De­siree Mc Eachrane

I found my­self jig­ging about the house the oth­er day, singing, "Show me yuh jal­wa, show me yuh jal­wa." Up to the day be­fore that, I'd known no chut­ney mu­sic lyrics and had felt no urge to learn. But three min­utes spent with a JMC 3 Veni de­mo video fea­tur­ing 'Sexy Savi­ta' on Youtube changed my mind a lit­tle bit. JMC 3 Veni is one of best known chut­ney so­ca and In­di­an mu­sic groups in T&T and 23-year-old Savi­ta Singh has been their front woman for the past two years. Al­though she was trained in clas­si­cal In­di­an dance be­fore she be­gan to sing with the band, at age 15, singing has be­come her grand pas­sion. And with her fam­i­ly back­ground, it's no won­der. Every­one, from her par­ents to her aunts and un­cles, were in­volved in singing at some point in their lives.

"The whole singing thing is in my blood," Singh said. So much so that when her late fa­ther first heard her sing, he start­ed to train her voice with an old cas­sette play­er and good old rep­e­ti­tion. The next thing Singh knew, she was be­ing asked to head­line with JMC 3 Veni on a tour to Suri­name. She's been with the band full time ever since, hop­ping across the globe from Guyana to Hol­land to show­case chut­ney so­ca. Even Hol­lan­ders like to show their jal­wa, ap­par­ent­ly.

Show Me Yuh Jal­wa, an old Bol­ly­wood song that is in­ject­ed with that 3 Veni chut­ney so­ca flavour, means show me your tal­ent, show me your mo­tion, Singh ex­plained with a laugh. It's a par­tic­u­lar favourite with her fans, es­pe­cial­ly since she in­cor­po­rates some of her clas­si­cal dance train­ing in­to her per­for­mance. She spe­cialis­es in Bol­ly­wood songs, but she does chut­ney so­ca with equal suc­cess. "Where ever I have per­formed, the peo­ple al­ways like me," Singh said with­out ar­ro­gance.

"I smile a lot. My stage per­for­mances show a lot of love." Maybe that's why peo­ple now call her 'Sexy Savi­ta'; she blushed a bit when I re­mind­ed her of the nick­name, protest­ing that she didn't give her­self the name. But she knows why her band mem­bers coined the name for her. "I be­lieve that I have a cer­tain charm," she said, smil­ing. And fans still have some hope, since Sexy Savi­ta is def­i­nite­ly sin­gle. For our in­ter­view she re­fused to talk about the love of her life, pre­fer­ring to talk about her late fa­ther. "Be­cause of him, I will nev­er stop singing. It's some­thing he al­ways liked me to do." Luck­i­ly, the band keeps Singh busy singing with gru­elling re­hearsals and tours to North Amer­i­ca and Eu­rope. But she's built a strong bond with her band mates, call­ing them, "the best mu­si­cians I know.

JMC 3 Veni

"You learn so much from just be­ing around them. And band leader Veeren­dra 'Cap­py' Per­sad is the best band leader ever," Singh said with daugh­ter­ly pride. For 2010, JMC 3 Veni's front man KI placed fourth at the an­nu­al Chut­ney So­ca Monarch. Singh plans to en­ter some time in the fu­ture; she's just giv­ing her­self a lit­tle more time to over­come a fear of com­pe­ti­tions. But she's not wor­ried. Singh knows that she's not even near the end of her jour­ney yet. Like so many young star­lets, she dreams of mak­ing it big. "I'm sat­is­fied now be­cause I'm just on the brink of my ca­reer. I'm get­ting the ex­po­sure; peo­ple are get­ting to know me. But when every­body knows who Savi­ta Singh is, that will be a dream come true."