It's the story of many a men, but this one dared to follow his dreams. And looking at us now is nothing but reality. He was born to, S.Gurdev Singh and Tej Kaur, in a village by the name of Giddarbaha, in distt. Faridkot in Punjab. His date of birth is 4th January, 1957, but as he says, "Dil Hona Chahida Jawan, Umaranch Ki Rakhiya....I actually live up to this sentence."
He went through
the normal drill of being educated in Malout. The one thing with
him even in those days was his singing! After the basics were over,
his parents thought it best to shift him to Patiala city for further
studies. The National Sports Institute was there and Gurdas Maan
joined up to finish his masters in physical education. At the point
he was all set to be a sports coach!!! He took part in many athletic
events and won himself a couple of medals. He also happens to be
a black belt holder in Judo.
He got to show off his talents in plenty of youth festivals, that were organized by various universities. And talent indeed, because it was here that he started winning awards for his work in singing and acting. On completion of his masters degree, he started looking around for a job.
But in the meanwhile, keeping the creativity channel
in him open, he continued to write as well as do stage plays. Having
arrived on the music scene more than two decades ago and still holding
on to his seat, the credit of taking Punjabi music from a regional
level to national and then on to the international level absolutely
goes to Gurdas Maan!!
FAME
BECKONED
Since
he was writing his own lyrics, in one of his plays in his earlier
days he was discovered by a TV producer from the Jalandhar TV Station
for his song, that went by the name of "DIL DA MAMLA HAI".
The producer thought it worth a TV recording and approached him
with the offer. And Gurdas Maan agreed to this, though not before
being apprehensive about it at first. The song went on air on the
31st of December for the first time in 1980 and was instantly a
hit!!! His kind of music created quite a stir, and people took an
instant liking to him.
Naturally with all that success he was asked to record the song
in his voice by HMV. After which there had to be no looking back,
his first music album was released in 1983. Just for the record,
till date, Gurdas Maan has done 25 albums and written over 200 songs.
During the time that he became such a rage , people in the music
industry were still doing the duet pattern and so he got many offers
to sing duet songs. And he had started solo therefore had no intentions
of changing that, besides he had the confidence to carry out his
presence on stage as well as in the music world. The 90's has been
the era of performers and while most singers prefer all kinds of
props during their performance, here's one singer who has stuck
by his gut and continues to hold the audience's attention all by
himself."Dil hona chahida Jawan, Umaranch ki rakhiya"
---- I actually live upto this sentence --- Maan says.