Friday Review
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MUSIC ACADEMY
Drama with mudras and poses
ANJANA RAJAN
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The footwork pattern remained the same, but Meenakshi changed hand gestures to depict an idea in different ways.
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Photo: V. Ganesan
masterful presence: Meenakshi Chittaranjan.
One of the reasons for Meenakshi Chittaranjan’s successful Bharatanatyam recital during the morning series of The Music Academy’s Dance Festival was her impressive musical support. A good vocalist tends to settle the audience, and for Mee
nakshi, this was all the more important, dancing as she was after the euphoria created by Vyjayantimala Bali’s lecture-performance. Radha Badri did more than the needful with her “Gajavadana Bedume.”
Thereafter Meenakshi took over with a masterful presence, beginning with a pravesa sollukattu, a rhythmic dance composition based on the traditional sollukattu of Sadir. Flagged off by a dramatic entry — a simple prenkhanam along a diagonal — and aided by the robust nattuvangam of Pandanallur Pandian, who along with Meenakshi composed this piece, the presentation came off powerfully.
Meenakshi presented the Thodi varnam, “Ma Mohalahiri” in Adi tala with jatis composed by mridangam vidwan Umayalapuram Sivaraman. The jati syllables progressing organically were made interesting with patterns of micro beats. For example, during the slow speed recitation of the jati syllables, the footwork was set to tisram and to faster speeds, before the jati recitation too progressed to second and third speeds.
Meenakshi effectively dramatised episodes like Draupadi’s humiliation in the Kaurava court with an emphasis on poses rather than elaborate mudras. In the charanam section, she avoided becoming predictable by changing the mudras of the aradi each time. Though the footwork pattern remained the same, she changed the hand gestures to depict suffering in different ways, sometimes doing away with hand gestures altogether. While the dancer’s abhinaya is communicative, her tendency to lick the lips shows she is distracted. In nritta, she does not always follow the tenet of “Yato hastastato drishtih…” so at times her eyes appear closed.
A popular choreographic piece was the song based on a poem from the Sangam age, “Poghum Vazhi,” transformed into contemporary Tamil by Gnanakoothan and set to ragamalika by Pandanallur Srinivasa Pillai. Zestful while keeping up her dignified presence, Meenakshi brought out the humorous banter between a cowherd and a village girl.
Besides Pandanallur Pandian and Radha Badri, Meenakshi was accompanied by Muruganandam Sakthivel on the mridangam, Kalai Arasan on the violin and A.N.Srinivasan on the flute.
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Friday Review
Bangalore
Chennai and Tamil Nadu
Delhi
Hyderabad
Thiruvananthapuram
|
