It’s ahead of rains that peacocks dance, fanning out their fancy feathers. But it’s after the monsoons that a ritual art with costume remindful of the pretty bird spreads across a clutch of shrines in God’s Own Country.
For all the innovations they promote with change of times, Indian puppetries shouldn’t suffer from flat electric lighting. After all, old-world charm is integral to these forms.
Frontline filmmaker K.R. Mohanan is dead. A look at his last work, which found an uncanny plot resemblance in a later movie by a fellow Kerala director
Monsoon 2017 is making a slow advancement upcountry even as the earth is moist in the capital, where a three-concert evening saw a couple of monsoon ragas rendered this week. What all make the classical tunes stimulating?
Kalamandalam Leelamma trod a suave path down Mohiniyattam when the Kerala classical dance gained wider name for seductive charm. Two of her students take a peek at the exponent who died the other day.
For a Bombay-raised Gujarati who has been a Delhiite for long to have mastered the country’s classical dances from its east and south is a pleasant cultural mix. It’s a rare pan-India feat from Sonal Mansingh.
The famed Kathakali maestro is now an octogenarian, having weathered many a crisis en route. The actor-dancer’s stories of resurgence border on the incredible, much like his pre-eminence in the classical Kerala theatre.
At age 33, he set up an institution to propagate one of India’s most ancient performing arts. Bangalorean Somashekar Jois speaks about his mission to further advance Konnakkol, the vocal rendition of classical percussion syllables.
With laser projectors and HD screens, a first such travelling multimedia art event now in India has a Desi section with a weekly cycle. A look at the two-tier ‘Drifting Canvas’ in Delhi
India’s classical performing arts do suffer from an obsession with pageant syndrome, but striking visual display is neither new nor entirely extraneous to the culture.
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