After moving to Kerala, I am blessed to have Shri Perumbavoor G Ravindranath as my Guru. The 4-year studies at Sarvodaya Vidyalaya, Nalanchira Trivandrum, and St Marys Higher Secondary School Pattom, Trivandrum from Class IX to XII have given me many opportunities for singing. All my teachers have been very encouraging. To name a few Mrs. Manju Thomas, erstwhile music teacher in Sarvodaya Vidyalaya was quick to identify the music in me, making me part of the choir group.
I have learned many Malayalam poems from my grandfather and chanting Geeta / Narayaneeyam from my mother. Our family gatherings were the first stage for me to perform singing and that would have awakened the singer in me.
My training in classical music gave me the base to sing a variety of songs. My introduction to Smule and friends singing on this app helped me boost my confidence to sing all genres of songs. Today, I can confidently sing a variety of Indian languages like Tamil, Hindi, Kannada Telugu, Bengali, and Odiya. Gujarati and Marathi.
I mostly sing melodies as I am at my best while singing them. Nevertheless, I am equally fond of trying various regional songs as there are a lot of other great music directors and compositions in regional languages. Apart from Hindi, Tamil, and Malayalam, Bengali songs are my current favorites. I am blessed to have a guru, Shri Perumbavoor G Ravindranath, who himself is a well-known composer in the Malayalam industry with lots of hit songs and light music songs.
I have been fascinated by the different compositions and styles in Western and Arabic music. Listening to Michael Jackson, Alan Walker, and the likes have inspired me to learn more about western music.
Building a career in music demands, willingness, sincerity, and challenging work apart from a God-given voice. Training in music started at an early age, and I continued learning despite a few breaks. Now it is a passion and I intend to make a career in music by constantly learning and utilizing every platform I get to perform. It may be incredibly challenging, but with dedication, experience, and good exposure, it is achievable. Teaching is the best way to learn and hence I am also interested in teaching music.
As I said before I like to focus on my music, explore and gain more experience. I will try to improve my singing skills especially by focusing on voice modulations and breathing exercises for better voice control. I intend to learn Hindustani music along with Carnatic this year and learn western vocals. I see myself as a performing artist in the coming years and am working towards that goal. My dream is to do research in music and continue learning as far as I could.
There are so many musicians to name but I am trying to mention a few that I consider unique in their ways. Primarily, my favorite singers are Mohammed Rafi Lata Mangeshkar, KJ Yesudas, and KS Chitra. The voice quality and ease with which each of these singers can sing have made them legends of their times. I cannot imagine a day without listening to their voices and this stands as testimony to the substantial number of songs and movies they have lent their voices.
From new generation singers, Shreya Ghoshal and Harishankar are my favorite singers. Shreya is someone who inspires me the most with her ability to sing songs in various Indian languages with so much ease.
Song: Ee Sundara Album/Movie: Amruthavarshini Singer: S. P. Balasubrahmanyam, Chitra Music Director: Deva Lyricist: K. Kalyan
A special thanks to Karthik for always being there and being a strong member of the team and helping identify many talents from vast Smule profiles.
The track is composed and programmed by Navaneeth Sundar and sung by Anoop Sankar. A tough song amazing effort by Anushka and such efforts that makes this singer a distinction apart from many competitors.
Artist Lata Mangeshkar Album Priyothama Ki Likhi Thomai, A beautiful song in Bengali. Must say the maturity and efforts to learn these tough compositions at such an early age itself shows how focused she is on a music career.
Anushka is one of the lead actors in the film Angry Indian Goddesses, a film by award-winning director Pan Nalin (Samsara). The film debuted at the Toronto Film Festival where it won the runner up for the Audience Choice Award. The film was dubbed in 79 languages and went on to win at international film festivals like Rome Film Festival and Hof Film Festival.
After Viva split, Anushka started working as a VJ on Channel V. She was a host for a travel show called V on The Run with Purab Kohli and Sarah Jane Dias where they travelled around India. She hosted shows like Launchpad, Hotline, and Jukebox.
Anushka started being hired as a voice over artist. She learned on the job as she became the voice behind brands like Vodafone, Levi's, Dove, Benetton, Nivea, Vaseline, Manforce, Godrej, Sony, Titan, Lakme, and Blackberry.
Angry Indian Goddesses, touted as India's first female buddy film, is an 2015 drama feature film showcased in more than a Dozen film festivals across the world, it won the Prestigious People's Choice Award (The Oscar Predictor) at the Toronto International Film Festival 2015 and won audience awards in premium festivals including Rome, Zurich and many others. It was picked up for global sales by Mongrel International (Canada) and has sold theatrically to over 67 countries.
During the release of the film in 2016, Anushka toured 18 German cities like Berlin, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Koln with the rest of the cast. The actors also went to Switzerland, Spain, Zurich, Madrid, and Lisbon. It was globally distributed by Mongrel International in more than 66 countries.
Angry Indian Goddesses was one of the first Indian films licensed by Netflix International and distributed digitally. The film premiered in India at the MAMI film festival and received critical acclaim for being a brutally honest portrayal of women in India. Produced by Jungle Book Entertainment in India and co-produced by One Two Films in Germany, the film also features a song called Zindagi written, composed, and performed by Anushka.
Stage is a huge aspect of Anushka's life as a musician and she spends season time touring the country and different parts of the world. She is known for her high energy performances, often jumping off stage, climbing onto and over barricades to interact with her audience, giving traditional Bollywood performances a heavy dose of rock and roll. She has won the Events FAQ award for best performer and has performed all over the world for colleges like:
With a successful career in films, she wanted to build a career as an independent artist. (She came together as an electro pop group in 2012 with Indie band Pentagram drummer and Filmmaker Shiraz Bhattacharya, Producer and Hypnotribe member Abhijit Nalani, Johan Pies, Guitarist, Pozy Dhar band called Shkabang. The band released a track and music video called Crazy and toured. The band disbanded 2 years later.)
Keen on expanding her skillset and taking her love for sound a step further, Anushka went to New York in the summer of 2015 for 3 months to study music production from the electronic music school Dubspot. There she learned to use the production software Logic Pro, along with her brother Shikhar Yuvraj Manchanda aka Rākhis who did a mix and master course there.
In 2016, Shikhar and Anushka produced the music for Jack and Jones which featured Ranveer Singh as a rapper. They followed it up in 2017 with a second music video for the same brand with Ranveer. In the following years they produced music for brands like Reebok, JBL, Jack & Jones, NBA, Chandon and Swiss Tourism at their studios The Beast India Company.
In 2019, Anushka and Shikhar worked on NBA's show Hoop Nation. They did the sound design for the documentary series and produced the music videos for all 4 episodes as well as the Trailer. In 2019 Anushka and Shikhar came on board as the music heads for Ranveer Singh and Navzar Eranee's music label IncInk Records, where they produced music for the artists, and shaped the sonic identity of the label.
In 2018, Anushka launched Kiss Nuka, her alter ego, with the electro pop song, Don't be Afraid, a music video conceptualized by her and Navzar Eranee. The music video was in top 10 music videos of 2018 by Rolling Stones and Homegrown.
The Music video also won at 17th Independent Music Awards in New York for best concept and best direction. The music was produced, edited and performed by Anushka as Kiss Nuka. With the formation of IncInk, Kiss Nuka also produced music for rap artists Kaam Bhaari and Spitfire. Mohabbat, produced by Kiss Nuka and Rākhis (Shikhar Yuvraj Manchanda), was nominated for Europe Music Awards. Kiss Nuka also produced tracks like Mehfil E Hiphop and Black, and the Mohabbat bhand mix for which she also edited and created a music video.
In Jan 2020, she released her 2nd official music video as Kiss Nuka on IncInk Records featuring rapper Kaam Bhaari, a scathing socio-political music piece on the current state of affairs. The song got a lot of critical acclaim. This was the first music video that Kiss Nuka directed as well as edited, besides producing and performing the song. The song was selected in the Silver Screenings category at the Berlin Video Music Awards Archived 19 April 2021 at the Wayback Machine.
In November 2020, Kiss Nuka released Kashmir featuring Khalid Ahmed from Parvaaz and award-winning Rabab player Sufiyan Malik. A piece dedicated to the beauty of Kashmir and its conservation, the video was directed, edited and produced by Kiss Nuka and was 5 years in the making.
In March 2021, Kiss Nuka was amongst the first few artists who adopted the digital world with her conceptualized live performance multi-media starring various artists, at the launch of Dice.Fm in India.
In 2021, Kiss Nuka launched I Am Seeking, a brand based on spiritual healing. Anushka's mother Tarmindar Manchanda (Terry Manchanda) who is a well known authority on crystals and their uses in Spiritual healing, has been a practicing spiritual healer, reiki, quantum healing for 30 years. I am Seeking is a brand under which Kiss Nuka will be releasing music, products and experiences related spiritual healing.
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