Gifted, mellifluous and deeply emotive. These are words that best describe the voice of rising starlet
Reena Bhardwaj, whose chance audition with India’s revered music composer AR Rahman catapulted her from the world of academics to the top of the Indian music charts! 

With Rahman she recorded her debut song, the beautiful “Yeh Rishta”, for the renowned artist MF Hussain’s film, Meenaxi in which she is described as having "a tone that just bewilders, and a voice as soothing as running water" (Asian Age). Soon after its release, Reena become the first British Asian artist to receive nominations for the coveted Zee Cine Award for Best Playback Singer and MTV India’s Award for Best New Talent of 2004.

Reena describes the start of her musical career as “a turn of fate”. Albeit born with an instinctive flair for music, Reena was an avid academic boasting a Bachelors and Masters in Management from the prestigious London School of Economics when her extraordinary talent drew the attention of some of the world's leading pioneers of music, both in India as well as the UK. 

Thus far her work with her favorite Indian composer AR Rahman includes performances in the award-winning film The Rising; Ballad of Mangal Pandey, the Tamil hit films, Baba & Sakkarakatti, The Legend of Bhagat Singh, Andrew Lloyd Webber's Bombay Dreams and most recently she features on Mani Ratnam’s most awaited offering, Raavan.

Reena has also been widely appreciated for her long standing collaborations with the critically acclaimed British producer and composer Nitin Sawhney, which began with a mesmeric rendition of the epic Indian poem “Heer” by Waris Shah for his 2003 album, Human. Her most popular works include the haunting "Koyal" and the chart-topping “Mausam” which she co wrote for Sawhney's 2006 album, Philtre. Most recently, on London Undersound she has rendered the achingly beautiful "Ek Jaan" - in which she expresses her feelings about growing up in London, and also sings alongside Paul McCartney on “My Soul”.

Reena has lent her soulful voice to many of Sawhney's film scores including the Channel 4 Drama, Second Generation, the Indo-French feature, Hari Om by Bharat Bala, and appears on Franz Osten’s 1929 silent classic A Throw of Dice with the London Symphony Orchestra, which is currently being toured with national orchestras around the world.

Over the years, Reena has enchanted audiences at some of the world's most culturally elite venues in Europe, Australia and Asia as well as world music festivals WOMAD and Glastonbury. Her most memorable appearances till date have been at London’s popular Jazz Café and at the 2007 BBC Proms with Nitin Sawhney, Natacha Atlas & Anoushka Shankar at the Royal Albert Hall, where her performance is said to have “left crowds afraid even to breathe”. (BBC Proms)

Versatile to genre and language, her diverse repertoire spans Indian Classical, Folk, Bollywood, Jazz, World and Popular styles in Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali, Tamil, Telegu and English, ranging from collaborations with UK’s acclaimed dance duo, Basment Jaxx to live concerts with Percussion King, Trilok Gurtu.

Alongside film projects and performances, Reena is currently working on a solo album, on which she hopes to create a global sound which will transcend cultural barriers and take her unique talent to an even wider audience.