LEC DEM ON NATYA ANUBHAV- Ms. LEELA SAMSON

[CRama]

The above lec dem was held on behalf of Paalam on 8 Jan 2016 in Infosys Hall, Ramakrishna Mission School, Bazulla Road, Chennai as apart of the ANUBHAV FESTIVAL. It was later webcast in paalam tv and I have transliterated it for publishing in SAMUDRA April 2016. I reproduce the same here for the benefit of rasikas who are in the periphery of enjoying dance recitals.

While introducing the artist, Dr.Radha Bhaskar said “Ms. Leela Samson is a renowned dancer and expert choreographer, versatile performer and alumni of Kalakshetra. As a virtuoso performer and sensitive interpreter of nuances of Bharatanatyam, Ms Leela Samson has carved a niche for herself in the field of dance. She is the founder of the dance company SPANDA which attempts to create new works in Bharatanatyam. Some of her choreographies are considered really path breaking. Leela Samson has received many awards like Padma Shri (1990), the Sanskriti, Nritya Choodamani, Kalaimamani (2005) given by the Government of Tamil Nadu, and the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award (1999–2000) for contributions to Bharatanatyam. Her lec dems are much sought after by rasikas as they are presented in a structured manner perfectly balancing the science and art elements of Bharatanatyam.” After this brief introduction, the lec dem followed.

Leela Samson “Thank You, Radha Bhaskar and paalam for inviting me to make a presentation of Bharatanatyam since it is such a generic subject. When you talk about dance as an art form, I would like to say that it is a form of communication just like any other language and one can assume that it is based on two very strong pillars that hold up the edifice of Bharatanatyam- one is nritta and the other is nrityam. Nritta is made of adavus, mudras, mandalas, postures, etc, and the other is based on mukhabhinaya and expression i.e, interpretation of sahithya. Today we are going to concentrate on what became known as margam and I believe that was fashioned by the Tanjore Quartet. What we received as margam, one could say that, before the sixties, it was alarippu, sabdam, varnam and thillana. Items like kauthuvam, pushpanjali, thodaya mangalam, mallari, keerthanams, javali, bhajans, ashtapadi, abhang, thumris, kajris were not actually part of what was conceived as margam. Now you see more and more of such items, and it was Smt Rukmini Devi, who introduced keerthanams which were eulogising deities- because she wanted to introduce more dedicatory items, apart from padams and javalis. Somewhere along the way we forgot the constructed margam and hence I am grateful that you have asked me to talk on the margam in a way because the margam is almost disappearing. Many other compositions have taken over what is called the margam. You don’t see margam even in Arangetram. When I was a little girl, we have to definitely go through the margam. It is easy to discuss the entire thing, but we can’t have a conclusion. It is a personal choice. So let us explore on what was handed over to us and examine the items that make up this wonderful form called dance.

The first item is ALARIPPU. It is the best way that a dancer can begin the recital. The word alarippu must have come from the telugu word alar inpu which means to induce enthusiasm in the dancer or in the audience. Some others say alar is flower. Both the meanings do agree for this item. There is no reference material for what the word means actually. Tradition stands for following up what the Guru says and I am following what my Guru has told me. However it is only surmised that the word originated from the telugu word. The alarippu is often called invocation and many children do participate in the invocation. Possibly more appropriate to call it as dedication of the body. There is no deity that is mentioned in the alarippu. The alarippu is done to abstract mridanga syllables. Since there is no dedication to any particular deity, the only inspiration that moves the item and the propriety is - utsaha- the desire to be there- centre one self before starting a complex programme. It strives to centre the body in alignment to a sruti and this requires lot of concentration. Though it is taught as first item to children, I personally feel it could be the last item, because it is so abstract and so difficult. There is no time or space for virtuosity. This may be taken as my personal opinion. But I consider it an outstanding composition of great genius, no less stalk. It is centred so totally of the form of Bharatanatyam. It is composed of drum syllables, like tha, tei, teiuum tak, tham kidataka tham, thei etc. People do various time cycles, tisram, misram, adi talam, sankeernam- very complex, nine beats divided into half beats, etc , As far as I am concerned, tisram is still one of the most beautiful pattern that you can see and the point is simplicity and not to make it complex at the beginning of the programme. So the thing with the alarippu is that it is done by introducing the three levels of the body and Alarippu allows you to expose the three basic levels of the body- hanakam (standing posture), arai mandi or ayatham (half sitting posture) and muzhu mandi (full sitting posture). With these postures, it very gently exposes the three speeds of the tala cycle. It is warming up of the body and it can be done in all the five jaathis but normally we do in tisram in three speeds. Now I will talk about it as a dancer. Alarippu is the unfolding or flowering of the body. It is almost like a very personal exercise format. Natyarambhe is the beginning hand position. It is so traditional and beautiful posture. The dominant rasa in alarippu people say as bhakthi, but I would say as utsaha. The ragas originally used were Nata and Sankarabharanam. Nata or Saurashtram were perhaps used for their appropriateness in temples when the deity was first taken around the temples. So in the performance too it was followed. But in schools like Kalakshetra where I studied, only two swaras were used during alarippu- i.e, pa and sa or ni and sa. No ragas were used during alarippu. We will show a portion of the alarippu- how each one unfolds and the three levels, three speeds and very simple movements. We have beautiful dancers to assist me- Bhavajan Kumar (Toronto) and Sathyapriya Iyer Mohan (Chennai)- both of them right now with SPANDA. If the alarippu, looks like very complex item where you are fighting with the talam, it does not serve the purpose. It just warms up. I prefer the tisram because it has the ability to allow your mind to focus inwards. (At this point, the alarippu was demonstrated with the pancha ghana ragams being played in the flute in the background). The alarippu shown here took only 3 minutes. You need to be very much prepared to do those 3 minutes. It takes a lot out to prove and it is so with the centre of fulcrum of the body. It involves tight works and the idea of three levels allows the dancer to open up the limbs to those positions. Deivam, sabha, guru are addressed in the item and the rounded movements at the end is like dedicating the entire body to dance which was actually introduced by Smt Rukmini Devi in 1940s-50s when it was considered as a revolution.

This is followed by JATISWARAM. As the word says, it is a combination of jatis and swarams. The drum syllables called jatis in the beginning followed by an item which is made up of swaras. The jatis are very small components and almost a formality and the minimum that is essential for swara based nritta composition. No abhinaya or no suggestion of any god or any story. It is pure abstract movement and the adavus of the style- you get into simple adavus which was composed in the very early stages in Tanjore and the combination of left and right hands allows you to show the beauty of this form. No sahithya exists in jatiswaram, but the patterns of the swaras are made visual in movement. It is very beautiful. Most jatiswarams do not have pallavi and anupallavi or charanam. In the dance component one sees thattu and mei adavu which are less than the mei advau done in a thillana. (The mei advau was demonstrated). Some people have said that jatiswaram is always done when the deity is taken on procession in the outer parikrama in the temple. So it is a way of moving along with the deity- the dancer facing the deity and moving backwards. These are very minimalistic- usually done once or twice or thrice in jatiswaram. The small jati that is performed in the beginning may last only 2 or 4 avartanas. The first line of the swaras is performed 3 to 4 times in increasing no of avartanas with simple ending in different jaatis like tisram ending in a khandam or misram and the last bit will end in the mel kalam swara pattern. Some where half way through the jatiswaram, you will see that the speed doubles. The last of the korvais end with the one avartanam to two to four to eight avartanams. As for the beginning swara of each line is concerned, it starts in the lower shadjam and in the last korvai touches mel shadjam. In between they move into da ni and sa or pa, da, ni, and sa depending on the raga which is taken up. In the kuchipudi style, and other Bhagavata mela, it is more complex and integrated. So two jatiswarams might have been there at the same time- where you have a jati and swara alternating. In some keertanams and thillanas the jati and swarams are interlined in the same line. But in the jatiswaram what we have seen here, jati was done first and then swarams continued ending in a small korvai. Most of the jatiswarams are in roopaka talam and some in adi talam. (A portion of jatiswaram in Kalyani was demonstrated in which the various shades of da, ni were shown vividly). The body of the dancer was slowly opening up, different adavus executed with complete beauty and completion. Nowadays it is rare to see an adavu completed in a performance. It is like edited ad film unlike the Satyajit Ray films of the past. When both sides of the body are participating in an adavu, it is dexterous; the dancer will experience something more than just the dance. It is also the balance that you see and what the dancer feel within. But I am also part of this journey. So I am partially a victim and also a perpetrator. It is just the way life moves on and things change. We are all part of the change. But the feeling I have for the margam is something great and for people like me who have experienced the complete margam, it is sad thing that it is vanishing- just like our food habits or dialects have changed.

The next item is the SABDAM. It is a simple word. Sabdam is the introduction of sahithya, meaningful words. Here in the sabdam, you have very simple form of sollukattu tha dhana dhandhana thajonu jonujonu. It is neither a jati or a part of the meaningful word that comes in the sabdam. The sabdam is usually in Misra Chapu and the first raga is strangely always Kambodi and the meter of the sahithya is clearly made for misra time cycle. The sabdam concludes with a simple teermanam. Abhinaya is very simple and the story is very basic- simple concept. The protagonist usually Krishna, Murugan or Vinayakar. The concept of sanchari is very minimalistic -no elaborate stories- that will be in varnam or keerthanam. (A portion of a sabdam in Kambodi on Krishna was shown). It is best left to young dancers or children.
The most complex item in the format is VARNAM. It is the longest composition and for the first time in the dance programme, the world of music and dance will unite here. It is also great in terms of rigorous practice or complications within the dance formats, it is really the litmus test for any dancer. For a young girl, to learn a varnam is a long journey to assimilate and control all the parameters that the varnam entails. The thrill of scaling the performance of a varnam is incredible. Half an hour or one hour rigorous dance on the stage- to retain one’s concentration and form for this long period doing various adavus, sancharis, without losing control of the Nayika-the central character of the piece. I would give high marks to a person who maintains that sthayibhava. You should never drift from the central character. I saw many young dancers in the Dance Festival in Music Academy last week and I was greatly impressed by their sthayibhavam in varnams- very complex ones. You want to get that final flavour of varnam, but there are very many subtle elements that will contribute to that final flavour. The varnam starts with a trikala teermanam and then they will do abhinaya for the words in the pallavi. The pallavi itself almost runs the time of an alarippu. (Lalgudi Jayarman Sir’s varnam in Neelambari- The dance for first line- Sentil nagar mevum devaa Sivabala nee Sinthai irangi ennai aala vaa velavaa was shown and word by word meaning explained by Ms. Leela Samson.) The first teermanam and the first line has taken 10 minutes. Each line in the varnam is thus elaborated and is interspersed with teermanams. The chittaswaram can be done once or more times. Abhinayam is done for the chittaswara sahithyam and then we do an interesting thing called thattumettu. This can be compared to a singer playing the mridangam and singing at the same time. You do the adavus just like any other song. In thattu mettu, the lower half of the body dancing to different rhythms like tisram, chatusram, khandam, misram etc, but the top half of the body is following the rhythm of the chatusram of the Adi talam of the sahithyam and the mudra should fall exactly at the point of that sahithyam. This is as specified in the Natya sastra. A challenging piece for the dancer- the hands should show the adavus, the face should show the expression and the lower half should show the rhythmic variations. (The visual of thattumettu was most appealing.) There are pada varnams and tana varnams. In general, the angas in the varnams are pallavi, anupallavi, chittaswaram and charanam. In a tana varnam, there is no sahithyam for the chittaswaram and ettugada swarams coming in the second half. But in a pada varnam there is sahithyam for every swaras. However, there are exceptions. Tana varnams can be sung in more than one kalam. But pada varnams can be sung only in the prescribed kalam. The sampradayam is to do the swara once or thrice with korvai patterns, then to do the sahithyam for the swaram followed by the thattumettu. Pada varnam do not sound appropriate in mel kalam. They sound very good in chauka kalam. In pada varnam, the swaras are not sung for pallavi, anupallavi and charanam. All pada varnams are meant for dance. Tana varnams are mainly devotional in nature while pada varnams mainly portray sringara bhavam. In dance programmes, many times swarajatis like Huseni replace varnams. In swarajatis, instead of chittaswaram, there may be a jatiswaram- a combination of jatis and swaras. For a dancer, the varnam is the last word in her ability to grasp the entirety of the form. She is dancing to sollukattu, teermanams, swaras, sahithyam, thattumettu, combined with complete nayika bhavam. She has to be energetic and fit enough to present the varnam without sag for at least 40 minutes, if not more. The ability to shift to very good exposition of subtle body movements from a challenging rhythm exercise is a pre requisite for a successful dancer.

PADAMS AND JAVALIS. Padams and Javalis provide you scope for great amount of abhinaya. Mostly in Telugu, Tamil, Sanskrit, Kannada and Malayalam, padams are rendered from anupallavi traditionally. Nowadays some padams are started from pallavi. If the main message of the padam comes in the anupallavi portion, it is appropriate to start from anupallavi. Different singers and different dancers have divergent views on this subject. Brinda Mukta bani established the manner of singing padams, although they have not been given enough credit. It is a sampradaya that is handed over to us and it is a fact that you cannot consider any other bani as being appropriate. They have set such high standard for rendering of padams and javalis. Our dance musicians find it easy to sing a varnam or jatiswaram or keerthanam than to sing a padam. This may be the reason why the padam slowly left the concert platform since 70s-80s. I think the reasons are twofold. One -teachers avoided teaching of abhinayam for padams. Padam teaching was not easy and therefore they did not get into it, reason being it is very difficult to sing an entire padam in a class. So, if the teacher cannot sing, obviously she can not teach. Especially when you are simultaneously singing the padam and showing the abhinaya. Secondly, those who could sing padams refused to sing for dance. You have to accept all these factors for the padams slowly bowing out of the concert platform. It was after the return of Kalanidhi mami and after a few people like Sowmya started teaching the padams, padams slowly appeared in the dance platform. A beautifully rendered padam is the most enjoyable part of the programme. A padam can never be replaced by a thillana or anything else. I think we have forgotten the kalapramanam of the padams and javalis. This entails lot of controversy. But we have to take the guidance of some veterans in the field. There are javalis that should be sung slowly and there are some padams that should be done a little faster. Then who decides the appropriate kalapramanam for these pieces. If the musician drags with a young dancer, it completely falls through and while a senior dancer wants to dance leisurely and if the singer rushes through, the show gets spoiled. (At this juncture, excerpts of the javali- Era raa raa in Khamas and padam Dari joochu in Sankarabharanam were shown, Ms Samson explaining the meaning). The meaning of the piece should decide the pace.

THILLANAS in South are very similar to Taranas in North. Mainly consisting of drum syllables with very little sahithyam- may be one line. Here the mei adavus are very definite. (Here portion of the Natabhairavi thillana was shown) There are many other items like Kauthuvam, virutham keerthanam, thodaya mangalam which have been enfolded in the dance repertoire. Each has very definite character. In all the pieces, the challenge before the dancer is to bring out the musicality and express the bhavam and retain the form of dance. It is also a task for the teacher to make the students aware of the nuances of each item and retain them in the particular genre without meandering in the territories.” Ms Samson thanked Bhavajan and Sathyapriya for having given very beautiful expositions of various items of dance. This was followed by question answer session.
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[mohan]

Thanks CRama for this writeup!

[rajeshnat]

crama
Thanks for your write up.i got a lot out of it.

[rshankar]

CRama - very elaborate write-up! Thank you. Did she mention anything about teaching every piece in a different manner for each student? In the past, most of the dance masters taught the same piece in different ways to different students - these days, it appears more mass-produced - and I see it with the kalAkshEtra dancers to a large extent. Any insights into that?

[CRama]

No Sankar. She did not touch upon the subject of personalised coaching.