In 50 years, he has sung over 35,000 songs in 14 languages. Some of his popular Hindi numbers are "Surmayee Ankhiyon Mein", "Dil Ke Tukde Tukde Karke", "Jaaneman Tere Do Nayan". Down south, he gave hits in movies like "Vadakkum Nathan", "Madhuchandralekha" and "Pattanathil Sundaran".
Birth name-Kattassery Joseph Yesudas
Also known as-Gana Gandharvan, Dasettan
Born-10 January 1940 (age 71)
Fort Kochi, Cochin,
Indian Empire
Origin-Kochi, Kerala, India
Genres-Indian classical music, playback singing, music director[1]
Occupations-Singer, composer
Years active-1961-present
The 71-year-old veteran was born in Fort Kochi to Augustine Joseph and Alicekutty. His father, who was a well-known Malayalam classical musician and stage actor, was his first guru.Later he joined the R.L.V. Music Academy in Trippunithura near Kochi and then studied at the Sree Swati Thirunal Music College, in the capital city under the training of Late Semmangudy Sreenivasa Iyer. But he had to leave his studies midway due to financial crunch. For a brief period, he was with Sri Vechur Hari Hara Subramania Iyer, after which he took advanced training from Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar. Incidentally, it was M.B. Sreenivasan, well-known South Indian music director who after his first meeting with Yesudas in 1961 had predicted that a star is born and was the one who gave Yesudas his first singing assignment.
Sreenivasan sent Yesudas a telegram asking him to rush to Madras (now Chennai) for a recording. But when the young singer reached Madras, he was told that he would have to wait for two months because there`s a change in plans.
Yesudas was shattered because he had no money. He even suffered a typhoid attack. When the recording date arrived, he had not recovered but the organisers were kind enough to allow him to sing a four-line `shloka` of Sree Narayana Guru in the Malayalam movie "Kalpadukel".
This marked the first recording for him and there was no looking back for Yesudas, who even after 50 years continues to be one of the most sought after singers in the industry.
Over the years he has been conferred the Padma Shri and the Padma Bhushan besides winning seven national and 17 state film awards in singing. Yesudas has three sons and his second son Vijay Yesudas too won the state film award for singing in 2007. Even though settled in Chennai, Yesudas comes to the state often and also owns a home in Florida.