Child prodigy Aditi Balasubrahmanium’s recent performance during World Dance Day caused Utpal K Banerjee to ponder about the factors involved while spotting talent early
What is the age at which a child should learn classical danceIJ
When leela Samson was based in Delhi, one would observe her in her Asiad Village home, nurturing toddlers. The dancer who relocated to Chennai, is currently involved with various assignments across India, including the chairmanship of the Sangeet-Natak Akademi.
In Chennai, the average age for learning Bharatanatyam is seven. Gifted kids can begin at four. Aditi Balasubrahmaniam, who kick-started the Sunday programme of the World Dance Day at IIC, has been a student of Natya Vriksha for five years. She is barely eleven.
Says her guru Geeta Chandran, “We generally begin training at seven and have 30-40 kids around that age, out of a hundred students. Aditi came here from Chennai, having started at three and a half years!”
When, after a brief musical invocation in raga Hamsadhwani, Aditi traipsed in with her Alarippu, she left spectators in no doubt about her talents as a child prodigy.
With mnemonics recited by her guru, her adavus were clinically clean and the karanas she chose to depict were picture-perfect.
A special point about her subsequent varnam in raga Natai Kuranji, was that this was a composition by Papanasan Shivam, a musical maestro brought in for Kalakshetra by Rukmini Devi Arundale. She had begun sanitising Bharatanatyam into more cerebral bhakti mode from the physicality of the prevailing sringara mode practised by devadasis: not excluding the great Bala Saraswati.
Papanasan’s ode to lord Shiva in his many spiritual aspects, suited little Aditi’s imagination perfectly.
Especially the concluding charanam, when the devotee exults in the God’s executing ananda tandava for cleansing the world. Asked about the dancing wonder’s ‘child prodigy’ status, her father Balasubrahmaniam, an executive in Earnst & Young remarked, “Dance is Aditi’s passion.
The main preoccupation of my wife Anita and I, are to see that she has her way.”
Aditi herself exclaimed, “I want to be a dancer and a wild-life photographer!”
The second half of the evening was given to Sattriya dance by Anvesha Mahanta. Emerging from sattras (monasteries), and recognised as the eighth classical dance in 1999, Sattriya has been an exclusive male preserve and only, of late, some sattras have opened doors to women.
Sattriya is yet to acquire the versatility of other classical forms. It remains within a domain defined by its 16th century founders, the maestro Srimanta Shankara Deva and his disciple Madhava Deva. So it was appropriate for Anvesha to begin in male costume and stick to the repertoire of two masters.
Her depiction showed innovations in form, like leaps, pirouettes and arabesques. It also displayed prowess in facial abhinaya. But the 25-year-old dancer, a PhD student in Delhi University researching into performing arts and folk traditions, showed dexterity in the later stree vesham, (feminine attire), when she enacted Shankara Deva’s masterpiece Parijata Harana. Elaborating on the Satyabhama’s Mana Bhanjana episode, she excelled in depicting its many dimensions of disappointment and despair, fury and remorse. As well as the shy shades of happiness and exultation.
As to why its good to start early with established classical genres, Geeta has the last word, “All classical forms have a basic standing posture. One must be of a certain age when holding this pose. Then you can begin training. In Bharatanatyam, it is araimandi (ardha Mandali in Sanskrit).
“It will only be steady by the age of seven. We tried the age five earlier, but found it unsuitable for the child’s bone-structure. Hence the glorious age of seven!”