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Deccan Herald » Fine Art / Culture » Detailed Story
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East meets West in exotic dance
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The seamless fusion of dance and opera in a performance of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas at The Arena theatre in Brimingham delights Sunil Kothari.
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“A 17th-century theatre audience would have been so familiar with classical mythology that Purcell had no need to elaborate on the background to events in Dido and Aeneas,” notes Susan Hamlyn in her programme note. “They would have known that Dido’s sadness at the start of the opera stems from fleeing her brother’s tyranny after he killed her husband, and that Aeneas, battle-worn and a refugee from the Trojan War, had lost his wife in the fall of Troy.”
Endorses Piali Ray, honoured with Order of British Empire (OBE), the dynamic artistic director, heading Sampad, an institution in Birmingham promoting South Asian arts, who took up the challenge of choreographing this when she was approached by MAC Productions; “The unique tradition of story-telling in Indian classical dance lends itself very well to the dramatic storyline of the opera. The primary inspiration has been the music and narrative of the opera. I have also tried to incorporate an eclectic mix of dance styles— not limited to Indian classical and folk. And, of course, the Arena as a performance space always excites me because it has a dramatic character of its own. And, it has a strong influence on choreography.” Dido and Aeneas is a passionate love story told through opera and dance. Organised by Prashant Nayak and his Milap Fest, it was curated by Kathak exponent Gauri Sharma Tripathi and associates. The opera was staged on August 21 last at The Arena theatre in Birmingham, UK.
A recent trend noticed in performing arts is that of a fusion between different art forms by Indian Diaspora artists. It fits the host country’s agenda of promoting harmony between different communities by inviting immigrants to participate in such collaborations. It offers scope for young artists to explore, experiment and collaborate with the host country’s indigenous cultural expressions. Therefore, classical Indian dance and English opera with South Asian dancers, British musicians and singers seek to find an intercultural expression in this mix of Asian, classical and English traditions.
I am no expert on opera, even though I have seen some of the best operas in the West. It was quite fascinating to watch the performance at MAC’s open-air, classically conceived Arena Theatre. Watching the dancers and opera singers performing seamlessly together was a fascinating experience.
Kathak dancer Sonia Sabri played the role of Dido. It was sung by outstanding young soprano Wendy Neiper, who has sung with the Swingle Singers, the Berlin Philharmonic and the Gotenburg Symphony Orchestra. Aeneas was played by Shane Shambhu, trained in Bharatanatyam by Pushkala Gopalan, sung by David Heathcote, sorcerer played by Kali Dass, a Malaysian male dancer from Kuala Lumpur, trained in Bharatanatyam, Kathakali and Kalaripyattu at the Temple of Fine Arts, and sung by Ian Gifford, and Belinda, played by Seeta Patel, with training in Bharatanatyam and folk dances under Indian Diaspora dancers in Birmingham and sung by Abigail Kelly. These performers carried the show with professional showmanship and commendable dance technique.
Piali Ray, who received training at the Uday Shankar Cultural Center in Kolkata under Amala Shankar, dancer and wife of Uday Sankar, has an unerring eye for groupings, placement of the dancers, and an ability to dovetail the dance with opera music and succeeded in matching the movements to the music and the drama that unfolded before one’s eyes. As the choreographer, she brought in elements of folk dance and a few Bharatanatyam movements in Dido’s group, which had trained in different forms.
The ones who had technique at their command like Kali Dass— the evil sorcerer in Swan Lake— performed with ease and won rounds of applause at the end when he came to take curtain call. So did Sonia Sabri with her command over the Kathak technique, and varying expressions at her beck and call, emoting feelings of tragic character Dido; Shane Shambhu, another tragic character, who at the end of the story stood atop a tree, like a heartbroken lover looking across the sea from the deck of a ship; and Seeta Patel as Belinda, Dido’s confidante, helplessly watching Dido commit suicide and later her body being carried away on a bier, covered with a white sheet.
Aeneas’s group, which performed the dance of the vicious witches in their black costumes and horrendous make-up (“Destruction is our delight, delight, delight our greatest sorrow,” they exult), in contrast to the folk dancers in their pleasant sartorial finery, seemed quite natural to the quick unfolding of the events.
Before the performance began, I wondered how director Michel Barry, designer Jennie Cocking, music director Paul Herbert and dance director Piali Ray, were going to fulfil the requirements of a mini-opera, full of surprises and mystery. Purcell wrote it for a girls’ school in 1689, who then sang the men’s parts, especially Aeneas’! Another surprise is that it is full of stage effects and spectacle. It has thunder, lightning and horror music, a hunting scene and a cave with vicious witches and magic.
The music is similarly surprising. There is a song-and-dance sequence with an echo, a laughing song, a chorus of courtiers who have gone out hunting and can’t wait to get back to town when the rain starts, and another chorus of comically heartless sailors. It is also full of dances— Purcell’s score has four for the courtiers, witches, Furies and sailors.
No wonder Ray had enough scope to develop this aspect of dance as an integral part of the opera. The sequence in which the troupe goes out for hunting is cleverly exploited using Bharatanatyam hasta mudras, a Kathakali enactment of riding over horses, shooting arrows with shikhara hasta mudra for holding the bow and kapittha for releasing the arrows. “Certain moments and sequences, such as that of the sailors and women at the port, have been conceived to add another dimension without moving away from the main story line,” adds Ray.
Some of the songs, since the opera is in English, can, if one is attentive, be understood even when sung in an opera by a soprano. For instance, when Dido senses from the beginning that her love for Aeneas is doomed, even when he offers to stay, in spite of Jupiter’s anger, she says, “It is enough, whate’er you now decree, that you had once a thought of leaving me.” Dido commits suicide. Her final dying lament is simple, profound and utterly sombre. Sonia performs with élan and dignity, enacting the tragic heroine’s role with consummate artistry.
The orchestra, conducted by Paul Herbert, engaged one’s attention from the word go, with its Harpsichord continuo, cello continuo, violins, violas, double bass and what have you and one walked away from the Arena elated at having watched a successful fusion work where dance and opera complemented each other and the narrative was the highlight of the presentation.
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Sunday, October 2, 2005
