Mano (singer)

Mano at a concert

While in 1979, Mano was shooting for a Telugu film for which the veteran M. S. Viswanathan was the music composer, it so happened that the original singer S. P. Balasubramanyam who was supposed to sing a song could not show up to the recording studio. Accidentally, Mano was asked to show his singing skills by the composer's assistant who was a good friend of Mano's father. Mano rendered a few of the Ghazal songs much to the appreciation of audience present there and the composer himself. From then on, Mano was signed by Viswanathan to sing few track songs upon which the main singer would sing in the final version. In 1982, Mano approached the famous composer Chakravarthy seeking a chance for his brother who was upcoming as a Tabla player. However, Chakravarthy insisted that he wanted an assistant like him to sing track songs. Mano, joined his troop and assisted for almost 2 years. In his tenure with Chakravarthy, Mano sang over 2000 tracks for almost all the leading singers.

Before beginning his long standing career with Ilaiyaraaja, Nagoor Babu was rechristened as "Mano" to avoid clash of names with the already established singer Nagore E. M. Hanifa. The name was selected and christened by Ilaiyaraaja himself in his first song "Annae Annae nee enna sonnae" in the Tamil film Fazil's "Poo Vizhi vaasalilae" title song. Mano went on to record many memorable songs under the same composer for his Tamil and Telugu films. In 1987, Mano got a big break by singing popular songs for the film Enga Ooru Pattukkaran. The songs "Shenbagame Shenbagame" and "Madhura Marikozhundu Vasam" became instant hits among the listeners. However, he also faced criticism from the critics who dubbed that his voice was an absolute clone to S. P. Balasubramanyam. Taking the criticism in his stride, Mano went on recording as many as 500 successful songs with Ilaiyaraaja and slowly branched out to sing for other Tamil composers as well.[3] He recorded maximum number of duet songs with K. S. Chithra, Swarnalatha and S. Janaki. He simultaneously sang many hundreds of songs in Tamil, Telugu and Kannada film industries. His teaming up with Hamsalekha in Kannada produced many chart buster numbers which are considered evergreen. His few Malayalam, Hindi and Oriya songs also were well received.

The late 1980s saw Mano experimenting with his voice through some modulations and it indeed worked in his favor to silence his critics. In the 1988 Kamal-starrer Soorasamharam, he first experimented with his voice encouraged by his mentor Ilayaraja (who wanted him to sound different in the song - Vedhalam Vandhirukuthu). He took inspiration for that song from the evergreen RD Burman number Mehbooba Mehbooba from Sholay and the song went on to be a big hit and he was much appreciated for the voice modulation. He later followed the same style for some more songs especially those with Arabic tunes. In 1994, he was approached by A. R. Rahman to sing the duet song "Mukkabla" with Swarnalatha for the movie Kadhalan. Mano was asked to sing in a very different style by the composer and he took the R. D. Burman route and the Mukkala song went on to become a huge blockbuster which broke all the regional barriers and reached out to the entire country. He recorded the same song in the Telugu and Hindi versions which also were well received. Following this stupendous success in experimentation, many music directors cashed in his newfound fame and made him sing in the same style. Some of the songs he modulated his voice for are "Aye Shabba Aye Shabba" for Vidyasagar's Karna, "I Love You" and "Azhagiya Laila" for Sirpy's Ullathai Allitha and "Thillana Thillana" for Rahman's Muthu. He has also done a few semi-classical numbers such as Athma Varaiyo. He has also sung a few Hindi film songs for Gulshan Kumar in Aaya Sanam, Aaja Meri Jaan, Kasam Theri Kasam, and Chor Aur Chand.

The 2000s also saw another face of Mano as the voice-over dubbing artist in the Telugu film industry. He dubbed his voice for almost all Rajinikanth starrers in Telugu. His voice became almost synonymous with Rajinikanth and was in great demand by all the directors and producers.[4] He also dubbed his voice for Kamal Haasan in some movies in Telugu.

Mano has worked as a music composer for the 2008 released Telugu film Sombheri. He got good response for his compositions. He also tried his hands on releasing Tamil film Azhagiya Tamil Magan (2007) as Mahaa Muduru in 2010 starring Vijay and Shriya Saran in the lead roles. The film, however, flopped at the box-office. He also produced two movies dubbed from Telugu to Tamil Madurai Thimiru and Kumaran Rajini Rasigan (dubbed versions of Yogi and Bujjigadu) under the studio name, "Lord Venkateshwara Productions" and "Mano Media Entertainments" respectively.[3]

Mano is hosting Manathodu Mano – a musical talk show in Jaya TV. He is also one of the permanent judging panel for Vijay TV's musical reality show Airtel Super Singer Junior along with Chitra and Malgudi Subha. He also co-judges the musical show Idea Super Singer on Maa TV. He also co-judges the musical show Sun Singer Season 6 (2019) with Karthik and Remya Nambesan. He also co-judges popular Telugu Television comedy seires Jabardasth and Extra Jabardasth with Roja.

Malayalam

• 1992 Soorya Manasam playback Singer

Telugu

• 1979 Needa
• 1979 Rangoon Rowdy as Raju
• 1980 Ketugadu
• 1992 Hello Darling
• 2003 Nee Manasu Naaku Telusu as himself
• 2015 Shivam

Tamil

• 1992 Singaravelan as Mano
• 1993 Porantha Veeda Puguntha Veeda as singer in song "Veettukku Vilakku"[5]
• 2003 Enakku 20 Unakku 18 as himself
• 2014 Vetri Selvan