The first recipient of the award was K. V. Mahadevan who was honoured for his composition in the Tamil film Kandan Karunai (1967).

A. R. Rahman is also the only composer to have received a national award in his debut movie itself.

Ilaiyaraaja is the only composer to have won the award for achieving in three different languages — Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam.

While A. R. Rahman won the award for performing in two different languages — Tamil and Hindi (including one for his debut film) Roja (1992).

When the award was reinstated in 2009, Ilaiyaraaja won it for the Malayalam film Pazhassi Raja.