Performance with Sudeshna Maulik and Janaki Rangarajan

This afternoon, I had the great fortune to present my first performance for Bharatiya Sangeetha Sangam. When I first began to learn about tabla and Indian music, all the Indian music concerts in Montreal back then were organised by BSS. To be performing for them now is a big honour. The programme was organised by BSS in collaboration with Sinha Dance and Manijeh Ali's new QuebeAsia dance series. This was a dance recital featuring Bharata Natyam dancer, Dr. Janaki Rangarajan, and kathak dancer Sudeshna Maulik. Sudeshna was accompanied by Jacob Charkey on cello, and myself on tabla.

The performance opened with an invocation to Shiva by each dancer; first Janaki Rangarajan and then Sudeshna Maulik. After this, Janaki performed three Bharata Natyam pieces; her own choreographies. This was followed by Sudeshna's kathak solo, accompanied by Jacob Charkey (cello) and myself on tabla. Jake performed a short alap, followed by my short tabla uthaan in vilambit teentaal. After this, we accompanied Sudeshna through vilambit, madhya, and drut teentaal. After this, Sudeshna danced a piece relating to the festival of Holi.

For the curtain call, Janaki and Sudeshna asked Jake and I to accompany them for an impromptu dance duet. While it was certainly brief, I was very happy to at least be able to accompany Janaki and Sudeshna together for that short time. While I am certainly not an expert on Bharata Natyam, I can say that Janaki is a Bharata Natyam dancer of the highest calibre; her movements are very clear and crisp, she is very rhythmically precise, and her performance was filled with great subtleties.

Of course, you have already seen me write about Sudeshna's performances; we have been performing together quite often since our first performances together in June of this year. As always, she danced amazingly.

I would also like to write a little about QuebeAsia. There were performances held every evening, from October 22 through 24, plus the above performance today, October 25. October 22 was a presentation of dance forms of Islamic inspiration by Manijeh Ali, Amrita Choudhury, and Sudeshna Maulik. October 23 was focused on contemporary interpretations of Indian classical dance forms, with performances by Sonia Lopez (the poem Chitrangada, interpreted in Odissi dance), Sudeshna Maulik (her kathak piece, Mystical Water), and Manijeh Ali's interpretation of Janaki Rangarajan's choreography, Thandavum. Unfortunately, I missed the contemporary dance performances on October 24 by Roger Sinha, Reena Almoneda-Chang, Manijeh Ali, and Justine Ricard. All in all, a great initiative by local dancer, Manijeh Ali. I look forward to future editions of the QuebeAsia series!