Mali

Though her parents were not musicians, they would play a lot of 1970s and 1980s style music to her.

Maalavika grew up listening electronic music.

When she was five years old, her parents decided to enroll her in various classes ranging from swimming and Bharatanatyam to piano and drawing classes.

A few years later, she quit all of her classes other than piano, which she learned till she was 17 years old.

Around that time, she also decided to try learning the guitar, because at that point she felt it was "cool".

Maalavika said she never had to seriously tell her parents that she wanted to be a musician, because "they're happy if I'm doing something I want and can sustain myself and be comfortable with a career in music."

Her first singing performance was at a party when she was 12 years old.

At the party, she sang Ella Fitzgerald's version of "Fever", with some of the lyrics changed to "suit the occasion".

She did her schooling at Sacred Heart Matriculation School and studied for a Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) at Loyola College, Chennai.

Maalavika Manoj (born 16 September 1993) known professionally as Mali, is an Indian singer-songwriter based in Mumbai, Maharashtra.

Maalavika Manoj was born on 16 September 1993 in Chennai, Tamil Nadu to Malayali parents from North Malabar.

Maalavika had been listening to music heavily since childhood.

In 2010, Maalavika performed at Maithri (the cultural events of Chettinad Vidyashram), and was named the "Best Vocalist".

RJ Arjun Thomas heard her there and suggested that she form a band to join the radio station Chennai Live's band hunt that was taking place at the time.

The band was eventually formed under the name "Bass-in-Bridge" in September 2010, with Arjun as the guitarist, Sajith Satya as the bassist, Leon James as the keyboardist, Maalavika as the vocalist and Shashank Vijay as the drummer.

The name is a pun on "Basin bridge".

Bass-in-Bridge was one of five underground bands (the other four being Wolf's Lair, Nailed, Blues Conscience, Blacklisted and Off the Record) that qualified for the event's finals which took place in November 2010, but Wolf's Lair emerged the winning band, with Blues Conscience and Off the Record as runners-up.

Maalavika called being a finalist at the band hunt her "claim to fame".

Bass-in-Bridge have also performed live at Chennai's Pasta Bar Veneto, Pondicherry's "Sec Saturday concert" and Yamaha Music Square's "Up on the Roof".

In June 2011, Bass-in-Bridge performed at a music festival called "Fete de la Musique" at the Goethe Institute, Chennai.

The band dissolved in the same year, with Leon, Maalavika and Sajith becoming solo artists.

Maalavika was featured in the "Sachin Anthem" composed by Dhanush, which was released in February 2012.

In June 2012, she performed at the World Music Day celebrations organised by Goethe Institute and Alliance Française de Chennai in association with Unwind Center.

In December 2012, she performed a few songs at a "Christmas Extravaganza" organised by Dr. John Joseph Foundation at YMCA, Vepery.

In mid-2013, she left for France to complete her BBA degree, but returned to Chennai a year later after graduating.

She graduated from Loyola in the same year, and moved to Mumbai, Maharashtra to pursue a career in music.

Maalavika's debut album Deceptive was to be released on 16 June 2013 at Chipstead, Taj Coromandel, but was released on iTunes a day in advance.

She chose the stage name Mali.

It was mixed by the US-based composer/mixer/producer Anton Pukshansky.

The album also features other artists like Ujjayinee Roy, Karthick Iyer, "Ghatam" Karthik and Ed DeGenaro, all of whom helped Mali with the instrumentals.

According to Mali, the album has "a mix of styles such as jazz, electronic, blues and so on" and she compares it to "a box of assorted chocolates – something for everyone".

The song "No Place Like Home", which Mali considers "the tune dearest to her on the album" was composed over a period of three years; she wrote it when she was 16 years old.

It took her 15 months to finish the whole album.

The album has six songs, which include "This One's for You", "Deceptive", "It's Not the Same", "No Place Like Home", "Wannabe" and "Undefined".

In July 2013, Mali performed at "Thank You for the Music", a tribute concert to ABBA held at Chennai's Museum Theatre.

In April 2015, Mali performed with Sapta, an independent electro-acoustic world music act, at the event "Daddy's Toxic Thursdays" in Tap Resto Bar, Mumbai.

In the same month she performed at Mercedes Luxe Royale, a show sponsored by Mercedes-Benz and organised by designer Vivek Karunakaran in association with the Madras Midtown Round Table-42 at The Park in Nungambakkam, Chennai, and also at the launch event of Anams Man's Spring-Summer Collection held at ITC Grand Chola.

Mali performed the song "Walk Away" during the third season of the Kappa TV show Music Mojo.

In November, she performed the song "Deen", in collaboration with rapper Sofia Ashraf and Sapta.

By January 2016, Mali had joined "The Diva Collective", a collaboration between several Chennai-based female vocalists.