My sister Anjali, an occasional commenter here, attended the “Kathak at the Crossroads” conference that was held last weekend in San Francisco. She passes on these thoughts.
I have just returned from an international kathak festival and symposium, organized by the Chitresh Das Dance Company in San Francisco. Im having trouble refocusing on the mundane trivialities of day-to-day life. This was a rare gathering of a majority of the names and legends of kathak, with close to fifty artists, both dancers and musicians, attending from around the world. Some, like Birju Maharaj and Krishna Mohan Mishra, are descendants of long lines of dancers whose forefathers performed in the Moghul courts. Kumudini Lakhia is a dancer who broke the mold and, in the 1950s, injected Western notions of choreography into kathak, beginning a long discussion as to what is and is not traditional. Madhuri Devi Singh is one of the last living baijis (courtesans) of Benares, whose difficult life, etched in lines along her face, nonetheless produced a dancer of almost divine grace and tangible kindness. Other masters and grandes dames of kathak included Tirath Ram Azad, Chitresh Das, Sunayana Hazarilal and the sisters Saswati Sen and Vaswati Mishra. And then there were dancers of a younger generation (and by younger I mean close to or in their 40s) such as Rajendra Gangani, Aditi Mangaldas and the members of the Chitresh Das Dance Company.
There were presentations and panels. There was talk of fusion and confusion, of traditional versus contemporary, of authenticity, of accessibility. And there were performances. For a student of dance, this was a treat beyond treats. With three or four hours of performances every evening and additional showcase events during the days, I felt like a child with a bucket of my favorite candy and someone standing over me telling me I had to finish it all at once. It was almost too much. I wanted more time to savor each performance before being swept into another one. I watched in amazement the fastest and most precise footwork I have ever seen, the most deep-seated perfection of rhythm and timing, and the total devotion to an art form that one rarely encounters today.
I traveled to the conference with eight other kathak students from Boston, including a fifteen-year old. Throughout the performances, I stole glances at her, and smiled to see her keeping count of the musical cycle on her fingers, leaning forward in her seat in complete absorption with the dance. At the end of every show, her eyes shone with an enthusiasm, wonder and delight that I suspect few teenagers feel, much less exhibit in the course of their adolescence. And I thought about how lucky she was to have had this opportunity, to see these dancers who have lived and breathed this art form for decades, who very soon will no longer be dancing, and who too soon after that will no longer be among us at all. The girls friends all think it is weird that she studies kathak. Why not bhangra, they ask? To her, it is obvious why she chose kathak.
I thought, too, about the Nike ad that was the subject of discussion here a little while back. (In fact, I brought this up at one of the panel discussions, and in fact ran into a mutineer who identified himself as such after the session.) Should we be glad for the popularity of things sub-continental, even if they are gross distortions and dilutions of what some consider the real thing because at least they spark an interest in that culture? And what is the real thing? Bhangra is its own real thing. I looked around at the depth and richness of of the little world that enveloped me for three days and wondered about how to share it with more people. Jason Samuel Smith, Emmy award-winning tap dancer (of Bring in da Noise, Bring in da Funk fame) shared the stage with Chitresh Das for a dazzling collaboration (but NOT fusion) called India Jazz Suites and announced to the audience that the only thing that made him sad about being acquainted with kathak was that he had not known about it earlier. He went on to say that kathak should be taught in all schools. OK, so perhaps thats an exaggeration, and hes got his own proclivity for percussive dance. Anyone deeply involved in an art form believes that form should be taught in schools. But the underlying point is so true: that all kids should somehow be exposed to something so deep and so rich and so satisfying. How many kids born today (and by the way, congratulations to Amardeep and family!) will have that opportunity? To come into close contact with people who have given their lives to, and thus contributed tremendously to, music, dance, visual arts, literature? To have their hearts affected by art?
I returned home determined to practice more, and to bring my two-year old daughter, who already is in love with dance, to watch class now and then. Kathak is too rich, too beautiful, too historic, too meditative for me not to share it with her. I only hope that if kathak does not touch her soul, something else will.
- Anjali
You can contact Anjali here. Those in the Boston area can check out the kathak program she is involved with, Chhandika. Also, Birju Maharaj performs this Friday in New York City and Sunday in Boston.
