Down memory lane with Sujatha

Down memory lane with Sujatha

It took her a while to shed the little girl image, especially among Malayali music lovers to whom she was their very own 'Baby' Sujatha. The picture of the tiny tot standing beside K J Jesudas, matching him line for line in the romantic melodies of the day is a sight not many would have forgotten. Today, Sujatha Mohan is the one of the leading playback singers in south India. Yet there has been no change in the trademark smile or the pleasant, ready-for-a-laugh attitude.

Hailing from a family that is deeply interested in music, she ventured into playback singing when she was in Class VI, for a Malayalam film -- a song by M K Arjunan. Having lost her father at the age of two, it was not possible for her mother to bring her from Kochi to Chennai for recordings and she lost out on a lot of opportunities. Her marriage to Dr Krishna Mohan brought her to Chennai. She made use of her sabbatical from playback singing to learn Hindustani music.

Sujatha's first Tamil song, for Ilayaraja, was in the film 'Kavikkuyil'. But the song 'Kaadhal Oviyam Kandein' was not included in the film when it was released. "That is considered good luck (raasi) here", she says with a smile. Her big break in Tamil came, of course, via A R Rahman, with the song 'Puthu Vellai Mazhai' in 'Roja'. It became a big hit, to be followed by many others.

An established singer now in Tamil, it would probably be more apt to ask her which film she has not sung for. "Not in 'Boys'," she says promptly of Shankar's forthcoming film, which has music by A R Rahman. 'Run', 'Dhool', 'Nala Damayanthi', 'Priyamana Thozhi', 'Thithikkuthey'… the list of hit songs goes on…

For one who claims she does not know much about the Internet, the 'Maya Maya…' song in 'Baba' was quite an experience. Rahman sent the tune over the Internet from London while she and singer Karthik were in his studio going through Vaali's lyrics, she recollects. Once the recording was done, Rahman returned it from London with the corrections. Rahman was so impressed with the song that he asked her to sing the Telugu version also.

She is grateful to the all the music directors who gave her work in Tamil like Ilayaraja, A R Rahman, Deva, Vidyasagar, S A Rajkumar, Karthik Raja, Bharadwaj, Mani Sharma, V S Narasimhan, Sabesh-Murali, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Iman, Dina, Ramesh Vinayagam, Sirpee and Adityan.

It was noted director Priyadarshan who brought her back to playback singing with the Malayalam film 'Chitram', the musical super-hit starring Mohanlal. And there has been no looking back since. Thanks to Ouseppachan, Ravindran, Vidyasagar, Johnson, Mohan Sitara, M G Radhakrishnan, Bernie Ignacius, S P Venkatesh, Kaithappuram Viswanathan, Deepak Dev, Jayachandran and Alphonse.

She has sung in all the four south Indian languages and her Hindi numbers in films like 'Pukaar' and 'Taal' have topped the charts. Music directors Keeravani, Koti, R P Patnaik and Chakri have been responsible for her getting noticed in Telugu films.

Sujatha has won the Kerala state award twice, the Tamil Nadu state award twice, the Asianet award twice, the Film Critics award 11 times, the Cinema Express award and the Dinakaran award. With over 5,000 songs to her credit, this is hardly a surprise.

Sujatha, who has done 3,200 shows with Jesudas, has travelled all over the world. But it is indeed ironic that she prefers to browse travel sites, read books on travel or see the places on TV! Her hobbies include light reading, cooking and listening to music. And among her recent songs, she likes Aasai Aasai (Dhool), Mallikayae Mallikayae (Arasu), Maankuttiye (Priyamana Thozhi), Nenjodu (Kadhal Kondein) and Thithikkuthe… (Thithikkuthe).

She attributes her success to the support from her family. Her mother Lakshmi, who has been a tower of strength, an encouraging husband, Mohan, who accompanies her for programmes and daughter Shweta, who hardly complains despite long periods of absence from home.

It had been her father's wish that she should become a doctor and if he had been alive, that's what Sujatha would have been. But then the world of music would have lost a star!

SUJATHA

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Sujatha Mohan is a South Indian film playback singer. Her first hit song was Puthu Vellai Mazhai from Mani Ratnam's 1992 Tamil film Roja, composed by A. R. Rahman. Working in the industry for over two decades, she has lent her voice to hit songs from films including Gentleman (1993), Indian (1996) and Minsaara Kanavu (1997). She has also worked with film composer Ilayaraaja.

no sujatha fans in this forum? 😛

Originally posted by: Dawn05

Thanks for sharing .. didn't know about her before

😊

😳you're most welcome... Yeah she's not that famous.. She's pretty famous in the south though.. You should hear her song from Pukaar..It's just mindblowing..😃

thanx for sharing abhi...couldn't really recognize her from her name

thanks abhiji. Didnt know all this about sujata

Yes I've heard her Pukaar song. It's awesome!

I'm a grt fan of Sujatha...I just luv all her renditions....she breezes thro any song with such comfort!

Thnx Abhiji I really didn't have any idea about this Genius Talent called Sujatha from south……Thnx once again for sharing the news with us.

Thanks you so much Abhi 😃. I just love all her renditions in Telugu. I dunno Tamil so dunno about her songs in Tamil. But all her Telugu songs were 👍🏼

Thank you once again abhi. Today u have shared so much information about the south indian singers. 👏