Kathak ~ Lets Dance

My dance journey in school ended with three different performances (that includes Bharatanatyam,Western n Classical and Kathak) during the inauguration of the new auditorium by 2nd week of November. Unfortunately, I didn't find enough time for practice as I was nearing my so called "board exams".But still, I longed to give my best since it was my last performance in school. Personally, I love Kathak as I am a huge fan of "Madhuri Dixit".Without even knowing the A,B,C of Kathak, I had to practise for the show in just half a day,precisely 4 hours.Phew!!!Somehow,I completed the practice but I had to walk almost like a 'limbless' creature. But the next day was so good for me that I danced with full energy and enthusiasm and completed all the 3 performance with flying colours.

Later, after joining an engineering college, I didn't get any chance to dance and I was almost heart-broken.But when my II semester started, I came to know about an intra-collegiate cultural "FIESTA-2k13"and my joy knew no bounds. While searching for good songs, there came the release of the much-awaited and the most controversial "Vishwaroopam".The first song "Unnai Kanadha..." made me dumbstruck. The music of Shankar-Ehsan-Loy, the voice of Kamal Hassan and Shankar Mahadevan and above all, the choreography of Birju maharaj took me into a trance. Obviously, I took this song as one of my choice and started my dance with this song. I mixed Bharatanatyam and Kathak into this song. One of the songs in the dance medley was "Chikni Chameli" for which there were many claps from the audience. But still I was praised by my fellow contestants, my seniors and the judge for my Kathak dance. So Kathak form of dance is always very special to me.

One among the eight renowned classical dances of India is Kathak which traces its origin to Uttar Pradesh, a northern state in India. Kathak literally means 'stories' in Sanskrit. It was the Mughal period when Kathak gained its fame and status. The Mughals gave incredible significance to this beautiful dance form. But the reputation of Kathak did not last long due to the advent of British into India. However the dance has regained its eminence after the independence. The Maharaj family (Acchan Maharaj, Shambu Maharaj, Lachhu Maharaj and Birju Maharaj) is entirely responsible for the promotion of Kathak worldwide. A cannot-be-believed fact about Kathak is that this dance has lots of similarities with the Spanish Flamenco dance, most notably in the lack of much deviation from the vertical axis, percussive footwork, and dependence on (sometimes complex) rhythmic cycles. Regarding the costume, women dancers' clothing is the sari or most commonly Lehenga-choli. Mughals improvised the costume to the level of salwar kammez and today the most frequent wear is the Anarkali chudidhar. The traditional clothing for men is to be bare chested, accompanied with a dhoti, mostly tied in the Bengal style. But the Mughals' version of dressing is kurta-chudidhar. The dancers also wear a Ghungru, which is an anklet with bells. Despite many downfalls and escalations, currently Kathak is an officially sanctioned Indian traditional dance.