered vocal and soft piano to crescendo on a wave of richly layered strings—that shows the range this multitalented artist is capable of. “Kripaakari Devi” ups the tempo with pacey electronic percussion, while “Rasathi” closes out the proceedings with a novel time signature and cinematic sweep.