Geeta Chandran and Sudha Raghuraman chat with Utpal K Banerjee about their recent experimental project, Ashta Darshana, where dance dimensions were fused with eight directions of sound vibration
Does music descend from spheresIJ Is it an expression of the human heart and soul, resonating in chirping of birds, humming of cicadas, rustling trees and grassIJ Indeed, the seven notes of Indian music are linked with cries of fauna. Does it originate from spine, solar plexus, mobility of limbs and movement of the bodyIJ Are these manifestations of prayer to gods imbued with taste, flavour and multiple motions, as Natya Shastra visualised millennia agoIJ In a recent experiment at IIC, the brilliant, youthful, singer-composer Sudha Raghuraman (S) interacted with the hugely-talented, Bharatanatyam danseuse Geeta Chandran (G), to establish ‘connect’. A twin interview on the performance:
How did the idea originateIJ
S: I received a Culture Ministry’s grant to present my project, Music of Divine love. Calling it Ashta Darshana, I sought to look at all eight directions of music and broad-base my approach from abstractions to javalis, (light-hearted love-ditties).
G: Invited by Sudha to provide the dance dimension to her project, I chose abhinaya (expressions). Having learnt from Swarna Saraswati, and later groomed by the redoubtable Kalanidhi Narayan and Jamuna Krishnan, I thought today’s dancers tend to neglect this aspect.
You began with a shloka...
S: My solo overture was to evoke dasya (servility), sakhya (camaraderie), vatsalya (affection) and sundara (beautification). This was the pouring forth of devotee’s heart to his personal God, in raga Mishra Hamsadhwani, which can also be called Hamsa Vasanti.
Then came dance to greet rasaraja shringara: the monarch of all moods…
S: I composed in three ragas, Jog, Basalt and Charukesi. Without mixing storyline with music, I used swaras (notes), tanas (rapid articulations) and flute notations.
G: I interpreted Sudha’s melody in a cavalcade of nayikas (heroines): basakasajja (the adorning one), abhisarika (the trysting one), sambhoga (love in union), vipralamha (love in separation) and khandita (there was a solo then of a popular verse).
S: Yes, I sang Yaro ivar yaro… to express Rama’s being wonder-struck at seeing Sita in the orchard for the first time. Then there was a major item of male shringara…
I took up Chaura Panchshtakam, an epic of 50 couplets composed by Bilhan Sahana and Rasikapriya.
G: Bilhan expresses viraha (separation) from a lady-love, the beauteous princess Amaravati in
these couplets. The first depicts the heroine’s beauty and lover’s ardour in absentia.
The second is coming together in embrace, ensuing wrath, his inability to comprehend and his falling at her feet.
Jayadeva’s Ashtapadi came then…
S: His epic, Gita Govinda is word-perfect. Though sung all over the land, there is no alteration in text between
Odisha’s Jagannath temple and Kerala’s Guruvayur temple! I sang the Ashtapadi, Kesi Madanamudaram… in raga Shuddha Sarang.
G: Jayadeva is filigreed. I view it as a challenge!
Why was the following javali not dancedIJ
S: This is a Telugu javali in raga Behag by Swati Thriunal on Padmanabhaswamy. The text literally derides God for being too fast for his devotee! Mock anger is expressed as ninda-stuti (banter-cum-praise).
G: It’s a javali sung, in kachheris (soirees), so I let it go.
The penultimate item was a padam…
S: Composed in raga Deva Gandhari by Gopalakrishna Bharati, dedicated to the lord of Chidambaram.
G: I danced this to Shiva as a devotee who would like to lie at his feet within the sanctum sanctorum, to seek eternal sannidhi (vicinity).
The finale was flit-footed traipsing…
S: It was a lightly-sung Nama Sankeertana beginning with Vanamali Vasudeva Jagmohan Radharaman… in the lilting raga, Vrindavani Sarang.
G: It’s my favourite ending, with a jugal-jodi (coupling) of Radha-Krishna. It has Radha’s hladini shakti (embalming power).