Hariharan

His mother Alamelu Mani (born 1935) has had a long career as Carnatic vocalist and a distinguished teacher, and was honoured with the title Sangeeta Pracharya in 2019.

Hariharan did his schooling at Don Bosco High School, Matunga and graduated from SIES College of Arts, Science & Commerce, Mumbai.

Thereafter he pursued his studies at the St. Xavier's College, Mumbai.

At the start of his career, Hariharan did the concert circuit and also performed on TV.

He sang for a number of TV serials (e.g., Junoon).

Hariharan Anantha Subramani (born 3 April 1955) is an Indian playback, bhajan and ghazal singer who predominantly sings in Tamil, Hindi and Telugu languages.

He has also sung over 15,000 notable songs in 10 languages including Malayalam, Kannada, Marathi, Sinhala, Bhojpuri, Odia, Bengali, Sanskrit, Gujarati and English.

He is an established ghazal singer and one of the pioneers of Indian fusion music.

H. A. S. Mani – he was affectionately called Chellamani – groomed many Carnatic singers in Mumbai where he died in his early 40s due to cardiac arrest in 1963.

In 1977, he won the top prize in the "All India Sur Singaar Competition" and was promptly signed on by the late music director Jaidev to sing for his new Hindi film Gaman (1978).

His debut song "Ajeeb Sa Neha Mujh Par Guzar Gaya Yaaron" in that movie became such a hit that it won him an Uttar Pradesh State Film Award, as well as a National Award nomination.

His live concert recordings, Hariharan in Concert (1990), Saptarishi (1996) and Swar Utsav (2001) were run away successes.

Hariharan entered the world of Tamil films in 1992 introduced by debutant music director A. R. Rahman with the patriotic song "Thamizha Thamizha" in Maniratnam's film Roja.

The other major ghazal albums by him are Hazir (1992), Jashn (1996), Halka Nasha (1996), Paigham (1997), Kaash (2000), and Lahore Ke Rang Hari Ke Sang (2005).

He was judged best male playback singer in the 1995 Tamil Nadu State Government Film Awards for his soulful rendition of the song "Uyire Uyire" also by music director A. R. Rahman in Maniratnam's Bombay (Hariharan sang the song with K. S. Chithra).

Hariharan has been one of the most trusted singers of Rahman and has sung many songs for him in long list of movies that includes Muthu, Minsara Kanavu, Jeans, Indian, Mudhalvan, Taal, Rangeela, Indira, Iruvar, Anbe Aaruyire, Kangalal Kaithu Sei, Sivaji, Alaipayuthey, Kannathil Muthamittal, Guru, Enthiran etc. He composed music for the Indo Polish FilmNo Means No.

Another outstanding ghazal album was Gulfam, which not only hit double platinum in sales but also fetched Hariharan the Diva Award for the Best Album of the Year in 1995.

The year 1996 was a career milestone; he formed the band Colonial Cousins with Mumbai-based composer and singer Lesle Lewis.

Their first album, Colonial Cousins was a fusion album and was the first Indian act to be featured on MTV Unplugged.

It won a string of awards including the MTV Indian Viewers' Choice award and Billboard Award for the Best Asian Music Group.

By this single album, Hariharan established himself as one of the pioneers of Indian fusion music.

In 1998, Hariharan won the national award for the best playback singer for the soulful rendition of the song "Mere Dushman Mere Bhai" from the Hindi movie Border, composed by Anu Malik.

The next albums by this band were The Way We Do It (1998) and Aatma (2001) but were fairly noticed.

In 2004, he was honoured with the Padma Shri by the Government of India and is a two-time National Award winner.

Hariharan, associating with Lesle Lewis, formed Colonial Cousins, a two-member band.

They have cut many private music albums and also scored music for few feature films in Tamil and Hindi.

In 2023, Hariharan and late Gulshan Kumar's Hanuman Chalisa recorded under the label of T-Series crossed the 3-billion views mark on YouTube, making it the first devotional song in the world to do so.

Hariharan was born to classical musicians H. A. S. Mani and Alamelu Mani.

Hariharan has acted in a Tamil film with Khushbu, Power of Women (2005), and played cameo roles in the Tamil film Boys and the Malayalam film Millennium Stars.

Hariharan is one of the foremost Indian ghazal singers and composers with more than thirty albums to his credit.

In his early career, he cut several successful ghazal albums, writing most of the scores himself.

One of Hariharan's first ghazal albums was Aabshar-e-Ghazal with Asha Bhosle, which went gold in sales.

His latest ghazal album is Lafzz... (2008).

Hariharan worked with tabla maestro Zakir Hussain on his album Hazir.

The album Lahore Ke Rang Hari Ke Sang won rave reviews and critical acclaim inside and outside India.

A. R. Rahman was an avid listener of his ghazals way before roping him in to sing his first song in Tamil film music, "Thamizha Thamizha", for the film Roja.

Hariharan got another National Award for the Marathi song "Jiv Rangla" from Jogwa, set to tune by Ajay Atul in the year 2009.

He has sung more than 500 Tamil songs and nearly 200 Hindi songs.

He has also sung hundreds of songs in Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada, Marathi, Bengali and Odia languages.

Colonial Cousins released their fourth studio album "Once More" on 29 October 2012 under the label Universal.