BENGALURU: Dance enthusiasts can gear up for the latest edition of dancejathre, an annual dance fair organised by Shambhavi School of Dance. It is the brain child of acclaimed Kuchipudi danseuse and director of Shambhavi dance school, Vyjayanthi Kashi, who plans to provide a platform to professional dancers, amateurs and enthusiasts, irrespective of their age, through this dance festival.
“The main objective of having a fair on such a grand scale is to have a sense of community where dancers as well as non-dancers can share their knowledge, create something new or improvise on things that already exists,” says Kashi, who will also be performing an act on Krishna. She says her act will depict how the relationship between Lord Krishna and his gopis would be like in this day and age, so that the new generation can relate to it.
The two-day affair will see several dancers of international acclaim, like Odissi guru Bijayini Satpathy, Kathak exponent Manisha Sathe from Pune, Odissi dancer Meera Das from Bhubaneswar and many more. Apart from the performances, the festival will also be having an array of competitions, workshops, exhibitions, etc. Personally, Kashi is looking forward to the workshop on the making of Yakshagana jewellery. “Just to give you a fun fact, there are a lot of similarities between the jewelleries used by Yakshagana and Kuchipudi dancers.
Kuchipudi jewelleries have been contemporised a bit now, but I am so glad that Karnataka has saved the heritage of Yakshagana,” says Kashi. The festival will also be showcasing lesser known folk dances from different parts of the country. Keeping up with the trend and also to keep up with the promise that there is something for everyone, the festival also has workshops in afro-jazz and flamenco. “The festival is for everyone. By keeping it all about classical dance, we will be keeping the festival for a certain niche.
This way, people won’t have any excuse to not attend the festival,” laughs Prateeksha, who is a disciple and daughter of Vyjayanthi. Just to boost the morale of young dancers, the winners of the first day will be opening the act on the second day of the festival. The 9th edition of dancejathre 2020 is happening on Feb 8 and 9, at Ravindra Kalakshetra, JC Road, at 10:30 am.