Shivagnanam, known by the stage name P. Madhuri, is a

South Indian South India, also known as Dakshina Bharata or Peninsular India, consists of the peninsular southern part of India. It encompasses the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana, as well as the union territo ...

playback singer A playback singer, also known as a ghost singer, is a singer whose singing is pre-recorded for use in films. Playback singers record songs for soundtracks, and actors or actresses lip-sync the songs for cameras; the actual singer does not app ...

. She has sung songs in

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was des ...

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

, and

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

. She has twice won

Kerala State Film Award The Kerala State Film Awards are the film awards for a motion picture made in Kerala. The awards started in 1969 by the Department of Cultural Affairs, Government of Kerala and since 1998 the awards have been bestowed by Kerala State Cha ...

for best playback singer.

Early life

Shivagnanam was born in

Tiruchirappalli Tiruchirappalli () ( formerly Trichinopoly in English), also called Tiruchi or Trichy, is a major tier II city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the administrative headquarters of Tiruchirappalli district. The city is credited with bein ...

in a

family on 3 November 1941. She married V. Jayaram at the age of 13 and became the mother of two kids by 16. She was a part of an amateur drama troupe when Malayalam music director G. Devarajan happened to watch one of her performances at Madras. She was introduced to films by Devarajan through ''Kadalppalam'' (1969), in which she sang the famous Mappila song "Kasthuri Thailamittu Mudi Minukki". Devarajan handpicked her and groomed her into one of the most successful Malayalam playback singers of all time.

Career

She mainly sings Malayalam songs. She was probably the fourth most prominent female singer after S. Janaki, P. Susheela and P Leela in Malayalam in the 1970s and mainly sang songs composed by G. Devarajan Master. She has sung a total of 552 songs in Malayalam out of which majority is under G. Devarajan. This is a record in Malayalam film industry which no other female signers can claim. She has several folk songs, comedy songs, classical songs, devotional songs, romantic songs, sad songs under her credit, but what made her more popular was her ability to sing in high pitches. She had sung for all the music directors of that time, except MS Baburaj.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Madhuri, P. Indian women playback singers Musicians from Tiruchirappalli 20th-century Indian singers Malayalam playback singers Kerala State Film Award winners Living people 1943 births 20th-century Indian women singers Singers from Tamil Nadu Women musicians from Tamil Nadu 21st-century Indian women singers 21st-century Indian singers