OCTOBER 2016
and they were very much keen that I must learn from her. But Sudha amma was very busy traveling
and she was hardly in India. So, she was very concerned about how to allocate time for me and teach
me. But then she later called me over and made me sing. I sang about two songs to her. I think that
it’s God’s grace and God’s blessings that somehow she felt that I would be able to manage with her busy
schedules and learn from her. So she agreed to teach me and I think that was the greatest moment. So
since 1997 I have been learning from Sudha Ragunathan mam. Classical music as known it requires a
lot of regress training very informally. But formally I began to perform about five-six years back. That
is when my first season concert began and I slowly started to perform formal concerts.
My first concert for the spirit of youth series was in 2008 in the music academy. For music academy
season my first concerts were in the year Carnatic music concerts I have also sung for movies and
commercials. My recent song was for the Magnum office movie Bahubali. You completely priorities
only on music. So whether it is Carnatic music concerts or playback singing or commercial the key is
practice. So I keep practicing at home.
When you go to the concerts it is like switching to that mode. You are tuned in that mode and you go
and do that there. You go with an open mind. You never know what is going to come up in the studios
and you prepare for whatever comes from the music director that moment. So like I said it’s just there
in the family and I have inherited the habit from them as well. Since I have been doing this God’s grace
I have had the opportunity to do this from my childhood. I think I have never found the difficulty
in switching. But dubbing is quite different from singing because that requires a lot of sync with the
timing and matching with the character’s image also on screen and modulation and all of it happens
together at the same time.
Again for dubbing, singing helps a lot because playback singing requires a lot of modulation. When
you are singing in the tune, Shruti and tempo along with the lyrics you still need a lot of dynamics. So
that dynamics, whether it is love, romance, happily laughing and singing or crying and singing, helps
in dubbing as well.
I always remain open minded, just having my priority on singing good and being a very good musician. That will always continue and I would like to perform a lot of shows such as fusion music shows
as well which has different genres like Carnatic. But we also do new pieces of film music and elements
from Hindustani classical music and fusion to them, Carnatic music, Improvisation infusion to them.
I would like to perform a lot more live shows and definitely playback singing and all of this I would
love to continue and grow in multiple poles probably.
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