Usha Uthup

Usha Uthup (formerly Iyer) (born November 8, 1947) is a popular Indian pop singer. She was well known for popular hits in the late 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.
She has sung in 16 Indian languages including Bengali, Hindi, Punjabi, Assamese, Oriya, Gujarati, Marathi, Konkani, Malayalam, Kannada, Tamil, Tulu and Telugu. She can also sing in several foreign languages including English, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Sinhalese, Swahili, Russian, Nepalese, Arabic, Creole, Zulu, and Spanish.

Her first public singing occurred when she was nine. Her sisters who were already exploring a music career, took her to a musician called Ameen Sayani who gave her an opportunity to sing on the Ovaltine Music Hour in Radio Ceylon. She sang a number called "Mockingbird Hill". After that, several appearances followed through her teenage years.

Uthup started singing in a small nightclub in Chennai called as Nine Gems in the basement of the erstwhile Safire theater complex on Mount Road , when she was 20, wearing a saree and leg callipers. Her performance was so well received that the owner of the nightclub asked her to stay on for a week. After her first night club gig, she began singing in Calcutta at night clubs such as "Talk of the Town" and "Trincas". She met her future husband Uthup in Trincas. After Trincas, her next engagement took her to Delhi where she sang at the Oberoi hotels. By happenstance, a film crew belonging to Navketan unit including Shashi Kapoor visited the nightclub and they offered her a chance to sing movie playback. As a result, she started her Bollywood career with Hare Rama Hare Krishna. Originally, she was supposed to sing Dum Maro Dum along with Asha Bhosle. However, as a result of internal politicking on the part of other singers, she lost that chance but ended up singing an English verse.

In 1968, she recorded covers of two pop songs in English, "Jambalaya" and The Kingston Trio's "Greenback Dollar", on an EP, Love Story, and "Scotch and Soda", another Kingston Trio song, which sold very well in the Indian market. She also spent some time in London during this early period. She was a frequent visitor to Vernon Corea's BBC office at the Langham in London and was interviewed on "London Sounds Eastern" on BBC Radio London. Usha visited Nairobi as part of an Indian Festival. She was so popular that she was invited to stay on. Singing and quite often nationalistic songs in Swahili made her extremely popular and the then President Jomo Kenyatta made her an Honorary Citizen of Kenya. She sang the famous song "Malaika" (angel) with Fadhili Williams who was the original singer. She produced a record "live in Nairobi" with a local band Fellini Five.

Uthup sang several songs in the 1970s and 1980s for music directors R D Burman and Bappi Lahiri. She also reprised some of R.D. Burman songs that were sung by others such as Mehbooba Mehbooba and Dum Maro Dum and popularised them to a distinct end.

She is a stage performer and gave performances all over the world and is known for her lively stage presence. She has been felicitated with several awards over the years, some of which include Rajiv Gandhi Purashkar for National Integration for quality music, Mahila Shiromoni Purashkar for international peace, and Channel [V] award for outstanding achievement.

She recorded her first album with Luis Banks for which she was paid Rs. 3500. Since then, she has recorded numerous albums. Usha's Hindi version of Michael Jackson's Don't Stop Til You Get Enough, titled '"Chhupke Kaon Aya'", can be found on the album Tom Middleton - The Trip (2004). A cover of Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" is on another Tom Middleton album, Cosmosonica - Tom Middleton Presents Crazy Covers Vol. 1 (2005). She recently recorded a song called "Rhythm and Blues" with the Indian Rock Band Parikrama which appeared on Channel V on April 23, 2007.


Uthup is also an actress, often singing and acting in India's signature musical films. In 2006, she acted in the Malayalam movie - Pothen Vava as Kurisuveettil Mariamma.
She made a cameo appearance in the movie "Bombay To Goa" with Amitabh Bachchan and Shatrughan Sinha in 1972. In 2007, she appeared in "Bow Barracks Forever" directed by Anjun Dutt as herself. Again in 2007, she appeared in "Hattrick" music video as herself.
She appeared in disguise on Indian Idol 1 and 2. She was one of the co-judges of the 2007 and 2008 & Idea Star Singer Season V (2010) the most rated south Indian reality show as well music oriented reality shows in Malayalam.

Usha's trademark is her massive bindi and flowers that she wears in her hair, as well as her Kancheepuram saris.

Awards

• Filmfare Award Nomination as Best Female Playback Singer for the song "One Two Cha ChaCha" from Shalimar (film) (1978)
• Filmfare Nomination as Best Female Playback Singer for the song "Hari Om Hari" from Pyare Dushman (1980)
• Filmfare Nomination as Best Female Playback Singer for the song "Rambha Ho" from Armaan (1981)