The VOICE behind these AMAZING SONGS

‘You could be out of sight, out of mind, but it may take just one song to bring you back and to let you know that your audience is still rooting for you.

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’Mahalakshmi Iyer has been singing for the movies for more than two decades.

Trained in Hindustani music, she has songs in different genres, different languages.

She has even got an Oscar-winning song -- Slumdog Millionaire’s Jai Ho to her credit.

She looks back at her career,

You are trained in Hindustani music. Was the atmosphere at home a musical one? Is that what made you take up singing?

Yeah. My mother was a wonderful Carnatic singer.

I am the youngest of four sisters.

There was so much music in the family, so much music playing from morning.

Everybody had varied tastes.

Automatically, I would start singing. Everyone was singing, of course.

Somewhere down the line, my parents, like the quintessential south Indian parents, decided one must learn music.

They decided Hindustani would be better because we lived in Mumbai and sang a lot of Hindi -- mainly north Indian music.

Also, my father was a keen listener of Hindustani classical music.

The mahaul (atmosphere) was so music-dominated that I had no choice but to take up music later.

I learnt from the time I was 10 years of age.

How did playback singing happen? You made your debut in 1998 with Dil Se..

I sang a lot of jingles.

Television was big at that point of time, so I sang for a lot of serials.

I was working with a few musicians who were working with Rahman sir. So someone mentioned about me.

When I met the musician Ranjitji (Ranjit Barot), he told me, ‘I thought you would be recording in Chennai.’

I said I haven’t received the call.

He said, it will happen.