A versatile artist, Darbuka Siva is an Indian actor, musician, music director and a radio jockey from Chennai. Having started his career as a drummer and percussionist for some of the most popular bands in India, he eventually went on to spearhead the most noted music projects like Yodhakaa and La Pongal.
Born and raised in North Madras, Darbuka was interested in music from a very age and he always knew that music was his calling, spending most of his time around several music venues and studious during his college. When he started out in the music industry as an amateur in 1999, he learned to play the drum, which he had brought with his own money. A year later, he started his performing career with Oikyotaan, an experimental Bengali Baul music band, which was led by Bonnie Chakraborty whom Darbuka considered as his mentor.
In 2003, Darbuka met Tanvi Shah who shared a similar musical interest with him and together they formed the band 'Zahraa' and performed popular music from all over the world. Soon, the band became famous in Chennai and established Darbuka as one of the few Egyptian percussionists in Chennai. Later in 2005, Darbuka formed the band 'Yodhakaa', which initially started off as an experimental band with Indian classical music but with a contemporary approach. In 2010, he released an album which was received with rave reviews from both the critics and the music fanatics.
Darbuka later gained more fame and recognition for creative a La Pongal, a platform for contemporary folk music. In 2012, the band released its maiden album, which featured around 70 traditional folk musicians on Pongal Day. It was a first-of-its-kind album that went to feature in MTV Coke Studio India representing the Tamil folk music on the national stage.
After working as a musician for a considerable period, the musician-turned-actor made his debut on the silver screen with Rajathandhiram (2015). His other notable film credits as an actor include Mo (2016), and Thodari (2016). His 2018 release includes Nimir, which is his first film in the year as a composer.