L. R. Eswari

Biography

Lourde-Mary Rajeswari, better known as L. R. Eswari, is an Indian playback singer who has sung various songs in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Tulu, Konkani, English and Hindi. She is a recipient of the Kalaimamani, an award for arts and culture in Tamil Nadu, for her contributions to the film industry.

Early life

Eswari was born Lourde-Mary Rajeshwari in present-day Chennai to Regina Mary Nirmala and Anthony Devraj. She did not have any formal training in singing. Her mother was a chorus singer in films. Eshwari used to accompany her mother to the studios and soon began singing in the chorus herself, but quickly got a break to lend her voice as lead-singer. Her first break came from K. V. Mahadevan in 1958 in the movie Nalla Idathu Sammandham, her first solo song recorded in this movie was "Ivarey Thaan Avare". Major recognition for her came from the song "Vaarai En Thozhi Vaaraayo" from the movie Pasamalar (1961) sung under the baton of Viswanathan–Ramamoorthy.

Career

Eswari gave her first song "Inbanaalidhe Idhayam Kaanudhe" for the movie Manohara(1954) along with Jikki. She sang under the direction of famous composers like M. S. Viswanathan, T.K. Ramamoorthy, K. V. Mahadevan, Veda, V. Kumar, Shankar-Ganesh, G. K. Venkatesh and Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan. Her voice was considered to be suited for peppy numbers in films.
She has also recorded many devotional albums in praise of the Goddess Amman. She sang Christmas songs like "Varuvai Varuvai" and "Deivam Thantha Divya Kumaaran". She has won the Kalaimamani Award and other state awards.
P. Susheela and she sang with Unadhu Malar, Chiththira Poovizhi, Ninaithaal Sirippu, and Thoodhu Sella. She sang a duet "Gudilona Naa Swamy Koluvai Unnadu" with S. Janaki in the Telugu movie Idalokam, with music by Chakravarthy. She rendered several duets with S. Janaki in Kannada movies as well.
She sang various duets with Ghantasala, in the Telugu doyen in his own music direction in the Telugu movie Pandava Vana Vaasam, and in K. V. Mahadevan's music direction in Prema Nagar, T. M. Soundararajan, A. L. Raghavan, P. B. Sreenivas, S.P. Balasubramaniam, K. J. Yesudas, J. P. Chandrababu, C. S. Jayaraman, S. C. Krishnan, Thiruchi Loganathan, A. M. Rajah, Seerkazhi Govindarajan, Malaysia Vasudevan, and Jayachandran. She also sang duets with female singers, most notably with P. Suseela, S. Janaki, Vani Jayaram, K. Jamuna Rani, M. S. Rajeswari and Soolamangalam Rajalakshmi.
She sang "Kanda kanmaniye ammana araginiye o raja", a Kannada song for the movie Bala Nagamma in the early 1960s.

Re-entry

After a long break, she made her re-entry through a Tamil song, "Kalasala Kalasala", in the 2011 movie Osthe, starring Silambarasan. She sang the song "Naa Poondamallida" in the film Thadaiyara Thaakka in the following year. She has also recently sang a Kannada song for the movie Victory, named "Yakka Nin Magalu Nanage", with Kailash Kher. In 2013, she sang a duet song called "Thagadu Thagadu" along with T. Rajendar in the movie Arya Surya. In 2014, she sang the song "Jaipuril Jaipuril" in the movie Athithi, with music by Bharadwaj. In 2020, she sung a song for the film Mookuthi Amman named "Aadi Kuthu". She received the title Mother of Chennai. Notable songs

Malayalam songs

She had sung in around 200 Malayalam films.

Onscreen appearances

Pudhu Manithan (1991) as herself
Thillalangadi (2010) as herself
Mookuthi Amman (2020) as herself