Hyderabad: Cultural programmes go virtual in the city

The WhatsApp group of members who used to throng the city's cultural hotspots like Lamakaan, Phoenix Arena and Our Sacred Space for their weekend fixes of cultural programmes and stand-up comedy shows are almost comatose since a month.

With the coronavirus scare emphasising on social distancing and discouraging group activities, the event facilitators at these venues are in a forced holiday, relieved from incessant phone calls from organisers and members of the public.

All across social media platforms, the active theatrewalas, music programme types are sharing their lockdown activities and yearning for the good old times. One venue, Our Sacred Space has launched a virtual tour of their facilities to keep the prospective event conductors interested.

It has also announced a variety of programmes, simultaneously to be held online, over their dedicated support bases. They comprise German language classes, art and craft class, handwriting improvement, calligraphy etc for varying fee payments which range from Rs 500 – Rs 4,600. Recently, it had even promoted a teaser of a storytelling event specifically to appeal to children.

Other than this, there are groups which want to fruitfully utilize the lockdown phase by asking potential writers to write about their experiences and what did they 'feel, observe and absorb' with a deadline of May 20.

The contributions could be fiction or non-fiction with poems, short/micro stories and essays or articles with a word limit of 2000 words. Another leading theatre group in the city has utilized this interregnum to launch a six-day virtual workshop on voice, speech and diction.

A Karaoke club has encouraged its members to go for a premium online membership for a portal which can enable them sing and enjoy, an activity which has found traction among a large section of its members.

'It's the peak period for outdoor activity lovers like us which has been forced to shut down' laments T Balakrishnan, a co-founder of a Karaoke music group and presently busy with online meetings with his members. As summer months see impressive footfalls in all the cultural centres in the city, it would have been a happy, busy time for the youngsters to meet, interact and perform their stuff, which is not possible at least this summer season. Now, one can only hope, post- monsoon, the events will have a schedule and crowd support of its own, with all attendant restrictions and insecurities in the minds of the audiences.