BENGALURU: Parveen Sultana and TM Krishna will be among the many maestros conversing with students from over 100 schools, from across the country, at an intensive six-day programme to be held in the city from today.
At this convention, International School Convention (ISC) of Spic Macay, youngsters will be introduced to Indian arts and crafts through workshops and talks. For the first time, this event will have participation from international students and teachers. Two hundred and fifty artistes will be present as trainers.
This residential programme will be held at DPS Bengaluru (north) and 30 acres of space will accommodate students from 20 states including Manipur and Tamil Nadu. For all six days, the students will wake up at 4 am and practise seven different types of yoga including Koodiyattam, a theatre form of yoga, till 7 am.
Thirty types of workshops will be conducted till afternoon where students will be introduced to classical art forms and crafts such as as mask making. Evening concerts will be held every day from 6 pm to 9 pm and these will be open to the public. Overnight public concerts will be held on December 29.
Students will also present their learning on the final day. The convention will conclude with heritage tours in and around Bengaluru including Mysuru and Srirangapatna.
Sadhana Rao, a Spic Macay advisor, has been a volunteer for 30 years, ever since she joined the programme as a student in Miranda House. “I have always felt there was something missing in the education system. I figured what it was once I joined Spic Macy. It has been 30 years now,” she says.
Karthika Venkatesan, convenor of this programme says that they pick only the best in the field to be gurus. They have to have bagged a Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, at the very minimum. Karthika has also developed an app for the programme that runs a schedule of the event.
The first convention was held in 1985 in Hyderabad and Kiran Seth, the founder of Spic Macay, says that there were 50 participants and jokes how the gathering then was divided with the World Cup.
What is Spic Macay?
Spic Macay (or Society for the Promotion of Indian Classical Music, Culture Amongst Youth) was founded in 1977 and organises cultural programmes on classical music, dance, folk arts, yoga and heritage walks at various educational institutions. The idea is to make Indian heritage known and accessible to today’s youngsters. It has been 40 years of Spic Macay and, till date, it has been running as a voluntary organisation.