EXPLORING AND DISCOVERING CONNECTIONS
DANCETALK was a story of a search for cultural connections. The story teller was Celine Pradeau–Kanagasabai, from France,
Celine had her initial training in ballet from the age of five. But as she reached young adulthood she felt an inner urge to express her feelings more individualistically, and switched to contemporary, or modern dance, making it her main medium of expression. It was easy for her to go from ballet to contemporary dance because the discipline, movements and configurations of ballet are rigorous and structured. As she went along as a professional dancer, at her mothers prodding, and, to please her own curiosity about the dance form of her Tamil father’s place of origin, she studied Bharatanatyam for over 10 years and performs Bharatanatyam in France
The real story of her exploration of dance and the quest for connections between dance forms has only begun now as she tries to make connections using Bharatanatyam and Modern dance in her new hybrid dance, which, she feels, would be too pretentious to name yet, but for the time being, is ‘Bharatemporary’.
The difference between most Indian dance forms and ballet inspired dance, such as Modern dance, is that, contemporary dance is more in the air. In modern dance, the dancer leaps, bounds and soars, gyrates, contracts and releases the body; sometimes making moves that are sharp and jagged, sometimes fluid; in a free-form of terpsichorean propulsion and energy; sometimes reclining, sitting and writhing on the ground - often inventing new steps in the routines. Though this may appear disordered, modern dance relies greatly on technique, control, experimentation and inventiveness.
Contemporary dance is different from ballet too, or classical ballet, as it is sometimes called, in the sense that ballet follows a structured code of technique, and is light and airy, with either delicate, or long, fluid movements and graceful leaps, where the dancer appears to be momentarily suspended in the air.
According to Celine Pradeu, after she had demonstrated Classical ballet, ‘The Dying Swan’ to the music of ‘The Swan’ by Camille Saint Saens, with the typical turned out position of the legs, the expressive, graceful and delicate fluttering movements of the body, and the typical classic-ballet postures which she did barefoot, making the toe dancing of a ballet dancer even more difficult to do, she admitted that since she had given up ballet long ago in favour of contemporary dance, she found ballet very difficult and strenuous, as it was very demanding on the body. Deceptive as it looks, the ballet dancer has to work harder on posture, turn out, core strength and lightness,
whereas, she said, ‘modern’ or ‘contemporary dance’ is more fun and less stressful.
In the system of the classical dance form Bharatanatyam, on the other hand, all movements are defined and classified, the dance is very grounded, precise and balanced, and the basic stances are, with the feet turned out and the knees bent outwards in the half-seated position, or the legs-together position or the full-seated position movements, and the rhythmic stamping of the feet. Bharatanatyam, has a well structured grammar of dance. And Adavu, often thought of as footwork, is really the basic unit of Bharatanatyam, it defines the characteristic coordinated expressive movements of the whole body through a vocabulary of the hand gestures, position of the legs; posture while standing, movement while walking, and the hand gestures and facial expressions which convey meaning and show emotion - and all this is in perfect synchronisation with Rhythm or Tala.
In Bharatanatyam, Nrittya - is interpretative dance. Gestures in this stream convey messages, sentiments and emotions through leg, hand, neck, head and the movements of the eyes, which complement and highlight the movements of the body. The main technique of Natya - dance drama, is Abhinaya, acting out a story using expressions. And Nritta, is non interpretative, pure dance to add beauty to dance form. Adavus form the basic component of Nritta.
Music too for both, contemporary dance and Bharatanatyam is quite different.
Modern dance is about discovering new ways of using music and sound in relation to movement; of integrating dance into the music - and vice versa. So the music for modern dance could be any music that the dancer would like to interpret. It could be pop music, or jazz, or the folk music of any country or region, or it could be abstract, strange and difficult music. The dancer decides the music or soundscape that best suits the project, or choreography that has been envisaged as per the dancer’s artistic vision and aesthetic. In contemporary dance, since it is about interpretation, experimentation and a play with the elements of physical expression, music can be selected, or, could be specially composed, for better coherence between the dance and the music.
The music in Bharatanatyam is ‘Carnatic’ classical style; focused and made to order for dance. Since Bharatanatyam is choreographed and prearranged to the demands of the grammar of dance, the music too has to be suitably structured to accompany the dance. The whole arrangement of the music is pre-planned and the rhythms are set to the story that is being told in dance. The music ensemble therefore has to be truly expert to accompany a dancer, with the ability to adjust the music as per the cues received from the dancer and the percussionists emphasize the beats that are important to the dancer. The ensemble always includes someone capable of calling out rhythmic syllables that denote dance movements.
Celine Pradeua Kanagasabai explained the difficulty in marrying the two dance forms for her upcoming solo dance performance which will open in Paris
A huge problem of execution is the difference in the centre of the body. The centre of balance! In the basic postures of Bharatanatyam; the centre, the weight of the dancer is different, there is little use of the hips or off-balance positions, whereas in contemporary dance, the centre of the body and the balance is in another place - for a completely different set of postures and movements. The body needs to be centred differently to do justice to both the dance forms and their different needs of technique in using the body, space, and the ground.
In this hybrid dance form, finding the right music, too, needs to be addressed. For this however, she has found a solution with special music being composed to meet the demands of both Contemporary dance and Bharatanatyam in her particular amalgam of dance styles, through the close and empathetic involvement in her new dance form by her husband, composer and violinist, Guillaume Blanc.
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