He would gladly oblige any new or upcoming music composer saying it gave him another opportunity to explore creativity and recognize talent. Of course he picked up more than a dozen Filmfare awards and state government awards on the way.īut awards and recognition hardly mattered for this engineer turned singer. For someone who got his break in Tamil cinema he could win his first national award in Tamil only in 1996, the previous five having gone for songs in Telugu, Kannada and Hindi. A great fan of Mohammed Rafi, SPB said that the Hindi singer was his inspiration to sing romantic songs with such passion and involvement. Subsequently SPB became the most sought after male voice for any romantic song in Tamil cinema and then in Telugu and other South Indian languages as well. Related Stories Singer SP Balasubrahmanyam Dies Of Covid-19 In Chennai Since then SPB has been the reigning male playback singer in Tamil cinema.
The song and the singer went on to become raging hits. MGR loved it so much that he called the young singer to his house and gifted him a gold ring. Mahadevan that SPB record the duet “Ayiram Nilavey Vaa”. Soundararajan sing for him, and was convinced by the film’s music director K.V. MGR, who till then had refused to let anyone but T.M. So as luck would have it SPB’s first song to be heard by Tamil listeners was for the MGR-Jayalalitha starrer “Adimai Penn” a box office hit that got released in 1969. Viswanathan, who gave SPB his first break in Tamil cinema in 1969 through “Shanthi Nilayam” (an adaptation of Jane Eyre). Such was his “kelvi gnanam” (ability to grasp by just listening),” commented legendary composer M.S. “Balu would listen to the tune just once and would be ready for the take. Balasubrahmanyam or fondly known as SPB overcome these “deficiencies” while climbing the pinnacle of film music were his dedication, never say die attitude and loads of talent to back his golden voice. When he won his second national award for “Ek Duje Ke Liye”(1981), he confessed again - that he did not know Hindi. When he won his first national award for the Telugu film “Shankarabarnam”(1979), singing for the film’s protagonist– a Carnatic musician– Sripathi Panditaradhyula Balasubrahmanyam confessed that he had never learnt Carnatic music.