Kavya Ajit

Kavya was born on 17 July 1991 in Kozhikode to Dr. Ajit Bhaskar^[2] and Dr. Lakshmi S, a professor of gynaecology.^[3] She learnt the basics of Carnatic Music from her grandmother Kamala Subrahmaniam, former All India Radio artiste and continued further education after moving to Chennai.^[1]

She attended Presentation Higher Secondary School in Kozhikode.^[4] She completed a degree in computer science engineering and worked as a software engineer before shifting to a full-time career in music.^[1] She is married to Vidhyasagar Venkatesan^[5] and they have a daughter, Lakshya. The family resides in Chennai.^[6]

Kavya stepped into music scene in 2014 with the Ranjan Pramod's romantic musical Rose Guitarinaal. The film's music composer Shahbaz Aman, who was in search for a new voice, liked hers and offered her the song Engum Nalla Pookkal which became her first breakthrough.^[1] It was followed by a string of songs tuned by Shaan Rahman for the films Praise the Lord, Oru Vadakkan Selfie and Nam Duniya Nam Style which was her Kannada debut. She was next heard in Lavender, composed by Deepak Dev where she performed two tracks for the film. The soundtrack was lauded for Dev's combination of western music and old-world lyrics.^[7]

She debuted in Tamil film music industry through the song Hey Umayaal for the film Urumeen scored by Achu Rajamani.^[8]

Her first taste of success came after singing Neeyen Kaataai from the film Jo and the Boy, composed by Rahul Subrahmanian.^[1] She received wider recognition following the release of the breezy melody Ee Shishirakalam, tuned by Shaan Rahman for the film Jacobinte Swargarajyam. The song was an instant hit and was praised by critics and audiences alike.^[9][10] In 2016, she made her Telugu debut through the song Jakkanna from the eponymous film. The track was lauded for its grooviness.^[11]

In 2017, she lent her vocals for Gopi Sundar's composition Chekkanum Pennum for Omar's second film Chunkzz^[12] followed by Agnijwalaa from the Bollywood film Mom for A.R Rahman's Malayalam soundtrack album.^[13][14]

Kavya has performed at numerous Carnatic concerts, Western Vocal and Violin gigs and has shared stage with various artists like A.R Rahman,^[15] Karthik, Vijay Prakash, Naresh Iyer, Vineeth Sreenivasan, Stephan Devassy, Shaan Rahman and Gopi Sundar as part of various TV music shows and live performances.^[1] She has sung various commercial jingles and has collaborated with artists like Vishal Chandrasekhar, Siddharth Menon, Justin Prabhakaran and Madley Blues for their albums and singles.^{[16][17][18][19]}