Shankar Mahadevan Birthday Special: 5 best songs by the 'Breathless' singer

One of Bollywood's most acclaimed singers, Shankar Mahadevan, is all set to celebrate his 55th birthday on Thursday.

Born in a Tamil family, Mahadevan learnt classical and Carnatic music as a child and began playing veena at the age of 5 under veena maestro Shri Lalitha Venkataraman.

After college, Mahadevan began working as a software engineer in Mumbai, but fate had a different plan for him, and he eventually made his way into the world of playback singing.

In a career spanning nearly 20 years, Mahadevan has lent his voice to a number of chartbusters in not only Hindi, but in English, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Urdu and Punjabi languages as well.

In 2000, he won his first National Award for playback singing for the song 'Yenna Solla Pogirai'. The music maestro has won three National Awards in his career so far. In 2019, he was awarded the prestigious Padma Shri award for his contributions to music.

Check out 5 best songs of Shankar Mahadevan that one can never get enough of:

Breathless

Touted to be Mahadevan's most popular work, 'Breathless' released in 1998. The track is a steady stream of lyrics that is recorded by the singer without a break, stanza, verse and apparently, without even a pause for breath.

Dil Chahta Hai

Every road trip with friends is incomplete without playing 'Dil Chahta Hai' -- the title track of the film which goes by the same name. The music of the song has been composed by the famous trio of Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy, and it is sung by Shankar Mahadevan and Clinton Cerejo.

Mitwa

'Mitwa' was sung by Shafqat Amanat Ali, Caralisa Monteiro and Shankar Mahadevan. It was the most hit song from the 2006 film 'Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna' starring Shah Rukh Khan, Rani Mukherji, Preity Zinta and Abhishek Bachchan.

Maa

The heartwrenching song 'Maa' from the film 'Taare Zameen Par' won Shankar Mahadevan a National Award. Even after all these years, the song has the power to evoke various emotions in the minds of the listeners and leave them teary-eyed.

Shree Ganeshay Dheemahi

Any event related to Lord Ganesha is incomplete without the song 'Shree Ganeshay Dheemahi' from the film 'Viruddh... Family Comes First'. The song was released in the year 2005, and has been immortalised by the legendary singer.