Music
Music has been an essential part of Indian life since the Vedic times, and Vedic hymns are chanted at religious functions even today. Indian music comprises a wide variety of instrumental and vocal traditions, which include the classical, religious, popular, theatrical, and modern. The best known of these internationally, however, is classical music. The classical music tradition of North India is called Hindustani music while the southern school is Carnatic music.
Indian classical music is based on the raga, which is a melodic framework for improvization based on a given set of notes; and on tala (or taal), which can perhaps be best equated with time-measure or metre. Small ensembles of not more than five or six musicians generally perform together. Improvization plays a major part in the performance, the most characteristic feature of which is the gradual acceleration of tempo leading to a final climax. Apart from a variety of vocal forms, Indian music also brings into play a number of instruments: the sitar and the veena, the violin, the flute, and drums like the mridangam and the tabla are commonly used.
Folk music reflects the differences in region, religion, status, and race. While there is no clear line of demarcation between folk and classical music, the most widely accepted definition of folk music is that its authorship is not known. In the villages, music is not just a form of entertainment but is an essential element in many of the activities of daily life and plays a prominent part in most of the rituals. Religious music, in the form of baul, kirtana, and bhajan, are also an important part of daily life, not just in the villages.
A genre which has grown overwhelmingly in popularity is the music of the movies. Elaborate orchestral movements, and choral groups are a characteristic feature of such music. Towards the end of the twentieth century Indian "rap", "disco", and "pop" music created an entirely new music culture.
FOLK, CLASSICAL, AND POPULAR MUSIC
Rural areas
The wide field of musical phenomena in India ranges from the relatively simple two- or three-tone melodies of some of the hill tribes in central India to the highly refined art music heard in concert halls in the large cities. This variety reflects the heterogeneous population in terms of race, religion, language, and social status. In the villages, music is not just a form of entertainment but is an essential element in many of the activities of daily life and plays a prominent part in most of the rituals. These include life-cycle events, such as birth, initiation, marriage, and death; events of the agricultural cycle, such as planting, transplanting, harvesting, and threshing; and a variety of work songs. Much of this music could be described as functional, for it serves a utilitarian purpose; for instance, a harvest song might well give thanks to God for a bountiful harvest, but underlying this is the idea that singing this song in its traditional manner will help to ensure that the next harvest will be equally fruitful. These songs are usually sung by all of the members participating in the activity and are not sung for an audience.
In each area and even within a single area, different social groups have their own individual songs whose origins are lost in antiquity. The songs are passed on from one generation to another and, in most cases the composers are unknown. Apart from folk songs, one also hears outdoor instrumental music in villages. The music is provided by an ensemble of varying size, which usually consists basically of a shehnai in North India and nagaswaram in the South (an oboe type of instrument), and a variety of drums. These groups play at weddings, funerals, and religious processions. The musicians are professional or semiprofessional. Such ensembles are found in tribal as well as folk societies and in villages as well as in cities.
Other professional music is also found in the rural regions. Most areas are visited by religious mendicants, many of whom travel around the countryside singing devotional songs, accompanying themselves either with a one-, two-, or three-stringed lute that generally provides only a drone or with a frame (tambourine-like) drum. They carry with them a small begging bowl and maintain themselves entirely on what they receive in alms. There are also itinerant magicians, snake charmers, acrobats, and storytellers who travel in the rural areas, often providing the only entertainment available in the villages. Music is often involved in their acts, and the storyteller generally sings his tales, which may be taken from the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, or from the Puranas, the legends that describe the adventures of the incarnations of God as they rid the world of evil. Sometimes the narrative songs are concerned with historical characters and describe the wars and the heroic deeds of the regional rulers. Some storytellers specialize in generally tragic stories of romance and of lovers.
During certain religious festivals, the villages might be visited by a travelling band of players who enact some of the mythological episodes connected with the festival. Such performances are accompanied by music and may also include dances. During the festivals villagers may visit neighbourhood shrines or temples, there encountering religious mendicants singing devotional songs and perhaps watching elaborate enactments of the episodes connected with the festival. Thus, the villagers become familiar with the mythological and philosophical aspects of their religion.
In modern times, rural areas are being influenced to a greater extent by urban culture. The principal impact came through the introduction of relatively inexpensive transistorized radios, which had found their way into fairly remote villages. By the end of the twentieth century the television and its multi-channel coverage, has brought music of all ranges to the remotest home. In addition, travelling cinemas, set up quickly and easily in tents, have visited the rural areas for some years. As a result, the traditional rural forms of music and dance are in the process of change.
Classical Music
In the cities many different forms of music can be heard. Of these the best known in the West are the classical music of North India, sometimes called Hindustani music, and that of South India, or Carnatic music. Both classical systems are supported by an extensive body of literature and elaborate musical theory. Until modern times, classical music was patronized by the Princely courts and to some extent also by the wealthy noblemen. Since India gained independence in 1947, and with the abolition of the Princely kingdoms, the emphasis has shifted to the milieu of large concert halls. The concertgoer, radio, television, and the cinema are now the main patrons of the classical musicians. In recent times the growth of university music programmes, particularly involving classical music, has placed greater emphasis on music history and theory and has provided a further source of income for musicologists and musicians. The traditional system of private instruction, however, still continues to this day.
Classical music is based on two main elements, raga and tala. The word raga is derived from a Sanskrit root meaning "to colour", the underlying idea being that certain melodic shapes, involving specific intervals of the scale, produce a continuity of emotional experience and "colour" the mind. Since neither the melodic shapes nor their sequence are fixed precisely, a raga serves as a basis for composition and improvization. While a raga is primarily a musical concept, specific ragas have acquired, particularly in North Indian music, a number of extra musical elements and are associated with particular periods of the day, seasons of the year, colours, deities, and specific moods.
The second element of Indian music, tala, is best described as time measure and has two main constituents; the duration of the time measure in terms of time units that vary according to the tempo chosen; and the distribution of stress within the time measure. Tala, like raga, serves as a basis for composition and improvisation.
Indian classical music is generally performed by small ensembles of not more than five or six musicians. Improvization plays a major part in a performance, and great emphasis is placed on the creativity and sensitivity of the soloist. A performance of a raga usually goes through well-defined stages, beginning with an alapa (improvised melodic prelude) that is followed by a composed piece set in a particular time measure. The composition is generally quite short and serves as a frame of reference to which the soloist returns at the conclusion of his improvisation. There is no set duration for the performance of a raga. A characteristic feature of North Indian classical music is the gradual acceleration of tempo, which leads to a final climax.
Non-classical music of the cities
Classical music interests only a small proportion of the people, even in the cities. Since about the 1930s a new genre, associated with the cinema, achieved extraordinary popularity. Most Indian films are very much like Western musicals and generally include six or more songs. Film music derives its inspiration from a number of sources, both Indian and Western; classical, folk, and devotional music are the main Indian sources, while Western influence is seen most obviously in the use of large orchestras that employ both Western and Indian instruments. The influence of Western popular music, too, is very evident. In spite of the eclectic nature of Indian film music, most of the songs maintain an Indian feeling that arises largely from the vocal technique of the singers and the ornamentation of the melody line.
Aside from classical and film music, there are several other forms of urban music, some of which closely resemble the music of the rural areas. In city streets one is likely to encounter an outdoor announcing a wedding or a funeral. Street musicians, religious mendicants, snake charmers, storytellers, and magicians perform at every available opportunity, and work songs are sung by construction workers and other labourers. In private homes still other forms of music are performed, ranging from religious chanting to traditional folk and devotional songs. In public places of entertainment, the listener may encounter, apart from classical and film music, theatrical music from one of the relatively modern forms of regional theatre; and in the lowbrow places of entertainment courtesans still sing and dance in traditional fashion. In the larger cities there are performances of Western chamber music and occasionally symphony concerts, as well as popular dance music, rock, and jazz in the night clubs.
VEDIC CHANT
Compilation of hymns
An important aspect of ancient religious life was the bard-priest who composed hymns in praise of gods, to be sung or chanted at sacrifices. By about 1000 BC this body of chanted poetry had grown, and the best of the poems were formed into an anthology called Rigveda, which was then canonized. It was not committed to writing, but text and chanting formula were carefully handed down by word of mouth from one generation to the next, up to the present period. The poems in the Rigveda are arranged according to the priestly families who used and, presumably, had composed the hymns. Shortly after this the Yajurveda, the Samaveda, and the Atharvaveda were created. Each of these Vedas has several ancillary texts, called the Brahmanas, Aranyakas, and Upanishads, which are also regarded as part of the Vedas. In order to ensure the purity of the Vedas, the slightest change was forbidden. Underlying this was the belief that the correct recitation of the Vedas was "the pivot of the universe" and that the slightest mistake would have disastrous cosmic consequence unless expiated by sacrifice and prayer. The Vedas are still chanted by Brahmin priests at occasions such as weddings, initiations, and funerals, besides the daily devotions of the priests.
Chant intonation
In the most common style of Rigvedic and Yajurvedic chanting found today, that of the Tamil Aiyar Brahmins, it is clear that the accent is differentiated in terms of pitch. This chanting is based on three tones; the udatta and the nonaccented syllables (called prachaya) are recited at a middle tone, the preceding anudatta syllable at a low tone, and the following svarita syllable either at the high tone (when the syllable is short) or as a combination of middle tone and high tone. In this style of chanting the duration of the tones is also relative to the length of the syllables, the short syllables generally being half the duration of the long.
The more musical chanting of the Samaveda employs five, six, or seven tones and is said to be the source of the later secular and classical music. The chants are entirely unaccompanied by instruments, and this may account for some of the extreme variation of intonation.
The changes brought by the twentieth century have weakened the traditional prominent position of the Vedic chant. The Atharvaveda is seldom heard in India now. Samavedic chant, associated primarily with the large public sacrifices, also appears to be dying out. Even the Rigveda and Yajurveda are virtually extinct in some places, and South India is now the main stronghold of Vedic chant.
RHYTHMIC ORGANIZATION
South India
Just as the system of classifying raga is better organized in South Indian music, so too is the system of classifying tala, or time measure. The main group is composed of 35 talas, called the suladi-talas. Each tala is composed of one, two, or three different units: short, medium, and long. Each tala may be performed in either slow, medium, or quick tempo; there is no gradual acceleration as in North Indian music.
North India
In North Indian music the talas are fewer and not organized in any systematic manner. As in South Indian music, the two main factors are the duration of the time cycle and the subdivisions within the cycle. Each of these subdivisions is marked by a clap or a wave, with the greatest emphasis falling on beat 1 of the cycle, which is called sam. North Indian talas have a further feature, the khali ("empty"), a conscious negation of stress occurring at one or more points in each tala where one would expect a beat. It often falls at the halfway point in the time cycle and is marked by a wave of the hand. There is nothing comparable to the khali in the South Indian system. A further distinguishing feature found only in North Indian talas is the emphasis placed on the characteristic drum pattern of each tala, called theka. Two talas might have the same duration and subdivisions but might, nevertheless, be differentiated from each other by different characteristic drum patterns.
MUSICAL FORMS AND INSTRUMENTS
South India
Both raga and tala provide bases for composition and improvization in Indian classical music. A performance usually begins with an improvised section, called alapa, played in free time without accompaniment of drums. It may have various sections and might on occasion last half an hour or longer. It is followed by a composed piece in the same raga, set in a particular tala. In South Indian music all composed pieces are primarily for the voice and have lyrics. In North India, however, there are also some purely instrumental compositions, called gat and dhun. The emphasis on the composition varies in the different forms of song and, to some extent, in the interpretation of the performer. In South Indian music the composed piece is generally emphasized more than in the North. Much of the South Indian repertoire of compositions stems from three composers, Tyagaraja, Muthuswami Dikshitar, and Shyama Shastri, contemporaries who lived in the second half of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries. The devotional songs that they composed, called kriti, are a delicate blend of text, melody, and rhythm and are the most popular items of a South Indian concert. The composed elements in these songs sometimes include sections such as niraval, melodic variations with the same text, and svara-kalpana, passages using the Indian equivalent of the sol-fa syllables, which are otherwise improvised.
The longest item in the South Indian concert, called ragam-tanam-pallavi, is, on the other hand, mostly improvised. It begins with a long alapa, called ragam in this context, presumably because this elaborate, gradually developing alapa is intended to display the raga being performed in as complete a manner as possible, without the limitations imposed by a fixed time measure. This is followed by another improvised section, tanam, in which the singer uses meaningless words to produce more or less regular rhythms, but still without reference to time measure. This section, too, is without drum accompaniment. The final section, pallavi, is a composition of words and melody set in a particular tala, usually a long or complex one. The pallavi may have been composed by the performer himself and be unfamiliar to his accompanists, usually a violinist who echoes the singer's phrases and a drummer who plays the mridangam, a double-ended drum. The statement of the composition is followed by elaborate rhythmic and melodic variations that the accompanists are expected to follow. It is customary to have a drum solo at the end of the pallavi, and the performance concludes with a brief restatement of the pallavi.
Other forms used in South Indian classical music derive largely from the musical repertoire of bharatanatyam, the classical South Indian dance. The varnam, a completely composed piece, serves mainly as a warming up and is performed at the beginning of a concert. Padam and javali are two kinds of love songs using the poetic imagery characteristic of the romantic-devotional movement mentioned earlier. Tillana has a text composed mostly of meaningless syllables, which may include the onomatopoeic syllables used to represent the different drum sounds. This is a very rhythmic piece and is usually sung in fast tempo.
The ensemble used in present-day South Indian classical music consists of a singer or a main melody instrument, a secondary melody instrument, one or more rhythmic percussion instruments, and one or more drone instruments. The most commonly heard main melody instruments are the veena, a long-necked, fretted, plucked lute with seven strings; the venu, a side-blown bamboo flute; the nagaswaram, a long, oboe-like, double-reed instrument with finger holes; the violin, imported from the West about 200 years ago, played while seated on the floor with the scroll resting on the player's left foot; and the gottuvadyam, a long-necked lute without frets, played like the Hawaiian guitar, with a sliding stop in the left hand.
The violin is by far the most common secondary melody instrument in South India. It plays in unison where the passage is composed but imitates the voice or main melody instrument in the improvised passages. Of the rhythm instruments, the mridangam, a double-conical, two-headed drum, is the most common. Others include the kanjira, a tambourine; the ghatam, an earthenware pot without skin covering; the morsing, a metallic jew's harp; and the tavil, a slightly barrel-shaped, double-ended drum, which accompanies the nagaswaram. The most prominent drone instrument is the four-stringed tanpura (tamboura), a long-necked lute without frets. It accompanies the voice and all melody instruments, except the nagaswaram, which is usually accompanied by the ottu, a longer version of the nagaswaram but without finger holes. A hand-pumped harmonium drone, called shruti or shruti box, sometimes replaces the ottu or the tanpura.
North India
The most common vocal form in North Indian classical music at the present time is the khayal, a Muslim word meaning "imagination." The khayal is contrasted with the dhruvapada (now known as dhrupad), which means "fixed words". The two forms existed side by side in the Islamic period, and it is only in the last century or two that khayal has achieved ascendancy. There are two types of khayal. The first is sung in extremely slow tempo, with each syllable of the text having extensive melisma (prolongation of a syllable over many notes), so that the words are virtually unrecognizable. It is not usually preceded by a lengthy alapa; instead, alapa-like phrases are generally sung against the very slow time measure to the accompaniment of the drums. Also characteristic of the khayal are the sargam tanas, passages using the Indian equivalent of the sol-fa syllables, and the a-kar tanas, which are rapid runs sung to the syllable aah. The second type of khayal, which may be as much as eight times faster than the slow and is generally set in a different tala, follows the slow. Its composed portion is usually quite short, and the main features of the improvisation are the a-kar tanas. Occasionally, a composition called tarana, made up of meaningless syllables, may replace the fast-tempo khayal.
The thumri is another North Indian vocal form and is based on the romantic-devotional literature inspired by the bhakti movement. The text is usually derived from the Radha-Krishna theme and is of primary importance. The words are strictly adhered to, and the singer attempts to interpret them with his melodic improvisations. It is quite usual for a singer to deviate momentarily from the raga in which the composition is set, by using accidentals and evoking other ragas that might be suggested by the words, but he always returns to the original raga.
Some of the North Indian musical forms are very like the South Indian. The vocal forms dhrupad and dhamar resemble the ragam-tanam-pallavi.
Instrumental music has gained considerable prominence in North India in recent times. The most common instrumental form is the gat, which seems to have derived its elements from both dhrupad and khayal. It is usually preceded by alapa and jor, which resemble the alapa and non-tom sections of the dhrupad. On plucked stringed instruments these two movements are often followed by jhala, a fast section in which the rhythmic plucking of the drone strings is used to achieve a climax. The performer usually pauses before the composed gat is introduced. Like the khayal, the gat can be in slow or fast tempo. The composition is generally short, and the emphasis is on the improvisations of the melody instrumentalist and the drummer, who for the most part alternate in their extemporizing. The final climax may once again be achieved by a jhala section, in which the tempo is accelerated quite considerably. Other forms played on instruments are the thumri, basically an instrumental rendering of a vocal thumri, and dhun, which is derived from a folk tune and does not usually follow a conventional raga. One may also hear a piece called raga-mala (literally, "a garland of ragas"), in which the musician modulates from one raga to another, finally concluding with a return to the original raga.
The most prominent melody instruments used in North Indian classical music are the sitar, a long-necked fretted lute; surbahar, a larger version of the sitar; the sarod, a plucked lute without frets and a shorter neck than that of the sitar; the sarangi, a short-necked bowed lute; the bansuri, a side-blown bamboo flute with six or seven finger holes; the shehnai, a double-reed wind instrument similar to the oboe, but without keys; and the violin, played in the same manner as in South India. Secondary melody instruments are used only in vocal music, the two most common being the sarangi and the keyboard harmonium, an import from the West. The violin and the surmandal, a plucked board zither, are also used in this context. In recent times, instrumental duets, in which the musicians improvise alternately, have grown in popularity. In these duets the musicians may imitate each other's phrases, temporarily creating something of the effect of a secondary melody instrument.
As with South Indian music, the drone is usually provided by a tanpura or a hand-pumped reed drone similar to the harmonium but without a keyboard, called sur-peti in North India. The shehnai is usually accompanied by one or more drone shehnais, called sur.
The rhythmic accompaniment is usually provided on the tabla, a pair of small drums played with the fingers. As accompaniment to the somewhat archaic dhrupad, however, the pakhavaj, a double-conical drum, similar to the South Indian mridangam, is generally used. The shehnai in classical music is usually accompanied by a small pair of kettledrums, called dukar-tikar.
INTERACTION WITH WESTERN MUSIC
It is in the sphere of musical instruments that the influence of Western music is most obvious. In addition to the violin and the harmonium, many other Western instruments are occasionally used.
Apart from the area of musical instruments, Indian music appears to have absorbed very little of Western music. Western technology has, on the other hand, had a profound influence on Indian music. Sound-amplification devices have made concerts available to large audiences, and the intimate atmosphere in which the music was traditionally performed is now seldom encountered. The Indian musician has been obliged to adapt his music, once played before a select and musically educated group of listeners, to new circumstances involving a mass of people, many of whom are unable to appreciate the finer points of the music. The use of microphones during concerts has had a marked effect on voice production, and, since the voice no longer needs to project over distances, many modern singers now sing with a relaxed throat and produce a more mellow tone.
Since the mid-1950s, Indian classical music has been performed fairly regularly in the West. Initially, the audiences were composed mainly of South Asians, but gradually an increasing number of Westerners have been attending the concerts. Perhaps the music would not have reached beyond a very limited audience were it not for the interest shown by the American violinist Yehudi Menuhin, who sponsored a number of programmes in the West, and the British popular-music group the Beatles, who attempted to incorporate the sound of the sitar and other elements of Indian culture into the world of Western popular music. At the same time, several North Indian instrumentalists, such as Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan, Vilayat Khan, Imrat Khan, and Nikhil Banerjee, were received with overwhelming enthusiasm by Western audiences. By the end of the 1960s the sitar and tabla were heard frequently in Western pop music, jazz, cinema, and television programs, as well as in radio and television advertisements.
The trends in the latter part of the twentieth century were towards fusion, and an amalgam of the east and west. The emergence of pop, rap, and disco music gained immense popularity. The trend towards was not merely with fusion of the west and the east, but also with classical and popular music.
Qawwali
The classic Pakistani Qawwali music in its present form goes back to the 12th century, and the poet as well as composer Amir. But the qawwali music is perhaps even older. Qawwali, a sufi and religious music is closely connected to Islam. It is classic, but not in western meaning of the word. It is strictly built up in different stages. All with verse and chorus. The first stages activate the links with the living spiritual guides, the next with the departed saints and at last with God (Allah). It is believed that khayal form of music also originated from the qawwali style of singing.
Folk Music
The true rhythm of India lies in its folk music - the music of the masses. The extreme cultural diversity creates endless varieties of folk styles. Every event of life has a unique folk song associated with it - then be it festivals, advent of the new season, birth of a child, or day-to-day affairs like teasing one's loved one, admiring nature, etc. Music is an indispensable component of functions such as weddings, engagements, and births. There is a surfeit of songs for such occasions. The Indian folk music has today reached out to touch the hearts of masses across the globe with its melodious rhythm and endless energy.
Ghazal
Ghazal has its roots in classical Arabic poetry. Ghazal is an Arabic word which literally means talking to women. It grew from the Persian qasida, which verse form had come to Iran from Arabia around the 10th century A.D. The qasida was a eulogy written in praise of the emperor or his noblemen. The part of the qasida called tashbib got detached and developed in due course of time into the Ghazal. India has produced some of the exceptional talents in the field of ghazal singing like Begum Akhtar, Jagjit Singh, Pankaj Udhas etc.
Classical Music
The two fundamental elements of Hindustani classical music are raag and taal. Hindustani music is the music of North India, involving both Hindu and Muslim musicians. It is intimately associated with the north-Indian temple rituals and traces back its existence in the Shastras or ancient treaties in Sanskrit. The different forms of Hindustani music are - Dhrupad, Dhamar, Khayal, Tappa and Thumri.
Indian Musical Instruments
Sitar
Probably the most popular string instrument from India is the sitar. String instruments have gained popularity because strings are considered to be the best accompaniment to singing, a prime element of Indian music.
Sarod
Sarod is another popular stringed instrument. The body is carved from a single piece of well-seasoned teakwood and the belly covered with goat skin. There are four main strings, six rhythm and drone strings and fifteen sympathetic strings, all made of metal. These are played by striking with a plectrum made of a coconut shell.
Sarangi
The name derives from Sau Rangi meaning 100 colours. It has three to four main playing strings and about a dozen sympathetic strings. The instrument has no frets or fingerboard; the strings float in the air.
Esraj
Esraj is a combination between saringda and sitar. The base of the instrument is like saringda while the neck and strings are like sitar. It gives a sound very much like sarangi without being as difficult to play. It is quite popular in West Bengal.
Tanpura
It has four strings tuned to the tonic. The tanpura is known for its very rich sound. There are three main styles; the Miraj style, the Tanjore style and the small instrumental version sometimes called tamburi.
Santoor
Santoor is a North Indian instrument originating from Kashmir. It has more than a hundred strings which run across a hollow rectangular box and the strings are struck by a pair of slim carved walnut mallets.
Vichitra Veena
The Vichitra Veena is a stringed instrument like the rudra vina except it has no frets. It is played with a slide like a Hawaiian guitar.
Violin
Violin was introduced to India about 300 years ago and is a very important string instrument in the South of India. It is played in a sitting position and is held between the right foot and the left shoulder.
Tabla
Tabla is a pair of drums. It consists of a small right hand drum called dayan and a larger metal one called bayan. The function of the black spots on each of the playing surfaces is to create the bell-like timbre that is characteristic of the instrument.
Pakhawaj
Pakhawaj is essentially a north Indian version of the mridangam and is the most common north Indian representative of the class of barrel shaped drums known as mridang. During the last few generations tabla has usurped its position of importance.
Mridangam
Bears a strong superficial resemblance to pakhawaj but there are major differences in construction and technique. It is the most used drum in South Indian music.
Jal Tarang
This instrument is a set of china bowls that are filled with water. Each bowl is struck with a light wooden mallet to cause it to ring. Jal tarang is not very common and is normally found in the accompaniment of Kathak dancers.
Dholak
Very popular folk drum of northern India. It is barrel shaped with a simple membrane on the right hand side.
Pung
This is a long bodied drum with both ends covered in skin and plays an important role in Manipuri dancing when it is played by men and women, either in a sitting position or standing position.
Flute
Flute is found in every part of India, carved from bamboo it is made in every possible size.
Shehnai
A double reeded wind instrument with a widening tube towards the lower end. There are eight or nine holes, the upper seven for playing and the lower ones fortuning. The Shehnai is considered auspicious and is played on all festive occasions in India.
Indian Dances
India has a rich and varied tradition that goes back to prehistoric and proto-historic times. Evidence of this is available from artifacts recovered from sites of Indus Valley Civilization excavations, cave paintings, and from the Vedas, the Upanishads, and the epics. Dance as a social activity has been associated with all the significant moments of the life cycle, from folk dances that celebrate festivals, to the classical dance forms. Dance is also an integral, often indispensable, element in India's vast motion-picture industry.
The classical tradition is at least 2,000 years old and, in the course of history its influence has diffused throughout much of Southeast Asia. India evolved a type of classical dance-drama that combines movement, gesture, singing, music, and costumes. The participants in these dance-drama ballets use stylized gestures that are both highly symbolic and emotionally suggestive. The stories that are traditionally enacted are based on Hindu religion and mythology. The classical dance forms are bharatanatyam, kathak, kathakali, and odissi. Since independence, kuchipudi and mohiniattam have also been considered part of classical dance.
By the early decades of the twentieth century, and especially after independence, the revival of traditional dance forms was seen as an expression of national pride. This greatly helped in the development of Indian dance. Dance in India can be organized into three categories: classical, folk, and modern or contemporary. Classical dance forms are among the best-preserved and oldest practised in the twentieth century. The royal courts, the temples, and the guru-to-pupil teaching tradition have kept this art alive and unchanged. Folk dancing has survived in rural areas as an expression of the daily work and rituals of village communities. Modern Indian dance, a product of the twentieth century, is a creative mixture of the first two forms, with freely improvised movements and rhythms to express the new themes and impulses of contemporary India.
The present-day popularity of dance in India can be judged from the fact that there is hardly any Indian motion picture that does not have half a dozen dances in it. In the typical "boy meets girl" film the hero and heroine dance everywhere and anywhere. A film company may not necessarily have a scriptwriter, but it must have a dance director. To provide ample dance opportunities, motion pictures have been made on the lives of poets, courtesans, and temple dancers and on mythological themes. For these the services of expert dancers are sought.
In the twentieth century, classical dance left the temples and royal courts and is now presented regularly on the stage in large cities. Rich industrialists, international hotels, and the wealthy families of the upper class are the chief patrons. It is not uncommon to have a classical dance recital by a major performer at a business dinner or for the annual function of a club. Some universities have dance as a regular subject in their curricula. Folk dancing has also become more common as a contemporary cultural event in the cities. Most colleges have their folk-dance troupes, and even the police of Punjab State in India have their folk-dance groups to perform the bhangra. Folk dance, cut off from its rural settings, has lost much of its original vigour and beauty, but that is the inevitable result when regional cultures are cross-fertilized by artistic exchanges between states.
INDIAN CLASSICAL DANCE
The Dance-Drama
India has evolved, through its classical and folk traditions, a type of dance-drama that is a form of total theatre. The actor dances out the story through a complex gestural language, a form that, in its universal appeal, cuts across the language barriers of the subcontinent. Some of the classical dance-drama forms (such as kathakali, kuchipudi, and bhagavatha mela) enact well-known stories derived from Hindu mythology. The twentieth-century dancers Uday Shankar and Shanti Bardhan created ballets that are inspired by such traditional dance-dramas. Contemporary Indian directors and writers are re-examining traditional dance forms and are using these in their current works for greater psychological appeal and deeper artistic impact. Millions of people in the villages of India are still entertained by traditional dance-dramas from folk heritage. In spite of the popularity of straight prose plays among urban audiences, the appeal of dance-drama is unquestionably deeper and more satisfying to the rural Indian, whose aesthetics are still rooted in tradition.
The chief source of classical dance is Bharata Muni's Natya-Shastra (first century BC to first century AD), a comprehensive treatise on the origin and function of natya (dramatic art that is also dance), detailing its various aspects such as the types of plays, gesture language, acting, miming, theatre architecture, production, make-up, costumes, masks, and various bhavas ("emotions") and rasas ("sentiments"). No other book of ancient times contains such an exhaustive study of dramaturgy.
Techniques and types of classical dance
According to the Natya-Shastra, the dancer-actor communicates the meaning of a play through four kinds of abhinaya (histrionic representations): angika, or conveying emotion through the stylized movements of parts of the body; vachika, or speech, song, pitch of vowels, and intonation; aharya, or costumes and makeup; and sattvika, the entire psychological resources of the dancer-actor.
The actor is equipped with a complicated repertoire of stylized gestures. Conventionalized movements are prescribed for every part of the body, the eyes and hands being the most important. There are 13 movements for the head, 7 for the eyebrows, 6 for the nose, 6 for the cheeks, 7 for the chin, 9 for the neck, 5 for the breasts, and 36 for the eyes. There are 32 movements for the feet, 16 on the ground and 16 in the air. Various actions of the feet (such as strutting, mincing, tromping, splaying, and beating) are carefully worked out.
There are 24 single-hand gestures (asamyuta-hasta) and 13 involving both hands (samyuta-hasta). One gesture (hasta) may mean more than 30 different things quite unrelated to each other. The pataka gesture of the hand, for example, in which all the fingers are extended and held close together with the thumb bent, can represent heat, rain, a crowd of men, the night, a forest, a horse, or a flight of birds. The pataka hand with the third finger bent (tripataka) can signify a crown, a tree, marriage, fire, a door, or a king. In karkata ("crab"), a gesture using both hands, the fingers of the hands are interlocked to indicate a honeycomb, a sleepy yawn, or a conch shell. Of course, for each of these different meanings, a hasta is given a different body posture or action.
The male or female classical dancer enacting a story in a solo performance simultaneously plays two or three principal characters by alternating facial expressions, gestures, and moods. For example, the roles of Lord Krishna, his jealous wife Satyabhama, and his gentle wife Rukmini, may be essayed by one person.
The aesthetic pleasure of Hindu dance and theatre is determined by how successful the artist is in expressing a particular emotion (bhava) and evoking the rasa. Literally rasa means "taste", or "flavour", and is that exalted sentiment or mood which the spectator experiences after witnessing a performance. The critics of Hindu drama do not generally concern themselves so much with plot construction or the technical perfection of a poem or play as with the rasa of a particular work. There are nine rasas: erotic, comic, pathetic, furious, heroic, terrible, odious, marvellous, and spiritually peaceful. There are nine corresponding bhavas: love, laughter, pathos, anger, energy, fear, disgust, wonder, and quietude.
Four distinct schools of classical Indian dance -- bharatanatyam, kathak, kathakali, and manipuri -- exist today, along with two types of temperament -- tanava, representing the fearful male energy of Shiva, and lasya, representing the lyrical grace of Shiva's wife Parvati. Bharatanatyam, which takes its name from Bharata's Natya-Shastra, has the lasya character, and its home is Tamil Nadu State, in South India. Kathakali is a pantomimic dance-drama in the tanava mood, with towering headgear and elaborate facial makeup, that originated in Kerala. Kathak is a mixture of lasya and tanava characterized by intricate footwork and a mathematical precision of rhythmic patterns; it flourishes in the north. Manipuri, with its swaying and gliding movements, has lasya characteristics, and it has been preserved in Manipur State in the Assam Hills. In 1958 the Sangeet Natak Akademi (National Academy of Music, Dance and Drama) in New Delhi bestowed classical status on two other schools of dance -- kuchipudi, from Andhra Pradesh, and odissi, from Orissa. These two styles overlap the bharatanatyam school and therefore are not as distinctly different in temperament and style as other forms.
Bharatanatyam
Bharata Natyam, (Sanskrit: "Bharata's dancing"), also spelt bharata-natya, originating in Tamil Nadu, has movements of pure rhythm, rendering a story dramatically in different moods. It is indigenous to the State of Tamil Nadu, and its techniques and terminology have been traced back to ancient treatises such as the Natya-shastra, written by the Brahmin sage and priest Bharata some time before the third century. For a long time, Bharat Natyam was performed only in temples by dancers in service of the temple, the devadasis. The dancers must learn the language of gestures, mudras - so as to express feelings, movements and characters in the stories which she narrates through dance. Bharatanatyam expresses Hindu religious themes and was originally performed exclusively by female temple dancers; public performances of the dance did not begin until about 1930.
A bharatanatyam programme usually lasts two hours without interruption, and includes a specific list of performances, all performed by one dancer. The accompanying orchestra - comprising drums, drone, and singer - occupies the back of the stage, led by the dancer’s guru.
In pure style, bharatanatyam is classically clear in technique. The feet beat out complicated counter rhythms; the legs are bent in a characteristic low squat; and arms, neck, and shoulders are part of the movement. In the pantomime sections, the hands tell the story through a conventional gestural language (mudra), while the face expresses the mood. In pure dance, the hands are restricted to 11 symbolic gestures.
Kathak
The Kathak dance form originated in the northern India. The influence of the Mughal tradition is evident in this dance form, and it has a distinct Hindu-Muslim texture. The word Kathak, derived from 'Katha', literally means storyteller. Kathak demands very intricate footwork and precise rhythmic patterns and is danced by both men and women. The dance takes its movements from life, stylizes them, and adds the complex rhythmic patterns; there is a mathematical precision in doubling and quadrupling the beat with quick transfers and shifts. Kathak is steeped in the Radha-Krishna love lore, and the basic dance posture and some of the steps can be traced to the raslila.
Kathak has an exciting and entertaining quality with intricate footwork and rapid pirouettes being the dominant and most endearing features of this style. The costumes and themes of these dances are often similar to those in Mughal miniature paintings. Beats are called matras and the footwork tatkar. Important elements of kathak are chakkars, torahs, and tihais. Chakkar denotes whirling with great speed and stopping for a fraction of time after each whirl within the prescribed beat while at the same time maintaining the beauty of the form. Torah is a composition consisting of rhythmic syllables. Tihai is the repetition of a phrase of rhythmic syllables used to adorn the concluding part of a torah. There are two styles of kathak: the Jaipur gharana and the Lucknow gharana. While the Jaipur gharana specializes in the brilliance of footwork, the Lucknow gharana excels in bhava. Today, the maestros of this dance form include Pandit Birju Maharaj, Uma Sharma, and Shovana Narayan.
Kathakali
Kathakali, a well-developed dance-drama of Kerala is a performance where the actors depict characters from the epics Ramayana and Mahabharata and from the Puranas (ancient scriptures). The dancers adorn themselves in huge skirts and headdress, wearing a most intricate style of make-up. Kathakali draws heavily from drama and is danced with elaborate masks and costumes. Like Bharatanatyam, Kathakali also needed a resurrection in the 1930s. The great poet Vallathol rediscovered Kathakali, establishing the Kerala Kalamandalam in 1932 which lent a new dimension to the art-form in South India.
Manipuri
Protected for years in a valley of exceeding beauty, Manipuri is the art expression of every man, woman and child of Manipur which is characterized by a variety of forms that are linked to folk tradition and ritual. The musical forms of that culture reflect the worship of Vishnu. It is around episodes from his life that the faith of the people is entwined. During the dance interpretations a narrator may chant dialogue and descriptive action, interspersed with choral singing. Manipuri is not aggressive but smooth and graceful and technically easier, although more limited, than the other classical styles.
As with other Indian dances, the dancers wear bells on their ankles; but the movement of the dance does not accentuate them, the steps being light and close to the floor. Women wear a large, stiff skirt decorated with round mirror pieces, and a shimmering gauze veil. The hair is adorned with flowers, and their cheeks and forehead are dotted with sandalwood paste. Known for its femininity, manipuri is marked by a slow, swaying and swirling rhythm. The dancer, with her hips thrust back and head tilted on one side, turns and sways and glides. The mask-like immobility of her face is in sharp contrast with other schools of dance, in which the face and eyes are a major source of expression.
The manipuri drummer, his torso naked except for a white dhoti with a red border tucked above his knees, dances while he plays on the drum. His energetic and electric movements are a masculine counterpart to the slow, undulating patterns woven by the female dancer. The sanskirtan and the rass are revered musical traditions enacted appropriately at different times of the year by the community as a whole.
Chief twentieth-century exponents of manipuri include Atomba Singh, who preserved the tradition of ras dancing, and Amubi Singh. Manipuri was popularized throughout India when, in 1917, the poet Rabindranath Tagore saw demonstrations of the art and brought back dance teachers to serve in his Vishva-Bharati University at Shantiniketan in West Bengal.
Kuchipudi
Kuchipudi is one of the main classical dance styles of India. It originated in the seventeenth century in the village of the same name (Andhra Pradesh State), with the creation by Sidhyendra Yogi of the dance-drama Bhama Kalapam, the story of Satyabhama, the charming but jealous wife of Lord Krishna.
Sidhyendra Yogi taught the art to Brahmin boys of Kuchipudi and gave a performance with them in 1675 for the nawab of Golconda, who was so pleased that he granted the village Kuchipudi to the Brahmin Bhavathas for the preservation of this art. As an offering to Krishna, even now, every Brahmin of the village of Kuchipudi is expected to perform the role of Satyabhama at least once in his life.
What differentiates kuchipudi from the other five classical dances is that here the dancer often sings and speaks dialogue in addition to the accompanying music which is characteristic of all Indian dance forms. All roles are traditionally played by men (but in recent times by women also). A kuchipudi recital begins with the sprinkling of holy water and the burning of incense. Indra-dhvaja (the flagstaff of the god Indra) is planted on the stage to guard the performance against outside interference. Women sing and dance with worship lamps, followed by the worship of Ganesha, the elephant god, who is traditionally petitioned for success before all enterprises. The bhagavatha (stage manager-singer) sings invocations to Sarasvati, Lakshmi, and Parashakti, the goddesses of learning, wealth, and energy respectively.
Two men hold up the traditional coloured curtain. A long gold-embroidered braid is hung on the curtain as a challenge to anyone among the spectators who dares to act and dance. If anyone should take up this braid, the dancer playing the female character Satyabhama will cut off "her" hair. The principal characters are introduced from behind the curtain after each one has done a brisk dance, and at that time the bhagavatha sings out the background and function of each. Well-known kuchipudi dancers are Vedantam Satyanarayana, Yamini Krishnamurthy, and Raja and Radha Reddy.
Odissi
The ambience of Orissa, the philosophy of Lord Jagannath and the sculpture of the 13th century Sun Temple of Konark, are reflected in its dance form – Odissi, also spelt orissi. It originated and was initially developed in the temples and later flourished in the courts as well. Perhaps the most lyrical style of dance in India, Odissi follows unique body norms; the iconography of a whole culture is echoed in its structure. The tribhanga, a three-bend posture, interlinking a people’s philosophy with the physical, is a series of triangles which are not only physically difficult to execute, but which also call for immense restraint and finesse on the part of the artist. Many of the 108 basic dance units (karanas) mentioned in the Natya-Shastra can be found only in odissi, and the numerous postures of the style reflect specific moods and adorn the carved panels of the Konark Sun Temple.
Odissi, related to bharatanatyam in its basic pattern, emphasizes sinuous postures and is enlivened by a variety of elevations and jumps. It is predominantly a dance for women. Kelucharan Mahapatra and Indrani Rehman are two of the principal figures associated with odissi.
Other classical dance forms
Among other classical or semi-classical dance forms are bhagavatha mela, mohiniattam, and kuravanchi. The bhagavatha mela performed at the annual Narasimha Jayanti festival in Melatur village in Tamil Nadu uses classical gesture language with densely textured Carnatic music. Its vocabulary was enriched by the musician-poet Venkatarama Sastri (1759-1847), who composed important dance-dramas in the Telugu language. Mohiniattam is based on the legend of the mythological seductress of Hindu lore, Mohini, who tempted Shiva. It is patterned on bharatanatyam with elements of kathakali and uses Malayalam songs with Carnatic music. Kuravanchi is a dance-drama of lyrical beauty prevalent in Tamil Nadu. It is performed by four to eight women, with a gypsy fortune-teller as initiator of the story of a lady pining for her lover. Formally, it is a mixture of the folk and classical types of Indian dance.
Mohiniattam
Mohiniattam, the female semi-classical dance form of Kerala is said to be older than Kathakali. Literally, the dance of the enchantress, Mohiniyattam was mainly performed in the temple precincts of Kerala. It is also the heir to Devadasi dance heritage like Bharata Natyam, Kuchipudi and Odissi. The word 'Mohini' means a maiden who exerts desire or steals the heart of the onlooker. There is a well known story of Lord Vishnu taking on the guise of a 'Mohini' to enthrall people, both in connection with the churning of the milk ocean and with the episode of slaying of Bhasmasura. Thus it is thought that Vaishnava devotees gave the name of Mohiniyattam to this dance form.
FOLK DANCE
Indian folk dances have an inexhaustible variety of forms and rhythms. They differ according to region, occupation, and caste. The half-naked Adivasis (aboriginal tribes) of central and eastern India (Murias, Bhils, Gonds, Juangs, and Santals) are the most uninhibited in their dancing. There is hardly a national fair or festival where these dances are not performed. The most impressive occasion occurs every year on January 26, Indian Republic Day, when dancers from all parts of India come to New Delhi to dance in the vast arena of the National Stadium and along an 8-km parade route.
It is difficult to categorize Indian folk dances, but generally they fall into four groups: social (concerned with such labours as tilling, sowing, fishing, and hunting), religious, ritualistic (to propitiate an angry goddess or demon with magical rites), and masked (a type that appears in all the above categories).
The kolyacha ("of the Kolis") is among the better-known examples of social folk dance. A fisherman's dance indigenous to the Konkan coast of western India, the kolyacha is an enactment of the rowing of a boat. Women wave handkerchiefs to their male partners, who move with sliding steps. For wedding parties young Kolis (fishermen) dance in the streets carrying household utensils for the newlywed couple, who join the dance at its climax.
The social folk dance of Rajasthan is the ghoomar, danced by women in long full skirts and colourful chuneris ( cloth scarves draping the head and shoulders and tucked in front at the waist).
Especially spectacular are the kacchi ghori dancers of this region. Equipped with shields and long swords, the upper part of their bodies arrayed in the traditional attire of a bridegroom and the lower part concealed by a brilliantly coloured papier-mâché horse built on a bamboo frame, the dancers enact jousting contests at marriages and festivals. Bawaris, are accomplished performers of this form of folk dance.
In the Punjab region, the most electrifying social folk dance is the harvest dance, bhangra, performed by men and popular on either side of the India-Pakistan border. This dance is always punctuated by a song. At the end of every line the drum thunders, and the last line is taken up by all the dancers in a chorus. The bhangra is an ecstatic dance performed by men of all ages, who spring, shout, and energetically dance in a circle while moving their hips and shoulders to the frenetic rhythm of the drum. The gypsy women of Andhra Pradesh belonging to the Lambadi tribe wear mirror-speckled headdresses and skirts and cover their arms with broad, white bone bracelets. They dance in slow, swaying movements, while the men act as singers and drummers. Their social dance is imbued with impassioned grace and lyricism and is less wild than that of gypsies in other parts of the world.
The bison-horn dance of the Muria tribe in Madhya Pradesh is performed by both men and women, who traditionally have lived on equal terms. The men wear a horned headdress with a tall tuft of feathers and a fringe of cowry shells that dangles over their faces. A drum shaped like a log is slung around their necks. The women, their heads surmounted by broad, solid-brass chaplets and their breasts covered with heavy metal necklaces, carry sticks in their right hands like drum majorettes. Anywhere between fifty and a hundred men and women dance at a time. The male "bisons" attack and fight each other, spearing up leaves with their horns and chasing the female dancers in a dynamic interpretation of nature's mating season. The Juang tribe in Orissa performs bird and animal dances with vivid miming and powerful muscular agility.
Some major examples of religious folk dances are the dindi and kala dances of Maharashtra, which are expressions of religious ecstasy. The dancers revolve in a circle, beating short sticks (dindis) to keep time with the chorus leader and a drummer in the middle. As the rhythm accelerates, the dancers form into two rows, stamp their right feet, bow, and advance with their left feet, making geometric formations. The kala dance features a pot containing curds, symbolizing fecundity. A group of dancers forms a double-tiered circle with other dancers on their shoulders. A man climbs to the top of this tier, breaks the pot hanging overhead, and splashes curds over the naked torsos of the dancers. After this ceremonial opening, the dancers twirl sticks and swords in a feverish battle dance.
Garba, referring to a votive pot, is the best-known religious dance of Gujarat. It is danced by a group of 50 to 100 women during the annual festival of Navaratri ("Nine Nights") that honours the goddess Amba Mata, known in other parts of India as Durga, or Kali. The women move in a circle, bending, turning, clapping their hands, and sometimes snapping their fingers. Songs in praise of the goddess accompany this dance.
Of the endless variety of ritualistic folk dances, many have magical significance and are connected with ancient cults. The karakam dance of Tamil Nadu State, mainly performed on the annual festival in front of the image of Mariyammai (goddess of pestilence), is to deter her from unleashing an epidemic. A pot of uncooked rice surmounted by a tall bamboo frame is placed on the dancer’s head, who has to retain it without touching it during the tumbles and leaps that are part of the performance.. People ascribe this feat to the spirit of the deity, which, it is believed, enters the dancer’s body. The Therayattam festival in Kerala is held to propitiate the pantheon of gods and demons revered by the Hindus of Kerala. The dancers, arrayed in awe-inspiring costumes and masks, enact unusual rituals before the village shrine. A devotee makes an offering of a cock, which the dancer grabs, beheads in one stroke, blesses, and hands back to the devotee. This ceremony is punctuated by a prolonged and ponderous dance.
The greatest number of masked folk dances are performed in Arunachal Pradesh (formerly North East Frontier Agency), a Union Territory of India, where the influence of Tibetan dance forms may be seen. The yak dance is performed in the Ladakh region of Kashmir and in the southern fringes of the Himalayas, near Assam. The dancer impersonating a yak, dances with a man mounted on his back. In the sada topo tsen, a folk dance performed with masks; the male dancers wear gorgeous silks, brocades, and long tunics with wide, flapping sleeves. They wear grotesquely grinning wooden masks, crowned with a diadem made of skulls, representing spirits of the other world. The dancers employ powerful, rather slow, twirling movements, with hops. The chhau, a unique form of masked dance, is preserved by the royal family of the former state of Saraikela in Bihar. The dancer impersonates a god, animal, bird, hunter, rainbow, night, or flower. He acts out a short theme and performs a series of vignettes at the annual Chaitra Parva festival in April. Chhau masks have predominantly human features that are slightly modified to suggest varied emotions. Their serene expressions painted in simple, flat colours differ radically from the elaborate facial makeup of kathakali or the exaggerated ghoulishness of Kandyan masks and those of the Japanese No drama. As the chhau dancer's face has to be expressionless, his body communicates the total emotional and psychological tensions of a character. His feet employ a gesture language; his toes are agile, functional, and expressive, like those of an animal. No song is sung during the performance; the only accompaniment is instrumental music. In another form of chhau, practiced in the Mayurbhanj district of Orissa, the actors do not wear masks, but through deliberately stiff and immobile faces they give the illusion of a mask. The style of their dance is vigorous and acrobatic.
MODERN INDIAN DANCE
While in the West the theatrical elements of spoken words, music, and dance developed independently and evolved in the forms of drama, opera, and ballet, Indian theatrical tradition continued to combine the three in its dramas. Indian films still follow this rule, the heroine suddenly bursts into song or dances for the hero -- a practice quite curious to Westerners -- but in fact the filmmakers are following their own classical and folk tradition. Recently, dance in the form of ballet with complex choreography in the Western sense has emerged as a distinct idiom.
Modern Indian ballet has its roots in the work of Uday Shankar, who went to England to study the plastic arts and was chosen by the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova to be her partner in the ballet Radha and Krishna. Young Shankar returned to India fired with enthusiasm. After studying the essentials of the four major styles of classical dance, he created new ballets with complex choreography and music, mixing the sounds from wooden clappers and metal cymbals with those of traditional instruments. He used classical and folk rhythms and employed Western stage techniques. He presented his ballets with a skill and polish previously unknown to Indian audiences. These ballets included Shiva-Parvati and Lanka Dahan ("The Burning of Lanka"), in which he used wooden masks from Ceylon. In Rhythm of Life (1938) and in Labour and Machinery (1939), he employed contemporary political and social themes. He established a culture centre at Almora in 1939 and during its four years' existence created a whole generation of modern dancers.
Shanti Bardhan, a junior colleague of Uday Shankar, produced some of the most imaginative dance-dramas of the modern period. After founding the Little Ballet Troupe in Mumbai (now Mumbai) in 1952, he produced Ramayana, in which the actors moved and danced like puppets. His posthumous production Panchatantra ("The Winning of Friends") is based on an ancient fable of four friends (a mouse, a turtle, a deer, and a crow), and uses masks and the mimed movements of animals and birds.
Narendra Sharma and Sachin Shankar, both pupils of Uday Shankar, have continued his tradition. Other important figures who have shaped modern Indian dance include Menaka, Ram Gopal, and Mrinalini Sarabhai, who has experimented with conveying modern themes through the bharatanatyam and kathakali styles.
Folk Dance
The Indian folk dance is simple without being naive, for behind its simplicity lie both profundity of conception and a directness of expression which are of great artistic value. The concept of portraying emotion is generally speaking foreign to folk dance and what is expressed is natural and original. What is important here is not the grace of the individual dancer or the virtuosity of the isolated prose, but the total effect of the overwhelming buoyancy of spirit, and the eloquent, effortless ease with which it is expressed. It has intimate relationship with functions of daily life; food-gathering, harvesting, rites, rituals and beliefs. The popular folk dances of India are Ruk Mar Nacha, Purulia Chhau, Rangoli Bihu, Singhi Chham, Karma, Cheraw Dance, Hojagiri, Bardo Chham, Chang Lo, Lahoo and Thang Ta in the East. Bhangra, Charkula, Ghoomar, Spaw Dance and Kinnauri Nati in the North. Kalbelia Dance, Koli, Tarangmel, Dandiya Raas, Garba, Tippani Dance, Panthi, The Padhar Dance, Dharmar and Hamchi Dances in the West. Devarattam, Dollu Kunita, Thapetta Gullu, Garadi, Lava Dance and Nicobarese Dance in the South.
Chakiarkoothu
This dance form is believed to have been introduced to Kerala by the early Aryan immigrants & is performed only by the members of the Chkiar caste. A highly orthodox type of entertainment, it can be staged inside temples only & witnessed by the Hindus of the higher castes. The theatre is known as Koothambalam. The story is recited in a quasi-dramatic style with emphasis on eloquent declarations with appropriately suggestive facial expressions & hand gestures. The only accompaniments are the cymbals & the drum known as the mizhavu, made of copper with a narrow mouth on which is stretched a piece of parchment.
Chhau
The Chhau dance is indigenous to the eastern part of India. It originated as a martial art and contains vigorous movements and leaps. Some Chhau dances use large stylized masks. The depiction of birds and animals is a distinctive feature. There are also heroic dances with sword, bow or shield, with which dancers demonstrate their dexterity. In recent times, Mayurbhanj Chhau has become popular as a medium of choreography, with its wide range of postures and movements that adapt well to modern as well as traditional treatment.
The people of Rajasthan live life to the hilt. After hard work in the harsh desert sun and the rocky terrain they steal a few moments for gay. There is dancing, singing, Drama, devotional folk music and puppet shows, transforms the hardworking Rajasthan into a fun-loving and carefree individual. Each region has its own folk entertainment, the dance style differ as do the songs. Of considerable significance are the devotional songs and the communities who render these songs. Some of the better known forms of entertainment are:
Ghoomar Dance
This
is basically a community dance for women and performed on auspicious
occasions. Derived from the word ghoomna, piroutte, this is very
simple dance where the ladies move gently, gracefully in circles.
Drum Dance
This is a professional dance form from jalore. Five men with huge drums round their necks, some with huge cymbals accompany a dancer who holds a naked sword in his mouth and performs vigorously by twirling three painted sticks.
Gair
Another
Holi dance but performed only by men. This becomes Dandiya Gair in
Jhodpur and Geendad in Shekhawati.
Kachhi Ghodi
This is a dance performed on dummy horses. Men in elaborate costumes ride the equally well decorated dummy horses. Holding naked swords, these dancers move rhythmically to the beating of drums and fifes. A singer narrates the exploits of the Bavaria bandits of Shekhawati.
Kathputli
Puppet plays based on popular legends are performed by skilled puppeteers. Displaying his skill in making the puppets' act and dance, the puppeteer is accompanied by a woman, usually his wife, who plays the dholak, or drum and sings the ballad.
| Month | Location | Name | Events |
| December - January | Calcutta | Dover Lane Music Festival | Classical Dances, Instrumental Music, Vocal Recitals |
| January - February | Mahabalipuram | Mamallapuram Nritya Utsav | Classical Dances: Bharat Natyam, Kuchipudi, Kathak, Mohiniattam, Odissi, Kathakali |
| February (fix date 18-28 Feb) | Agra | Taj Mahotsav | Classical Dance, Folk Art, Light Music |
| February - March | Chidambram | Shivaratri Natyanjali Utsav | Classical Dance: Bharat Natyam |
| February - March | Jeypore (Near Korhaput) | Desiya Natyam | Masked Dances |
| March | Khajuraho | Khajuraho dance Festival | Classical Dance: Bharat Natyam, Kathak, Kuchpudi, Odissi, Manipuri |
| March - April | Varanasi | Gulabi Chait | Classical Music: Thumbri |
| October | Hampi | Hampi Utsav of Vijaynagar | Classical Dance And Music |
| October | Trivandrum | Surya Nritya utsav | Classical Dances: Mohiniattam, Bharat Natyam, Kathakali, Kuchpudi, Odissi, Manipuri, Kathak |
| October | Ahmedabad | Bhawai | Bhawai Dance Theatre |
| October - March | Trivandrum | Nishagandhi Nritya Utsav | Classical Dances: Mohiniattam, Bharat Natyam, Kathakali, Kuchpudi, Odissi, Manipuri, Kathak |
| November | Konarak | Konarak Dance Festival | Classical Dances |
| December | New Delhi | ITC Sangeet Sammelan | Classical Music: Hindustani, Carnatic |
| December | Gwalior | Tansen Utsav | Classical Dances and Music |