MALAYALAM PLAYBACK SINGER KP UDAYABHANU NO MORE

Eminent Malayali singer KP Udayabhanu, who rendered scores of songs noted for their emotional depth, died on Sunday.

Udayabhanu was 77 and had been keeping indifferent health for quite some time, film industry sources said.

An artist with All India Radio for decades, Udayabhanu had sung many all-time hits in Malayalam cinema, though he never went for a whole time film career.

He made his debut with the mid-1950s hit ‘Nayaru Pidicha Pulivalu’, in which he sang a popular number penned by eminent director and writer P Bhaskaran for which music was set by K Raghavan, who died only a few months back.

After the debut, Udayabhanu was roped in not only by Raghavan, also his colleague with AIR, and MS Baburaj but also by other top-notch composers like G Devarajan.

According to Malayalam film historian Balagopal, Udayabhanu’s voice and mode or rendering specially suited for sad songs in tragic or melodramatic films like ‘Laila Majnu’ of 1960s and 1970s.

“Udayabhanu’s career peaked with his all-time hits in ‘Ramanan’, based on the pastoral elegy written by one of the greatest Malayalam poets Changapuzha Krishna Pillai.

For the movie adaptation of the poetic work, Raghavan master composed music to the lines of Changanpuzha and he had no one else but Udayabhanu to sing those sings,” Balagopal said.

Udayabhanu also enriched the ‘light music’ branch by singing and giving music to scores of songs during his long years with AIR.