Mahalakshmi Iyer
Mahalakshmi Iyer (born 11 July 1976) is an Indian playback singer known for her contributions to Hindi, Assamese and Tamil film music. She has also recorded songs in several other Indian languages, including Telugu, Marathi, Bengali, Odia, Gujarati and Kannada. Shortly after completing her graduation, she began her professional career by lending her voice to advertising jingles. Although she recorded her first song in 1997 for the unreleased film Dus with the composer trio Shankar–Ehsaan–Loy, her first officially released film song came in 1998 with A. R. Rahman in Dil Se... Over the years, she has recorded approximately 5,000 songs, working with many leading composers across the Indian film industry.
Mahalakshmi was one of the lead vocalists in the song “Jai Ho” from the film Slumdog Millionaire (2008). For this track, she shared the Grammy Award for Best Song Written for a Motion Picture at the 52nd Grammy Awards held on 31 January 2010. The same song also received the Academy Award for Best Original Song at the 81st Academy Awards. Throughout her career, she has received several accolades, including the Maharashtra State Film Award for Best Female Playback Singer, the Orissa State Film Award for Best Singer, the Gujarat State Film Award for Best Playback Singer, the Gujarati Iconic Film Award (GIFA) for Best Playback Singer, and the Filmfare Award Assamese for Best Playback Singer in 2024.
In addition to her work in film music, she has collaborated with international artists such as Michel Sanchez and Éric Mouquet on the project, Deep Forest. She has also released Indie singles and continues to perform extensively in live concerts worldwide, frequently touring with prominent composers such as A. R. Rahman, Shankar–Ehsaan–Loy, Vishal-Shekhar, Jatin–Lalit and Zubeen Garg.
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