S Janaki to call it quits with a Malayalam song

S Janaki, who started her career in movies as a playback singer in the Tamil movie Vidhiyin Vilayattu in 1957, has lent her mellifluous voice to several evergreen hits in south film industry for close to 60 years. The Nightingale Of The South, as she is popularly known, has now decided that it is time to bring the curtain down on her stellar singing career, and has chosen a Malayalam song for her finale.
Janaki, who made her debut in Tamil, Malayalam, and Telugu in 1957, has selected a lullaby track Ammapoovinu from the Anoop Menon, Meera Jasmine-starrer 10 Kalpanakal as her swansong of sorts. ���It will be my final song,��� she says, ���I will not be recording anymore nor will I be singing at any functions.���
On her reason for bidding goodbye to her legendary singing career, the 78-year-old singer says, ���I am old now and I have sung in many languages. I would like to now rest, relax and leave my career behind.���
The singer has recorded close to 48,000 songs in her career, and has won four National Awards and 32 state film awards, in languages, including Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu and Oriya. She also refused to accept the Padma Bhushan in 2013, saying that it had ���come too late���.
So, why choose a Malayalam track for her finale? ���It wasn���t a pre-determined effort to choose a Malayalam song as my final one. I got the offer at a time when I was contemplating on calling it a day. It���s a lullaby, so, it���s close to my heart,��� she says.
The song was composed by music director Mithun Eeshwar, who incidentally met the singer during an event in Calicut, which was held to commemorate her 50th year in the film industry. He says, ���I had played her favourite song Singara Velane Deva on the violin that day and she liked it. I told her I would love to compose a song for her and she agreed. So, when this song came up, director Don Max and I approached her.���
Mithun recorded the song in Hyderabad last month. ���She was extremely happy about singing a lullaby. Once we finished the recording, she told us she wanted to end her career with this track. It took us by surprise. It���s not that she can���t sing anymore, but she doesn���t want to strain herself.���
The veteran singer���s last Tamil song was for the film, Thirunaal.
Read the story in Telugu here:
������������������������������ ������������������ ������������������������������ ��������������������� ������������������
Read this story in Malayalam