For those who say that there is a lack of talent among young musicians in the country today, well, they obviously haven’t heard Shruthi J. perform live.

Last week, at the media preview of her sophomore album Va, the award-winning singer performed two tracks off the EP – and boy can that girl sing.

* Shruthi's back *

Shruthi came into the music scene when she was only 14. She released her debut Life Is A Mystery, which won the “best Indian album” award at the Anugerah Industri Muzik 17 (AIM 17) last year.

She is currently the youngest person to have received an AIM award.

“This album is different from my previous one, which I worked on when I was about 12 or 13 years old. Now, I’m a little bit more mature and it shows in Va,” she said at the preview in Kuala Lumpur.

Va, which means “come” in Tamil, took six months to complete and Shruthi worked with two outstanding composers in the local Indian music scene – Saran Narayanan and SaranZ – on it.

Five of the tracks on the album were written and produced by Saran, while Shruthi co-wrote the song Sevaayil with SaranZ, which was released as a single last February.

However, it was the title track that soared the local charts after it was released last month as a Deepavali gift to her fans.

“I have never produced songs for other singers before so it was quite a different experience working on Va with Shruthi,” said singer-songwriter Saran.

He admitted that it was initially difficult to write a song for the teenage sensation as he had to get into the mindset of a 16-year-old girl to do that.
“I’m 33,” said Saran, with a smile on his face.

* Shruthi's set to rock the music scene *

Their chemistry is apparent on the tracks and Shruthi credits the producer for creating songs that are not only relevant to her lifestyle, but other young females as well.

“I also have a song called Love on this album, and it’s my first time singing a song about that subject,” said Shruthi a little coyly, adding that the song is one of her favourites for that very reason.

A classically-trained Carnatic singer, Shruthi takes a huge departure from her usual singing style and her latest album definitely makes her a bonafide pop singer.

“It is quite difficult for classically-trained singers to leave their singing styles behind, but Shruthi managed to do just that in the album. She sounds very modern which really fits the songs and the kind of music that we used for them,” added Saran.

Va will be released in February. Shruthi also plans to kickstart a string of concerts called Va: The Concert Tour, later in 2012.