Goodbye!

Covering the Natyanjali is special and demanding.
But we enjoy the assignment.
After all, KutcheriBuzz works hard at reportage.

That is why we took the Blogging route this year. Filed snappy reports, posted informal pictures and linked them up to the video and photo galleries.

Three made the team - Vincent D Souza, R Revathi and Mohan Das Vadakkara.

On Sunday morning, we went back to the Big Temple, took another look at this great edifice as thousands of visitors filed in and travelled back to our base in Chennai.

The reports, pictures and videos will remain upfront on www.kutcheribuzz.com for a month.
Enjoy them and get your friends to do the same.

P. S. : Natyanjali 2013 will start on March 10.

Pondy-Chidambaram-Karur; quite a connect

When yours is the last recital of the evening, when the audience is reduced to ten and when the time is 10.21 pm, you aren't going to be feeling great as the lights come on for the nth time.

But M. Suganthapriya from Karur did not mind.

She brought up two of her students for the first item and then left her place among the musicians and presented two items, gamely.

Her vocalist Susairaj from Pondicherry told me how young artistes like him and his flutist friend from Annamalai University teamed up with a mridangist and were contracted by Suganthapriya to be here for the Natyanjali.

"Dancers keep looking for musicians who suit their work and network," he said when I wondered how the Karur-Pondy connection came about.

The Triplicane delegation

This was the Triplicane delegation!

Aiswarya takes dance classes in this ancient zone of Chennai, home for Sri Parthasarathy Temple.

This evening her students performed late in the evening and following this recital, it was the turn of a smaller set of dancers who had come all the way from Arakkonam ( a railway zone an hour away from Chennai).

Aiswarya and her colleague in Arakkonam learn under dancer-guru Zakir Hussain ( he couldnt make it because of a wedding he had to attend, we were told).

The Natyanjali is a huge experience for young dance students who hail from the interiors.

What have they done to the Nandi?

Now what have they done to everybody's favourite Nandi here?

The massive Nandi that sits in front of the temple here is a gentle giant. And it is the focus of the abhishekams that take place here.

And on prodosham evenings, this place is very busy.

Now someone here decided that an elevator would make things easy for the priests to do their job. But clearly, the metal structure that appears to be some ugly calipher destroys the image of the Nandi.

It has to be taken away after it is put to use.

This World Heritage site needs a lot more attention. The campus lighting is poor; and the gopurams and all other structures are not lit up after dusk.

Tiny Mrinalini!

This group is all over the place!

Chennai-based Sheela Unnikrishnan has made a big impact with her productions featuring young dancers.

Smart packaging of the recitals also gets the guru corporate fixtures.

On Friday, she and her dancers were at Chidambaram. On Saturday, the team was at the Big Temple. And since Sheela was given 40minutes on stage, she did the smart thing - she got the youngest member of the team, a teeny-weeny Mrinalini Sivakumar to perform before the group got into the act.

Sheela tells me later that they rustled up a dance costume and tailor it for the little girl. "She is going to have her arangetram soon so I thought we could give her a chance here," said Sheela.

The girl enjoyed her time in front of the large audience and she got a big round of applause!

A long Kuchipudi recital . . .

Dr. Saraswathi Rajathesh came to Thanjavur with a group of Kuchipudi dancers and a production.

The local organisers prefer short recitals. So when the Bangalore artistes went on and on the organisers' foreheads creased.

Though the Big Temple is in the middle of this town, neighbourhoods do not hug it and so, the recitals do not get a guaranteed attendance.

And people tend to move on after 9 p.m.

Saraswathi says though Kuchipudi is not hugely popular in Bangalore, she gets youth who are keen to learn the dance. Relocated in Bangalore from Hyderabad, she is busy preparing for a Kuchipudi Fest in Bangalore on March 3 and 4.

You can reach her at www.natyasaraswathi.com

Maya, the French dancer

Maya grabbed our attention.

A French dancer who is based in Paris and learns dance under Aruna Subramaniam here in Thanjavur, Maya was keen to update us on her career.

She reminded us that we had met at the 2009 Natyanjali in Chidambaram. Yes, we did.

Now she is completing yet another study stint here in Thanjavur and will fly back next week.

She was happy she could perform for prodosham here, at the feet of the giant Nandi.

But she has a keen desire to bring a photographic exhibition on Indian dance that she collaborated with a friend.

She has tried the ICCR and failed.

Maybe the Alliance Francaise can help collborate.

Nice promos for the fest

The Brihanatyanjali started small.

Today, it is big.

Two aspects are good here.

One, local team co ordinates well and its response has made an impression on visiting artistes.

Two, the promotion of the fest.

They create lovely posters and flyers and make good use of them.

These efforts drive lots of tourists who are here as part of their Tamil Nadu / south India tour to spend an evening at the fest.

As we settle down here, we catch Kathakali dancer Probal Gupta from Bangalore on the stage . .