JOIN USAs a part of the ongoing ‘Bengaluru International Arts Festival 2012’ festivities, a bharatanatyam performance by Deepti Sudhindra was held recently at Chowdiah Memorial Hall.
This was followed by a Carnatic music concert by Padma Shri Aruna Sairam.
Deepti Sudhindra did her bharatanatyam training under the guidance of Guru Padmini Ravi for 20 years and performed with the Pradhan Dance Centre.
But when her guru stopped teaching, she decided to study theatre and understand nuances of free style dance movements. This recital was her comeback to the dance arena after a decade-long hiatus. It saw the revival of the traditional margam of bharatanatyam, which is slowly fading away, through a piece based on the grammar of both dance and theatre.
She began her performance with Tanmayee, which embodied the concept of becoming one with the absolute. The beautifully choreographed theme began with a Meera Bai bhajan, Paga Ghunguru, which led to the main piece, Dandayudha Pani Pillai’s Moham Aginen Indha Velai Varnam in karahara priya ragam. This was rendered artistically and skillfully by the talented dancer.
She was ably accompanied by her Guru Padmini Ravi on nattuvangam, with vocals by Suchetan Rangaswamy and Aishwarya Rangarajan, Lingaraj on mridangam, Sindhu Suchethan on violin, Srilatha on veena, Bharat on flute and Prassana Kumar on rhythm pads.
Most of the audience members seemed thrilled to see her take the stage in her old, familiar avatar and thoroughly enjoyed her performance. “I liked the concept because it was done in a completely innovative way. Never has a dancer focussed so much on dialogue during dance. I loved the way she depicted and brought the theme out,” says Manjula, an audience member, who is a dancer herself. “I really respect her for having the courage to come back to the world of dance after being away for such a long time,” she adds.
When Padma Shri Aruna Sairam of the Veenai Dhanammal School of Carnatic Music took the stage, wide smiles spread across the faces of the audience members. She began her concert with a song called Kanchadhalaya Dakshi Kamakshi. The voice reverberated in the entire hall with her brilliant recital. Her renditions of Saranga Nayane in ranjani ragam carried the audience into a trance and left them hanging there with other songs like Ranga Baro, Oh Rama Nee Namam and Kamalamba.
“Aruna is unbeatable! Her music is always creative and new. I liked her theme of centenary year tributes,” says Kruthika, who was quite enamoured by the entire show.
She paid her tribute to Madhura Mani Iyer with her performance of Chakkani Raja Margamu and to Ustad Amir Khan with her soulful singing of the Brindavani Venu. She concluded the blissful one-and-half-hour performance with her famous Kalinga Narthana Thillana.