Madurai Shanmukhavadivu Subbulakshmi was an Indian Carnatic singer. She was the first musician ever to be awarded the Bharat Ratna - India's highest civilian honour, the first Indian musician to receive the Ramon Magsaysay award in 1974 and the first Indian to perform at the United Nations General Assembly in 1966.
Sindhu Bhairavi is a 1985 Indian Tamil-language musical drama film written and directed by K. Balachander. The film stars Sivakumar, Suhasini, and Sulakshana. It revolves around the three lead characters: a Carnatic singer, J. K. Balaganapathi (JKB), his wife, Bhairavi, and his girlfriend Sindhu. At the peak of his career, JKB gets addicted to alcohol following complications with his affair, and his career goes into a downward spiral.
Swarnalatha was an Indian playback singer. In a career spanning almost 22 years, she recorded over 10,000 songs in many Indian languages, including Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Oriya, Punjabi, and Badaga. Her beautiful voice is the reason behind her title “Queen of Tones In India”.
Harini is an Indian film playback and classical singer born and raised in Chennai. She sings predominantly in Tamil films, besides other language films such as Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi films. She was first noticed by music director A. R. Rahman at a school competition where she was one among the winners. Eventually, she was signed in to record the song "Nila Kaigiradhu" for the film Indira (1995) when she was 15. The song went on to become one of the popular songs of the year and Harini began to get singing offers from other leading film composers.
Chinmayi Sripada, known mononymously as Chinmayi, is an Indian singer and voice actress who predominantly works in Tamil and Telugu films. Noted for her wide vocal range and versatility, she is one of the most popular singers in South India .She rose to fame for her critically acclaimed song "Oru Deivam Thantha Poovae" from Kannathil Muthamittal (2002), directed by Mani Ratnam and composed by A. R. Rahman. She debuted as a voice actress in Sillunu Oru Kaadhal (2006) rendering her voice for Bhumika Chawla, after being referred by one of A. R. Rahman's sound engineers. She debuted as a composer with a short lullaby titled Laali, which she also sang and released as part of Instagram's #1MinMusic.
Anuradha Sriram is an Indian carnatic and playback singer and child actress who hails from the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. She has sung more than 3500 songs in Tamil, Telugu, Sinhala, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali and Hindi films.
Nithyasree Mahadevan, also referred to as S. Nithyasree, is a Carnatic musician and playback singer for film songs in many Indian languages. Nithyashree has performed in all major sabhas in India. She has released more than 500 albums. She is best known for her rendition of the A. R. Rahman composition, "Kannodu Kaanbadhellam" - her playback debut song in the Tamil movie Jeans.
Nagapattinam Chandrashekharan Vasanthakokilam was a Carnatic singer and actress. Her work included the performances of kritis by Tyagaraja and Muthuswami Dikshitar and in the years after Indian independence, she helped popularise the famous mystic poet of Tamil Nadu, Kavi Yogi Maharishi Dr. Shuddhananda Bharati's songs. She died of tuberculosis in 1951.
Pattikada Pattanama is a 1972 Indian Tamil-language romantic comedy film produced and directed by P. Madhavan and written by Bala Murugan. The film stars Sivaji Ganesan and Jayalalithaa. The film deals with Kalpana, an urban woman who marries a villager Mookaiyan. After marriage, differences of opinion arise between the couple as Mookaiyan raises objections about city culture, leading to their separation. The rest of the film is whether Kalpana reforms and the couple reunite or not.
Ivan (transl. Him) is a 2002 Indian Tamil language film directed, written and produced by Parthibhan. The film stars him along with Meena and Soundarya. The film was a runway hit.
Porayath Leela was an Indian playback singer, Carnatic vocalist and a music director. She has recorded more than 5,000 songs in various Indian languages including Malayalam, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Hindi, Bengali, Sanskrit, Odia, Gujarati, Marathi and also Sinhale. She is also known for her extensive history of collaboration in the songs of composers v.Dakshinamoorthy, MS Baburaj, G Devarajan, ghantasala, MS Viswanathan, K. Raghavan, Br Lakshmanan, LPR Varma, BA chithambara athletes, AT ummer, MK Arjun, Johnson, ouseppachan, ilaiyaraja, and with the playback singers KJ Yesudas and Ghantalasa over the years. Leela is known for her sweet and melodious voice that she named Ganamani. She was awarded Padma Bhushan in 2006. She made her debut as a playback singer in the 1948 Tamil film Kangkanam.
Kunnakudi Subbalakshmi was a vocal Carnatic singer and elder sister of eminent violinist Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan.
Paradesi (transl. Vagabond) is a 2013 Indian Tamil-language period drama film written and directed by Bala starring Atharvaa, Vedhika, and Dhansika. The film's music was scored by G. V. Prakash Kumar. The film was based on the novel Eriyum Panikadu, a Tamil translation of the 1969 English novel Red Tea by Paul Harris Daniel and inspired by real-life incidents that took place before independence in the 1930s. It was released on 15 March 2013. The dubbed version of Telugu was released under the same name. The film opened to highly positive reviews with critics mainly praising the performances of the cast and the direction of Bala. The movie was an average grosser at the box office
Kudiyirundha Koyil is a 1968 Indian Tamil-language spy film directed by K. Shankar. The film stars M. G. Ramachandran, Jayalalithaa and Rajasree, with L. Vijayalakshmi, Pandari Bai, M. N. Nambiar, Sundarrajan, V. K. Ramasamy, S. V. Ramadas and Nagesh in supporting roles. A remake of the 1962 Hindi film China Town, it revolves around twins who become separated as children: one grows up to be a criminal, and the other is tasked with apprehending him.
Tharai Thappattai is a 2016 Tamil-language musical drama film written, produced and directed by Bala. The film features M. Sasikumar and Varalaxmi Sarathkumar in the leading roles, while Ilaiyaraaja composed the film's music based on karakattam. This film also happened to be Ilaiyaraaja's 1000th film. The film began production in 2013 and released on 14 January 2016. Ilaiyaraaja won the National Film Award for Best Background Score at the 63rd National Film Awards.
Yuvan is an Indian actor, who has appeared in Tamil language films. The son of director Feroze Khan, he made a breakthrough appearing in M. Anbazhagan's Saattai (2012).
K. Shivashankar was an Indian dance choreographer who worked in more than 10 languages but majorly with South Indian films, including Tamil films & Telugu films.
Sandham: Symphony Meets Classical Tamil is a studio album in Tamil by American Composer Rajan Somasundaram that involved various international artists. It is based on Sangam period ancient Tamil poetry and the first ever music album on Sangam poetry. The Hindu music review called the album "A Major Event in the World of Music". As of 15 July 2020, the album got into Amazon's Top#10 best seller list under International Music category.
Sahana is an Indian Tamil-language TV series produced by K. Balachander. It is a sequel to the 1985 film Sindhu Bhairavi which Balachander directed. The first episode was aired on Jaya TV on 24 February 2003.
Teejay Arunasalam is British playback singer and actor who has worked in Indian cinema, particularly Tamil language films. After making his acting debut in the Tamil film Asuran (2019) alongside Dhanush, he has also appeared in significant roles in Thatrom Thookrom (2020), anthology web series Putham Pudhu Kaalai Vidiyaadhaa (2022), and in Pathu Thala (2023) with Silambarasan.
