Don't regret beginning as a night club singer : Usha Uthup

Indian pop icon Usha Uthup, who has wowed her audience with her pop, filmi, jazz, and playback singing for decades has now created a new record - this is the 50th year of her career.

Usha began her career at a night club in Chennai in 1969, shifted to Kolkata later that year and began singing at 'Trincas' bar and restaurant in Park Street, which held live floor shows.

Now after having sung in more than 13 Indian and eight foreign languages and becoming a name to reckon with, she says has no regrets about starting her career as a "night club singer".

If her husky voice is a trade mark, so are the fresh flowers in her hair, her trademark big 'bindi' and her rich Kanjivaram saris, which she wears to all her live programmes, even abroad.

The Park Street diva, who was talking to reporters on Tuesday, said she is happy that she had started as a night club singer where there are no second takes.

"I am happy to tell all of you that I did not start as a playback singer. I started as a night club singer and I got the opportunity to playback because of that. In live singing there is no second take. If you have one take you had better be good, perfect," the 71-year-old singer of the blockbusters 'Hari Om Hari' and 'One two cha cha' said.

Usha said she always finds more energy in live performances than in playback singing.

"In playback you get many takes, till you get it perfect. So singing live is always much much better for me than to be able to do playback singing," she said.

However, it is also true that "One hit song in Bollywood gives me 325 shows. But the magic of the stage is something totally different," said the 71-year old, who got the best female playback singer award for 7 Khoon Maaf in 2011.

Asked what was her USP to become a popular singer, Usha said "firstly I owe my success to the fact I am an Indian."