Noted singer Kalyani Menon passes away due to age-related illness at 80 in Chennai

Chennai | Popular playback singer Kalyani Menon passed away on Monday at a private hospital here due to an age-related illness, sources close to her family said. She was 80. The last rites and cremation would take place in the city’s Besant Nagar on Tuesday afternoon. Kalyani, mother of cinema director and founder of Mindscreen Film Institute, Rajiv Menon, developed symptoms of stroke and was immediately rushed to the hospital here where she breathed her last, reported Press Trust of India. Born in Ernakulam, Menon started singing at the age of five in the “Navaratri Sangeeth Utsav” organised in the famous TDM hall there. She began her career as a playback singer by singing in Thoppil Bhasi-directed Malayalam movie Abala. Menon began her career in singing in the 1970s as a classical singer. Menon, hailing from Kerala and settled in Chennai shot to fame by singing in the movie, Dweep directed by Malayalam director, Ramu Kariat. Since then she was a regular presence in South Indian movies, including Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam. Menon’s famous songs with noted singer KJ Yesudas in Malayalam include ‘Rithubheda Kalpana Charutha Nalkiya’ of 1983 movie Mangalam Nerunnu and ‘Pavanarachezhuthunnu Kolangalennum’ of Mohanlal-starrer Vietnam Colony released in the year 1992. Besides Malayalam, she has sung in a number of Tamil movies, for top musicians Ilayaraja and AR Rahman. While she crooned for Ilayaraja in Nallathoru Kudumbam among others, she gave hits under Rahman including in Vinnai Thandi Varuvaya in 2010.