Bharatanatyam Maestro Enthrals Audience

Padma Shri Dr Ananda Shankar Jayant brought a Bharatanatyam ballet masterpiece of rare choreographic excellence to the packed audience at CCRT on Friday evening as the opening event of the Ramayana Kalpavrksam festival titled: “Sri Rama Namam- Entha Ruchi Ra”.

Kancherla Gopanna was employed by the Qutub Shahi Dynasty as a Tahsildar to collect revenues due to the Taneshah. As an ardent devotee of Lord Rama, he became known as Ramadas due to his great attachment to chanting Ramanama. When he discerns the state of neglected images of Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana at a Jatara in Bhadrachalam, he immediately decides to build a Temple as their proper abode. When the Saint Poet uses up the revenue collected by him for building a magnificent Temple at Bhadrachalam, the outraged Taneshah imprisons him.

Ramadas, languishing there, implores, chides, and beseeches the Lord for his deliverance. The money is repaid by two handsome strangers to the Monarch identifying themselves as Lord Rama and Lakshmana. An overwhelmed Taneshah releases Ramadas and further endows the Temple he built.

The dance presentation is built out of the most renowned keertanas of this Bhakta which are simple in melody but profound in meaning. Indeed, the ballet inspired devotion and suffused a divine atmosphere to permeate the viewers with bliss or Ananda!

The selected songs weaved together an enthralling story on stage. Lighting by Surya Rao deserves mention as the aharya of cream counterpointed with a border of brocade and other colours was burnished like gold in the rhapsodic play of the glimmering lights. Rich hues suffused the scene like a Tapestry come to life.

The dancers resembled intricately enamelled figurines forming ornately filigreed patterns on stage. Sound system was perfect, bass notes reverberating of the recorded music of exceptional quality sending thrills through the audience. The backdrop design by Gunjan Ashtaputre resembled Frescoes in design and the Digital scene shifting was marvelous to behold. During the item on Dasavataras, a Balinese Screen like image of the Ten Incarnations had them individually backlit at the exact moment of each Avatara’s enactment in tableaux.

The careful attention given to all these design aspects was like a Connoisseur’s dream come true. “Jaya Janaki Ramana” flowed into “Takkuvemi Manaku” i.e., What do I lack when the Lord is with me? Ecstasy is the theme of the songs sung as the grand Temple takes shape. The prison was interestingly depicted through students holding a thick cordlike rope at the corners with their Guru in the enclosed space.

Pleading songs during imprisonment change to anguished chiding in the immortal song “Ikshvaku Kula Tilaka” as the Saint describes the Jewellery he had made for the Idols. Ananda’s surpassing abhinaya changed from devotional trance to pathos and again to frustration bewitching the audience and the rasanubhava was overwhelming demonstrating the capacity of a master artiste to reach out to rasikas and enfold them with her genius on stage.

She was impressively striking and awesome as the ferocious Narasimha ripping out the Demon King Hiranyakasipu’s entrails. Pramod Reddy donned the Taneshah role with aplomb as a Guest artiste. The young students of Shankarananda Kalakshetra danced their roles with consummate ease and went through complicated nritta sequences without a misstep.

Soundaryalahari, Poojitha, Anusha, Neha, Srividya, Ridhishree, Khevna, Avani, Suhani, and Jeshitha gracefully gleamed in this performance filled with chiselled baroque grandeur presented with polished classical elegance.