SP Balasubrahmanyam sang his first Tamil song for me, declares Suriya's father

A week and more has passed since the versatile playback singer S P Balasubrahmanyam passed away in Chennai. All across online and offline media, tributes continue to pour in, many personal anecdotes about him are shared and most of them are very regretful of the fact that he is no more, but has left behind a rich legacy of 40,000 songs in many Indian languages.

As part of the memorial meeting held last week, many Tamil film celebrities had opened up about the singer who has been a part of their lives for decades now. Sivakumar, a popular chocolate boy hero of the 1960s and the father of two top heroes in southern cinema – Suriya and Karthi – added his own bit.

By now, it is an established factoid that SPB sang his first song for MGR in the 1969 hit film ' Adimai Penn'. Sivakumar, however differs. He says that it was in his film ' Paalkudam' that the talented crooner made his debut. In a report published in Dinamani, Sivakumar says that his film was released in January 1969 and the song ' Malligai Poo Vaangi Vandhen' was heard by the public much before the MGR flick which was released in May 1969. Effectively, that is his first song, is his argument.