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Sishtla Sreeramamurthy Janaki, commonly known as S. Janaki, is an Indian playback singer. Janaki has sung nearly 20,000 songs, encompassing most of the languages of South India, during a career that has lasted over 50 years. She has won four National Film Awards and 31 different State Film Awards. Her association with singer S. P. Balasubramanyam and composer Ilaiyaraaja is among the most popular musical combinations in South India.

She is known as, \"The Nightingale of the South\". She is a recipient of a Honorary doctorate from the University of Mysore and the Kalaimamani award from Tamil Nadu State Government. In 2013, she refused the offer of a Padma Bhushan award by the Government of India, saying that it had come too late and that South Indian artists were not given their due recognition.S. Janaki was born in a Telugu-speaking Brahmin family in Pallapatla, Repalle Town, in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh. Her father, Sishtla Sreeramamurthy, was a teacher and an Ayurveda doctor. She was interested in music from an early age and performed at the age of three. She was taught music by Sree Paidiswamy, a Nadaswaram Vidwan for a year and also learned a few songs from Varanasi Balaramayya. She was inspired from film music and used to render the songs of Lata Mangeshkar, P. Leela, Jikki and P. Susheela on stage before entering films.

The first movie recording made by Janaki in Tamil was for the film Vidhiyin Vilaiyattu but was not released. Later in that year she duetted with P. B. Sreeivas to sing Kannukku Nere for use in Magadhal Naattu Mary. This was released and 1957 became her breakthrough year as she obtained work in other languages also.During the 1960s, Janaki worked as a playback singer mainly in the Kannada and Malayalam cinema industries. Music directors such as S. M. Subbaiah Naidu, G. K. Venkatesh and M. S. Viswanathan provided songs specifically with her in mind

Through her work with Venkatesh, Janaki came to the notice of Ilayaraja, who had been an assistant music director under Venkatesh for several years. Ilayaraja used Janaki’s singing skills in his first movie, Annakilli, and that turned out to be a hit. Thereafter the two collaborated in numerous successful productions over the next two decades, with Ilayaraja not only composing for Janaki but also sometimes duetting with her. She was also increasingly given work by other music directors. For example, from M. S. Viswanathan in Avargal, from K. V. Mahadevan in Mazhai Megham), Sankar Ganesh in Aasai Manaivi and from V. Kumar in Oruvanukku Oruthi.After 20 years of working in the industry, she won her first National award, given for her performance in Sendhoorappoovey, and in 1977 was also awarded by the Tamil Nadu government.


Malaysia Vasudevan began singing Tamil in the late 1970s and duetted with Janaki in a song from Padinaru Vayadinile and in Kovil Maniyosai from the movie Kizhakke Pogum Rail. Other collaborations with Janaki included in Muthal Mariyadhai. They sang every variety of songs, though their village and folk kind of duets are more in number. This singing pair who rendered absolute melodies like Agaya Gangai rendered several hit sensuous songs like \"Nilakayithu\" also and their evergreen duets cover variety of songs from melody, classical, pathos to pop, sensous and fun-filled songs for movies during period of mid 1970s to mid 1990s.
Janaki worked with A. R. Rahman, beginning with the album Fantasy and then later in films such as Gentleman, Kathalan, Uyire and Jodi. She received a Tamil Nadu State Film Award for her work with him in Sangamam and has said that I have sung several beautiful songs for Ilayaraja, which were real gems. After IR’s songs and before people started forgetting me, Rahman gave me beautiful songs so that new generation also gets connected to my songs.