MYSURU: Legendary playback singer S. Janaki, fondly known as the ‘Nightingale of South India’, has passed away. She was 88 years old. The end came while she was undergoing medical treatment at a hospital in Mysuru. She has rendered tens of thousands of songs across nearly twenty languages.
Throughout her illustrious career, she sang around 48,000 songs in languages including Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Hindi, Odia, Bengali, Marathi, Tulu, Urdu, Gujarati, Punjabi, Konkani, Assamese, and Sindhi. In addition to these Indian languages, she also sang in foreign languages such as English, Japanese, Arabic, German, and Sinhala.
Janaki was born on April 23, 1938, in the Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh. Demonstrating an affinity for music from as early as three years old, her uncle, Dr. Chandrasekhar, played a pivotal role in nurturing her musical talent.
Her entry into the music world opened up in 1956 when she secured second place in an All India Radio national music competition. Subsequently, in 1957, she secured employment at AVM Studios in Madras. That same year, she made her debut in film playback singing with a song composed by T. Chalapathi Rao for the Tamil movie ‘Vidhiyin Vilayattu’.
Although that film was never released, she received opportunities to sing in six languages that very year, including Malayalam. Her debut track in Malayalam was ‘Irul Moodukayo En Vazhiyil’ from the 1957 film ‘Minnunnathellam Ponnalla’.
ലഘു വിവരണം
പ്രശസ്ത പിന്നണി ഗായികയും തെന്നിന്ത്യൻ വാനമ്പാടിയുമായ എസ്. ജാനകി (88) മൈസൂരുവിലെ സ്വകാര്യ ആശുപത്രിയിൽ അന്തരിച്ചു. ആറു പതിറ്റാണ്ടിലേറെ നീണ്ട സംഗീതജീവിതത്തിൽ മലയാളം, തമിഴ്, തെലുങ്ക്, കന്നഡ, ഹിന്ദി തുടങ്ങിയ ഇരുപതോളം ഭാഷകളിലായി 48,000-ത്തോളം ഗാനങ്ങൾ ഇവർ ആലപിച്ചിട്ടുണ്ട്. 1957-ൽ സിനിമ ലോകത്തേക്ക് കടന്നുവന്ന ജാനകിയുടെ വേർപാടിലൂടെ ഇന്ത്യൻ ചലച്ചിത്ര സംഗീതത്തിലെ ഒരു സുവർണ്ണ യുഗത്തിനാണ് വിരാമമാകുന്നത്.
(With inputs from MN)
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