Posted by Shruti Jayaraman (142.58.181.84) on January 13, 2006 at 21:43:53:

 In Reply to: Absolutely honest... what more could one want? posted by Vinod II on January 13, 2006 at 19:41:29:

 Yes, I agree. Anita madam's review is something that makes me reflect on beyond just how "proficient and well-executed" a top-class performance of today ought to appear.

I specifically enjoyed reading a few points about today's "flavoured" artistes that she was frank in expressing, perhaps the reason being that I suddenly realized how most other critics fail to notice these points in the performances of these top artists of today.

The excess usage of sensuous and flashy movements in bharatanatyam has indeed become almost a growing danger to the large community of dancers in the current scene. True, that the legendary Balasaraswati amma, is known to have kept up the ancient Sadir's traditional Shringara and that her dance was flying to newer heights back in those times.

I think there are a number of differences between the sringara she brought out and the sringara now playing in the hands of some attention-seeking dancers these days (reminds one of the old tamil proverb: Kuranga Kayyil poo maalai: a flower garland in the hands of a monkey) Sorry, that wasn't meant to be rude.

Shringara vs. Bhakthi......

Different schools may have different set of rules.

But the bottom line is: Doing justice to the lyrics of a song, whether it demands Shringara or Bhakthi Rasa, is by itself Bhakthi.
(Quoted by a senior dancer and guru, whom I had a chance to ask some of my questions to).

Doing Sringara merely for the sake of bowling the audience over is not doing justice to anyone - the song, composer, audience, or the dancer herself. (Quoted by a Senior dancer and guru, whom I had a chance to ask some of my questions to).

Shruti Jayaraman
Vancouver, Canada

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