Photos from Night 12 – Sivanai Patri Dance Troupe
Tags: 2010, classical, Culture, Dance, Festival, Isha, performers, Photos, Sadhguru, Yaksha
Photos from night 11 – Ustad Sayeeduddin Dagar
Tags: 2010, Culture, Dagar, Drupad, Music, Sadhguru, vocalist, Yaksha
Night 12: Sivanai Patri Dance Troupe
Sivanai patri is about Siva, the supreme artist and mighty vanquisher, who created life, nourished love and destroyed darkness. It is about the fountainhead of spirituality, but also the epitome of beauty, grace and compassion.
A dance performance to celebrate Tamil verse on the Cosmic Dancer by Priyadarshini Govind and Anjana Anand, Sivanai Patri takes you into the world of Tamil poets who sang about their ishta devata or personal god. Inflamed by the fervour of Appar, Sambandar, Tirukuta Rasappar, Muthu Tandavar and Tayumanavar, these songs address all men and women regardless of class or caste.
Explorating new artistic spaces inspired by the collaborative possibilities offered by both tradition and modernity, Sivanai Patri is an uplifting blend of poetry, music, dance and painting.
Priyadarsini Govind is a brilliant exponent of the Rajaratnam Pillai school of Bharatanatyam and Anjana Anand is from Kalakshetra, a cultural academy dedicated to the preservation of traditional values in Indian art.
Concept & Narration : Gowri Ramanarayan
Paintings : Lakshmi Srinath
Vocals : Savitha Narasimhan
Nattuvangam : Sri Balakrishnan
Mridangam : Sri G.Vijayaraghavan
Violin : Sri Kalaiarasan
Veena : Sri Anantanarayanan
Lights : Sri Krishnan Murugan
Tags: 2010, Culture, Dance, Isha, Sadhguru, sivanai patri, Yaksha
Photos from Night 10 – Smt. N. Rajam
Tags: 2010, Culture, Isha, Music, performers, Photos, Sadhguru, violin, Yaksha
Night 11: Ustad Sayeeduddin Dagar
Ustad Sayeeduddin Dagar hails from a family whose name is synonymous with the art of Dhrupad singing. He belongs to the unbroken lineage of the illustrious Dagar family of Dhrupad music propagated by Baba Gopal Das Pande (Behram Khan) of Jaipur.
Dhrupad is the oldest surviving form of Classical music in India and traces its origins to the chanting of Vedic hymns and mantras. Though a highly developed classical art with a complex and elaborate grammar and aesthetics, it is also primarily a form of worship, in which offerings are made to the divine through sound or nada.
Sayeeddin Dagar has been gracing this platform for more than 25 years. He has kept this tradition alive and represents the 19th generation along with brothers, the late Padmabhushan Ustad Aminuddin Khan Dagar, Ustad Rahim Fahimuddin Khan Dagar, the late Ustad N. Zahiruddin Khan Dagar and late N. Faiyazuddin Khan Dagar. His father, the late Ustad Hussainuddin Khan Dagar (alias Tansen Pandey of Kolkata) was his first guru, from whom he started learning at the age of six. After the death of his father in 1963, in Kolkata, he learnt extensively from the late Padmabhushan Ustad Rahimuddin Khan Dagar.
Tags: 2010, Culture, dhrupad, Isha, Music, Sadhguru, ustad sayeeduddin dagar, vocalist, Yaksha
Night 10: Smt. N. Rajam
Dr N. Rajam is India’s leading exponent of the North Indian (Hindustani) violin. Born into a family with a rich tradition of classical Indian music, her father, Narayana Iyer, was a prominent classical Carnatic violinist and her brother, T. N. Krishnan, is one of the foremost Carnatic violinists performing today. Her initial instruction was from her father, before she started training with Pandit Onkarnath Thakur, a renowned Hindustani vocalist.
Dr Rajam has a silken, infallible and definite touch on the violin, with not a single note ever out of place. In her notes to a Music Today album, she quotes her guru’s advice about playing: “Approach the musical notes with utmost tenderness, love and humility, caress them and cajole them”. She’s taken this advice to heart. Given her background in the two styles of Indian classical music (Carnatic and Hindustani) and her interests in and knowledge of both art forms, she is an ideal partner to Dr N. Ramani in a jugalbandi concert. People often refer to her music as the “Singing Violin”.
Tags: 2010, Culture, Isha, Music, performers, Sadhguru, Smt. N. Rajam, violin, Yaksha
Night 9-Pt Vishwa Mohan Bhatt
Grammy award winner Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt has mesmerized the world with his pristine pure, delicate yet fiery music. It’s due to his concerted effort that he not only created the Mohan Veena, but also managed to establish it at the topmost level in mainstream Indian Classical music.
Being the foremost disciple of Pt. Ravi Shankar, Vishwa Mohan belongs to that elite body of musicians which traces its origin to the legendary court musician Tansen (in Mughal emperor Akbar’s court) and his guru, the Hindu mystic Swami Haridas.
Vishwa Mohan Bhatt attracted international attention by his successful Indianisation of the western Hawaiian guitar, with his perfect assimilation of sitar, sarod and veena techniques; by giving it a unique design and shape and by adding 14 more strings, it helped him to establish the innovative instrument Mohan Veena. With blinding speed and faultless legato, Bhatt is undoubtedly one of the most expressive and versatile slide players in the world today.
Tags: 2010, Culture, guitar, Isha, Music, performers, Sadhguru, sitar, vishwa mohan bhatt, Yaksha
Photos from Night 8: Smt. Sudha Raghunathan
Sudha Raghunathan is one of India’s leading classical musicians. This accomplished Carnatic vocalist started her formal training at the age of nine under her mother, Smt. Choodamani’s guidance. Later, she also learnt the nuances of Carnatic music from Sri. T. V Viswanathan and Sri. B.V. Lakshman. However, the turning point came when she won an Indian government scholarship for advanced training in music and got the opportunity to train with the illustrious Padmabhushan, Sangeetha Kalanidhi, Dr. M.L Vasantha Kumari in 1977.
Sudha Raghunathan has performed concerts all over the world at the invitation of prestigious institutions. She has earned the respect of other reputed musicians from both the Carnatic as well as Hindustani music genres.
Tags: 2010, carnatic, Culture, Isha, Music, performers, Sadhguru, sudha raghunathan, vocalist, Yaksha
Night 7: CHARISHNU – the Desire to Move
Charishnu is a spectacular dance and music presentation that offers a glimpse of the diversity and richness of India`s performing arts. It includes a selection of the classical, folk and martial dance forms of this country. The wonderfully complex art of percussion is also presented through an ensemble of drums from different parts of India.
The word, charishnu, literally means `the desire to move`. Dancers of different forms move in varying rhythms, each in their own stylized way, each of them reveling in their respective languages of expression. The strength and beauty of each of these dance styles is captured individually, so that the viewer can savour each, yet appreciate the differences between them. All of them are given their due creative space, as they present themselves in their distinctive costumes, with their unique percussive support, in all the grandeur and the precision that are their hallmark.
Tags: 2010, Charishnu, classical, Culture, Dance, drums, folk, Isha, martial, Music, percussion, performers, Sadhguru, Yaksha
Night 6: Padma Talwalkar
Padma Talwalkar was initiated into Hindustani classical music by Pandit Gangadhar Pimpalkhare, and was groomed and inspired by him to take to music professionally. Trained by Smt Moghubai Kurdikar (a senior Jaipur vocalist), Talwalkar has added to her knowledge and repertoire under other veterans like Pt. Nivrutti Bua Sarnaik and Pt. Gajanan Rao Joshi.
Padma Talwalkar’s talent attracted recognition while she was still a student, when she bagged the Bhulabhai Desai Memorial Scholarship, and the prestigious Kasarbai Karkar Fellowship of the National Centre of Performing Arts.
Tags: 2010, Culture, hindustani, Isha, Music, padma talwalkar, performers, Sadhguru, vocal
