And so another one bites the dust. Sonu Nigam, mush master and baby-faced music maven is out of the television business for now. After seven years at the helm of satellite TV's most popular show, Sa Re Ga Ma, the singer has called it a day. "I haven't taken a holiday in seven years," he told mediapeople in
Mumbai. While his disappearance from TV screens will take awhile yet - he has shot episodes up until May 2000 he isn't shooting any more.
Reason: he wants to concentrate more on his film playback and pop career, offers for which, he says, have been flooding him, only his TV commitments prevent him from responding. So who's replacing him? Get this: the totally cool, ultra-savvy, drool-drool sons of Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, Ayaan and Aman Ali Bangash. But more on that later. Nigam actually made it to the TV screens on a rival show: Zee TV's Antakshari where producer Gajendra Singh picked him from a panel of playback pushers to replace
Anu Kapoor as host of the same show. Nigam declined, asking instead for a different format, Singh complied, spun off Sa Re and Nigam moved in. Within months, the two shows were locked in a ratings war, a war Nigam eventually won hands down.
