Indian Classical Dance Puns

Now offering Intro to Indian Classical Dance and Beginning Bharatanatyam at the Walters Cultural Arts Center in Hillsboro for the Winter/Spring 2022 season! Learn basics or continue your footwork and expression of Bharatanatyam at the Walters this season! Classes are lead by instructor, dancer and artist, Sweta Ravisankar - Sarada Kala Nilayam.

Find out more and register today here: www.hillsboro-oregon.gov/WaltersClasses

It’s not an official class. I’ve been classically trained for 18 years I’m starting from the basic so I can start dancing again because I miss it dearly. Absolutely no experience necessary. Be ready to be barefoot and severely SWEAT. I’m just gonna be doing the basics. 😊 Feel free to joins me

So lockdown in my city is lifted (for a second time) and I finally got to see my teacher and my classmates in person again. I'm sick and tired of online dance class tbh.

So teacher knows we all haven't practiced as much as we should havw so she tells us that today we're gonna warm up a bit more to get you back on track. It's outside in a park (if we were to do inside we would have to wear masks) and it's boiling hot. "Teacher, can we put on some music for warm up?" "Sure" "Whose phone has the most charge, you, (my name)? Ok, put on some good songs, ok? Not these boring pop songs. And oh, no BTS and Blackpink either"

(They know I listen to kpop, and think that Kpop = BTS and Blackpink = "cringe". That's of course wrong.)

Wait, I thought to myself, just y'all wait. "Ok wait you guys start I'll just put together a playlist". I have almost 150 kpop songs locally downloaded and around a 100 Bollywood, 100 regional and a lot of classical fusion stuff. So I mix a bit together here and there, a lot of oldschool Bollywood stuff (we all love 2000-2015 Bollywood) and lace the 30-minute playlist with kpop songs from the 2000s and 2010s.

I play it, and decide to look at their reactions to them hearing a non-mainstream Kpop song. I know when it comes.

It starts, the intro to Eugene's Bad Boy. Do they notice? No. The singing starts. Any change in expression? No. The song progresses, and ends, and no, they legit didn't notice anything. Anything.

Alright, second kpop song, After School's Shampoo. Same as above.

Third song, JtL's My Lecon. This actually sounds so indian, Pritam lifted the beat for Bhool Bulaiyya straight outta this track. Same reaction as above. They don't even notice lmao

Fourth song, Stray Kids' Ta. Whenever I heard this song, I always got reminded of Singham, so I thought, ok let's play it. It works.

Fifth and last song, the most "kpop" out of all the 5 songs, Itzy's Not Shy. Again no reaction. If I squint, I can see one or two heads bopping along... and the playlist ends.

Relieved, I breathe a sigh of relief. So much for "and oh, no BTS and Blackpink, ok?", huh, girls?

(Actually one aunty that was waiting with her daughter from the previous batch came to me and asked "were there a few Korean songs?". As it seems she works at Hyundai and hears the korean language everyday so

I’ve checked out one studio in JLT but the prices are so steep > 700 AED. My parents used to send me to Tarangini back when we lived in Deira (1998-2002) and the price was 125 AED per month. I know I can’t expect the same rate but most of the classes with reasonable rates are offered in Deira/Karama and that’s too far for me. Google is not being helpful! Would really appreciate any pointers. Not interested in online options. I miss Indian classical dancing.

Over last few months I undertook a personal pet project of exploring Indian arts and culture. Here is a list of short videos ~ 1min of music and dances. If you select the link, it will take you to the appropriate post, which inturn contain additional information (such as related styles/other compositions in the same raag or by same performer etc). Hope it will bring some cheer in these depressing times. Its amazing that how expressive they can be in such a short time span.

Carnatic Music

1. Two musicians Jonathan Kay and P Saravanan meet in a Temple in Tamil Nadu and have an impromptu jugalbandi of Saxophone and Nadaswaram
2. Gnana Vinayakane in Naat raag performed by Saxophone Lavanya a clip
3. I'd like to share this with top YouTube comment -"I am a pregnant woman. My baby makes lot of movements Everytime I play this." Jayanti Ramesh playing thillana in Kaapi ragam. Full video in comments.
4. Two musicians playing Nadaswaram, a south indian instrument (similar to Shehnai) mellifluously.
5. Eki Labonye Purno Prano composed by Rabindranath Tagore and sung by Kavita Krishnamurthi, a clip
6. Sukanya Ramgopal playing Ghatam with her all female crew, a clip
7. Raag Charukesi played on guitar by Shylu Ravindaran, a clip
8. Samadipta Mukherjee sings Mozart's symphony No 40 in classical Indian notes
9. Tava Dasoham by Sri Tyagaraj in mind bending raag Punnagavarali, a clip
10. Sri Gananatham bhajamyaham kirtan composed by Sri Tyagaraaj in raag Kanakangi played by U. Srinivas in Mandolin, a clip
11. Vijay Venkat plyaing Suddha Dhanyasi raagam in Vichitra Veena or Gottuvadyam, a clip
12. If you've ever wondered if music can show you bright rainbow colors, here is the proof - Raghuvamsasudha,Sri Ramaseva Mandali concert
13. Dhanashree Thillana fusion by Haricharan with Bennet &the band. Few renditions of this awesome composition in comments
14. N. Ravikiran playing the instrument "breathless" vichitra veena, an innovation of his own!
15. [Enna Thavam Sheid

Join our weekend free workshop on mindful abhinaya as we go through a soulful session exploring the nuances of different emotions in a trip across the forest. This is a one hour online private workshop with limited seats.

Dm for details.

Sadly, the older space for bharatanatyam is not in use and so we thought it would be nice to start a new reddit r/bharatnatyam dancers/teachers/enthusiasts are welcome to join!

mods Idk what flair to put this under

For all the impatient kids tl;dr: I can do the Black Mamba choreo without my knees hurting because it's part of my South indian classical dance warm-up/stretch routine.

• Full Story -

So finally after a five month partial lockdown and excruciating Google meet online dance classes , my country allowed 10 people in one room again. So my dance teacher split us up in 3 groups of 8 people and called my batch all to the studio again yesterday and boy, it felt so good seeing her in person again. In traditional indian arts, the teacher-student bonding(Guru-shishya parampara)is of a special meaning, which means my dance teacher is like a mother to me. She is actually a software engineer by profession, but teaches classical dance as a passion. My "school" is one run by her, woth ages spanning 3- 17 (majority are the little brats from ages 5-7) but I was in the batch with the elder kids (12+), So she can actually teach us something instead of constantly trying to shush the kids.

I had caught the tram I usually missed to the studio and arrived there 10 minutes beforehand, so after I initial greetings and oh-you-really-look-tired-sleep-and-eat-well we both warmed up together while waiting for the others to come.

When we Bharatanatyam students/dancers warm up our legs and do stretches, we do this one muscle strengthening exercise where you clasp your hands together stretched out in front of you to keep balance, keep your feet wide apart, and slowly, to the count of four, bend your right leg the way down until the left leg is completely stretched to the side. Then, without support of your hands, and only with the strength of your thigh muscles (Which we need for our base posture Aramandi), you come up again. And the same goes on the other leg (to my disdain, my left leg is weak).

This is repeated at least 20-30 times, and every time, the speed with which you go down/come up increases, until you're at one fourth of the original speed you started with. It's important to start slow, otherwise you might end up in a speed your legs, thighs and knees would like to sacrifice you to Satan for. Beginner mistake out of impatience, I've been there, done that.

If you did the exercise properly, then you're warmed up enough to stay and dance in [this posture ](https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-c6b62a7e7f047f5a

actors/actresses who are trained in Indian classical dance. If yes,which dance form?