The dreary weather outside the Indian Institute of World Culture auditorium on the19th of December could not dampen an atmosphere that was electric with the haunting melodies of  ghazals rendered soulfully by Florida-based Karaoke multi-lingual singer Lakshman Sriram.

Ghazal maestros like Ghulam Ali, Pankaj Udhas, Jagjit Singh and Mehdi Hasan came alive for the first time in the medium of karaoke and the audience got lost in ‘chupke chupke raat din aansu bahana yaad hai.’

The breezy romantic ‘sab ko maloom hai my sharabi nahin’, or the finger clicking ‘baat nikalegi to.., duniya kija ke pyaar mae’ etc were sung with remarkable versatility for the next two hours with deft compereing in Hindi by Chitra.

The legendary Manna Dey, the last icon of a bygone era, a larger than life persona, walked in to the welcome of Vedic chants to release four of Sriram's cassettes.

Bowing to the fans request, he mellifluously sang Harivamshrai Bachan's ‘Madhushala’ in two Hindustani raagas, that was composed by Jayadev- ‘Rithu aayi and Pi bin sona’, and his latest from ‘Laaga chunri me daag’.
Lauding Srirams' efforts of dedicating his career to singing and releasing cassettes of the best of vintage songs of some of the greats in the field of Hindi film music, he said that he himself could not sing his contemporaries songs.