Singing and syncing ‘Mind, Body and Soul’ for 12 years
M J Shriram, a veteran singer-actor for 35 years, has conducted more than 5,000 concerts. Also, he has been con ducting a Tamil resto karaoke concert titled ‘Mind Body Soul’ at the Black and White resto bar at The Residency on GN Chetti Road for the past 12 years. The show has completed 600 weeks as on 24 June and the 601st episod e is all set to be held on 1 July.
Talking about the concert, Shriram said that it materialised during a casual talk with the General Manager of The Residency 12 years ago on 10 September 2009.
“I pitched him the idea of doing a Tamil karaoke concert in the resto bar. Though he hesitated initially, he agreed to go ahead with the idea and we commenced the next week itself. Already concerts were conducted on Wedne sday and Friday. I was usually busy on weekends, and so we chose Thursday for our concert. From then on, it is he ld from 8 pm to 12 am every Thursday,” he said.
Shriram said that the concert is going to complete 12 years on 17 September. He added: ‘Mind Body Soul’ was th e first full Tamil Retro night to have started in Chennai and the speciality of this concert is that it focuses only on songs of Ilaiyaraja and SPB.
“The concert begins with ‘Idhu Oru Ponmazhai Pozhudhu’ and proceeds with the requests made by the audienc e. Our show has several repeat celebrity audiences,” he said.
During every milestone week, we made it a point to invite SPB and honour the musicians who were part of Ilayar aja’s troupe, Shriram added.
“Several chief guests including MSV, Gangai Amaran, Vidyasagar have graced the milestone weeks of the conce rt. Gangai Amaran, SPB Charan and Ramesh Vinayagam were the chief guests for the 600th week,” he said.
Fans hope that if maestro Ilayaraja could grace the 700th or the 750th week of the show, it would get fulfilled.
“I would like to express my gratitude to my sound engineer Sekhar, my co-singer Akhila and the hotel manage m ent for their continued support all these years. I am also thankful to the audience who have extended their unco nditional support to us for the past 12 years,” he added.
