Yesudas50 World Tour to reach Doha this week

Legendary singer K J Yesudas is set to perform in Doha on Thursday as part of Yesudas@50 World Tour 2012, commemorating his golden jubilee in playback singing. Accompanying him on stage will be Yesudas' son Vijay, mother-daughter duo Sujatha and Swetha Mohan alongside noted pianist and composer Stephen Devassy and a 16-member orchestra.

Qatar Tamizhar Sangam will honour Yesudas during the ceremony, event organisers said. The three-hour musical event will feature evergreen songs in Malayalam, Hindi and Tamil from the singer's career that has seen him record more than 40,000 songs in many languages since 1961. Other than Malayalam, Yesudas has sung the maximum number of songs in Tamil, and won the Tamil Nadu government award for the best playback singer eight times.

The 72-year-old singer has won seven national awards for the best singer in the Indian film industry, and state awards from the governments of Kerala (23 times), Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh (five times each), and West Bengal (once), a record no singer has equalled. Nearly 4,500 people are expected for the show, the first light music event by Yesudas in Doha in 15 years. Doha is the second venue outside India for the Yesudas@50 World Tour2012, which kicked off in Dubai on Friday.