Returning to the songs of Ningalenne Communistakki (but still looking for subtitles)

Since the last time I looked, a number of new clips have appeared from that classic communist film from Kerala called Ningalenne Communistakki.

I’ve found clips to replace old ones that disappeared (which I am now doing in some other posts – gradually), clips of songs from the film that I have never seen on YouTube before, and clips of the entire film (which definitely were not posted before the last couple of years). Unfortunately, I still cannot find a copy with English subtitles, but I have found one small song translation – in the comments section below one of the new(er) videos. I’ll get to that in a minute, but right now I would like to mention – for those who don’t know this already – that  this film, the play it was based on, the group that first produced it (that is, Kerala People’s Arts Club), and the history of communism in Kerala have been subjects of interest to me for quite a while, going back more than ten years before I started this blog. And I have referred to these subjects almost since the blog’s beginning, before the blog even settled into being a full-fledged Indian film blog (and then some). For these reasons, fairly soon, I plan to post a list of links related to this subject, from this blog and at least one other blog as well. (I will add it either as a postscript or a sequel post. But if you want to give yourself a preview before I do that, you are welcome to search for this film title or KPAC or Kerala, and you will find a whole lot of things.) For today’s post, though, I’m going to give these subjects a somewhat lighter treatment, because I mainly want to focus on the pleasure of finding, hearing, and watching  the songs – even though I, myself, don’t know a word of Malayalam and may never learn it, either.

Now let’s start with the song that I just said I was going to get back to, which is “Kothumbu Vallom….”

And let me say, this song would feel uplifting to me even if I didn’t know anything about the meaning of the words, but I do, thanks to the translation that appears  in comments below the YouTube post. The comment poster, Vinod KB, apologetically calls this translation “rough,” and it does include some errors in punctuation and spelling (which I have tried to clear up a little here) as well as some phrases that maybe don’t make sense. But despite its drawbacks, I think it does help us to understand the contents of the song – as well as the likely gist of a few of the others.

Rowing the small canoe, you farmer lady, who is the blacksmith lady who made your sickle used for reaping.  Blacksmith lady who made the sword for Unniyarcha lady and who also made made the shield for Pazhassi Lord, you made the the shield in olden times, you blacksmith woman. By blowing the wind to the kiln, you spread the fire in red sky when sun rises. You made the anklet for Leo (month), moonlight girl. For the Virgo, Libra (months) rain clouds, you made the rain clouds. You made the fan for the storm in the courtyard of western sea, the rainbow made by you, blacksmith lady. You made the Veena for the singers of revolution, you, blacksmith lady. You made the lamp for the huts of Vayalar, small lamp made by you, blacksmith lady. You bloomed one silver flower, blacksmith woman, in the sky which gets dark when it sleeps.

Vinod also provides an explanation of the symbolism in the song –  especially as it pertains to the history of India – but I’ll let readers travel to YouTube to see that. Actually, the explanation was a little (more) confusing to me, though there is much useful information there, too. And much of the symbolism and the  social ideas in the lyrics (as translated here) were clear to me from  a more general context – as they should be to many people, especially if they know a little about the socialist/Marxist perspectives and history. While I can’t really say anything about the meaning of the lyrics in the other songs in the film, I can imagine that some of those songs also have references like the ones here to the “red sky,” the coming storm (“in the courtyard of [the] western sea”), the “singers of revolution,” and the blooming of “one silver flower” (among a hundred blooming flowers, I assume). These kinds of lyrics capture the excitement and hope that would be present at the height of a radical or revolutionary socialist movement. (And maybe some, like this one, are also heartfelt tributes to members of the  agrarian working class.) This is something that I have kept in the back of my mind while I viewed the other clips in the film. Out of necessity (because I don’t understand the lyrics), I do have to give the other songs a somewhat lighter treatment, talking more about their qualities as film songs, my love for the sound of the vocals, and my thoughts about the moods and emotions that the song sequences convey. But they are also excellent songs for those reasons alone – which is why I think they are probably just as impressive as the socially conscious/leftist songs from Hindi cinema’s Golden Age.  (If only I could get one good, full translation or set of subtitles… If there are any Malayalam speakers out there who’d be up for such a project, please let me know!)

Now, there is another activist rallying song in the film that I have known about and enjoyed for a number of years, “Pallanayarin Theerathu.” Although I don’t know the exact context of this scene and I can’t understand any of the lyrics, I have always thought of this as the “campus rally song.” This is one of the songs that I particularlylly like for its vocals and music. I am especially charmed here by the singing of P. Susheela, whom I (and I guess most people) know from her playback in Tamil films. (Of course, I first became acquainted with P. Susheela as one of the Tamil playback singers for Padmini.) The male singer here is M.G. Radhakrishnan, who became renowned in Kerala as both a Carnatic singer and a music director. However, this song was made a while before he would take up the role of music director. The MD for this film  is the great D. Devarajan.

The first song from Ningalenne Communistakki that I ever saw/heard was “Neelakadampin Poovo,” which I liked instantly. This is not a rallying scene. I imagine that there might be some political messaging in the lyrics, and I wonder what book this woman is holding to her heart at the beginning (hmm, I wonder if it’s the Communist Manifesto . . . ). But generally, this strikes me as a sweet and  romantic kind of scene, made especially sweet by the legendarily melodic voice of Yesudas. (Among a number of songs that I’ve seen/heard by Yesudas, this is certainly one of my favorites.) The scene is also a lot of fun to watch and actually quite amusing, especially because of the exaggerated coyness exhibited by the female character. (I am not all that familiar with Malayalam actors, but from my reading of the cast, I believe the actress might be Sheela. In any event, this actress, all by herself, looks to me like a real bundle of sweetness. And the actor who serves as the face for Yesudas’ sweet voice is Prem Nazir.) By the way, there is another copy of this video that actually has better audio quality (because it comes through both channels), but I chose this one because it includes the beginning and end parts of the song/scene that the other version misses, and I think those parts are essential.

And then there’s “Ellarum Paadathu . . . ,” which repeats much of the music of “Neelakadampin Poovo”. . .  I don’t think there was any version of this posted before April of 2015, and I  discovered it just now, because I was looking for the second song in the film that was sung by P. Susheela. There still isn’t a video version of this posted anywhere (as far as I know), but I greatly enjoyed listening to it.

Now, getting back to Yesudas ,. . . Here is another song that showcases his legendarily melodious singing, and another sweet scene as well. (And I should add that, like the other song, it highlights Kerala’s beautiful natural scenery – maybe even more so this time.)

And then there is a lively song at the end of the film that accompanies one of the best march/rally scenes that I have ever seen. As with “Eelarum Paadathu,” it took  long time before I could find any version on YouTube, and when it finally appeared, it was only in an audio clip.. But it’s easy enough to find in the film, since it is at the very end; it is a fittingly inspiring conclusion. The song is  “Aikya Munnani.”

There are a couple of versions of the full film up on YouTube now (which I would not have thought possible a couple of years ago). I am favoring the version from Entertainment Junction, although the video is stretched a bit too wide (warning: bad aspect ratio!). The other version that I saw may have the same problem, or maybe not quite as much (I’m not sure). Both seem to come from the same source… This version, however, is not packed full of ads like the other one I saw (which is a pretty horrendous thing to see in a communist film!).  Also,  I particularly enjoyed the description of the film provided under the video, which summarizes the context in very good way:

 Ningalenne Communistakki (Malayalam: നിങ്ങളെന്നെ കമ്മ്യൂണിസ്റ്റാക്കി, meaning: you made me a communist), is a Malayalam socio-political play by Kerala People’s Arts Club (KPAC). This was the second and most popular stage play of KPAC . This drama propelled KPAC into the forefront of [the] Kerala cultural scene and played a historical role in popularising the Communist movement in Kerala during 1950’s, eventually leading to the establishment of first democratically elected communist ministry in the world in 1957 in Kerala under E. M. S. Namboodiripad.

I may have written a bunch about the historical context also, but I don’t think I could have summed it up in such a concise – and precise – way! But, of course, as I mentioned before, there are quite a few posts, articles, etc. – in this blog and elsewhere – that you might look at to get a more detailed perspective on Kerala’s most famous communist movie.

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[5/19] And here it is, the postscript that I promised . . .

Related posts from this blog:

https://roughinhere.wordpress.com/2008/01/19/fascination-with-kerala/

https://roughinhere.wordpress.com/2008/09/17/ningalenne-communistakki-1970-malayalam (My first post mentioning this film, close to nine years ago. But here, I include only one song, “Neelakadampin Poovo,” and then I refer to a post on KPAC at the site India9.com.)

https://roughinhere.wordpress.com/2010/05/01/may-day-special-songs-from-the-kerala-peoples-arts-club/ (Unfortunately, I’m going to have to replace most of the (dropped) clips here. The same is true of a couple of other related posts, which I won’t add links to until I get most of the song clips back.)

There is a post on Ningalenne Communistakki at the Old Malayalam Film Blog. But the songs are a little different – from the original play, it seems, not the film:

https://oldmalayalamcinema.wordpress.com/2010/07/12/kpac’s-old-malayalam-drama-songs-4/

 The Old Malayalam Film Blog has a more extensive series of blogs on KPAC drama songs. At the beginning of the series, much to my surprise, blogger Cinematters dedicated the series to me!
https://oldmalayalamcinema.wordpress.com/2010/07/09/kpacs-old-malayalam-drama-songs/

And that will be about it for related links for now – but more might follow. There actually is a good amount of writing out there about KPAC and Ningalenne Communistakki.

Another Mujra in a Different Kitchen

I think I have mentioned before in this blog that I have become quite fond of seeing what dances people have to offer in spaces in their apartments, such as their kitchens or living rooms. There are a number of reasons for that. One is that I get a little weary of the kind of Bollywood dance scene – prevalent especially recently – that involves a huge amount of production and lots of participants and lots of very elaborate costumes, too. Considering what most people picture when they think of Bollywood, it might seem like a huge contradiction for me to be so fond of Hindi films but also so fond of minimal production. But you’ll also notice that I obsess about the Vintage and Golden Age Hindi films, where production – whether out of choice or necessity – often was minimal. Films from that era most commonly feature solo dances or dances with a lead dancer or two and a small chorus. When there is a crowd dance, it seems kind of special because it is an exception. But these days, it seems that almost every prominently featured dance in an Indian film has to be overcrowded.

I have often had a tendency to flee forms that have been invested with a lot of money and production, into something more minimal and homemade. This goes back many years, to the late 1970s, when, as a teenager, I fled the expensively and pompously produced mainstream rock of the day into early manifestations of the genre that would become internationally known as new wave or punk.

Sometimes I like to see performances by people who are not necessarily stars and have not had huge studios invested in them, who are happy simply to practice and exhibit an art that they love. I also think it’s a lot of fun to see people doing classical Indian or Bollywood dances in very ordinary surroundings, in front of objects as incongruous as, say, modern kitchen appliances. I like the contrast, but I also like that the dancers are totally removed from the elaborate sets and surroundings that commonly go with such performances in a contemporary Bollywood movie or, say, a highly promoted theatrical production.

One example of the incongruous appliances that we might see a dancer perform in front of is a refrigerator. Several years ago, my blogging friend Sitaji (of Bollywood Food Club) wrote a delightful post on the “Refrigerator Mujra.” She actually gave me a lot of credit in that post for my supposed expertise about the contemporary Pakistani mujra (which is definitely very different from the classical mujra). But that’s far from the only reason I liked it… I really liked that Sitaji had noticed these refrigerators in so many mujras, especially by two of the most prominent dancers, Nargis and her sister Deedar. I thought that was terrifically observant, and since that moment, I have looked for refrigerators in many of the dances that I’ve watched.

So, finally, after all this time, I have decided to write a post featuring a handful or so of dances done in front of refrigerators, tables, couches, etc., in kitchens, halls, living rooms… But these aren’t contemporary Pakistani mujras – which have their own particular risqué quality and do get some commercial attention for it, being broadcast on TV, sold by DVD companies, and promoted on tours, etc. No, these are dances – whether classical or more loosely improvised “Bollywood,” etc. – that genuinely look like performances that people – or, to be more precise in this case,  women – have taken the time to do at home.

Since I have been writing just now about kitchens and refrigerators, I thought we should start out with this “Fast Kathak,” one of several videos posted under the name Jasmin Bieber that take place in front of a refrigerator. I guess we can say that this is at the low end production-wise and this is someone who is just starting to do these kinds of videos. But I couldn’t help but notice how, most of the time, her dance is beautifully framed by the refrigerator behind her. In fact, this is the video that made me think about the “refrigerator mujras” all over again, and as soon as I saw this, I had to contact Sitaji, who also was very impressed. And the dancing is pretty nice, too.

This next dance is much more clearly videoed, and it is very nice to watch. The song comes from a 1972 film Bawarchi, and the dance was done by the actress then known as Jaya Badhuri. It’s not an easy act to follow, but I think this dancer named Akanksha Sharma definitely does it justice . But as you can see, she is dancing in front of a wall that badly needs painting, in a foyer outside of a room that might very well be a kitchen (and if it is not a kitchen, I would welcome any suggestions as to what it is).

I found the following Kuchipudi dance to be quite beautiful, to the point where I definitely could not watch it just once. The channel is in the name of Naga Durga, which must be the name of the dancer and/or her troupe. Other videos show that she does perform in theatrical settings, but I think the homey background in this video actually adds extra charm. I can’t completely tell if it is in a home, though. A couple of times, you can see that on the right there is an area that looks like part of a small beauty salon. Of course, it could be a salon that was set up in someone’s home.

This next one is a classical dance that probably just appeared on YouTube as I was writing an earlier part of this post. It’s a very pretty dance, but I am also impressed by the fully furnished background, including the plush leather couch, the night table, and the home entertainment system. This is a classic living room dance, by Anindita Neogy.

And last for this post – but certainly not least – I am going to include two dances by Shanelle Bell. I think it is fair to say that I would consider Shanelle to be the queen of home-based Bollywood dancing in the U.S. Her dances can have some very funny and risque qualities, so they might be the closest in spirit to the refrigerator mujras that Sitaji posted about. But Shanelle bases most of her dances on classic Bollywood films, and she usually adds English subtitles. (So, I have actually found her dance videos to be very informative, too.) I have been watching her dances for more than a year now, and I think she is getting better and better as time goes on.

This dance below – for everybody’s favorite Nagin song, “Man Dole Tan Dole” –  is done entirely in a narrow hallway, leading to what I presume is the front door of the apartment. At some point, especially past the 4:30 mark, you can see a room on the side that may very well be a kitchen. At first I got excited because I thought I saw a refrigerator, but then I realized that it’s probably just a cabinet.

The next dance (based on a song from Hema Malini’s first film) is positively splendid. There isn’t much furniture here, but I imagine it’s a bedroom or the central room in a small apartment. The tiles are very nice.

I have seen quite a few at-home dances that I would consider worthy to post here. (In fact, as I recall, I saw a fantastic classical dance in a bathroom.) Unfortunately, I didn’t bookmark them, and I didn’t have the idea to do a post like this until very recently. When I find – or re-find – a handful more of these dances, I will proabably write a sequel post. I may very well also write a post devoted entirely to Shanelle Bell.

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Note on April 6:  I have to add another one to the list (I didn’t want to wait for the sequel post). This is Aishu, and I think she is marvelous.

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P.S. The title for this post was inspired by Another Music in a Different Kitchen, an album released in 1978 by a British punk rock group called The Buzzcocks.

The Adivasi Chain Dances (Santali and Dhimsa)

A few months ago, when I was reading Ted Shawn’s dance travel book from the 1920s, I was very intrigued by his descriptions of the dances of the Adivasi group, the Santals, and also by his mention of the Oraons, a tribe whom  a colleague of his had written about. As I mentioned in my blog post where I discussed this book, Gods Who Dance, Shawn had been disappointed in the dances that he’d found by the famed “Nautch girls” but then became completely captivated by these Adivasi dances, which he discovered while taking a break from the main part of his tour. In fact, his response to these dancers was positively euphoric, and because he was a good writer, it is a euphoria that readers can easily catch from him.

Of course, after reading Shawn’s description, I had to look at some Santali dances (and then some dhimsa dances, which I’ll get back to in a little while), and I also was instantly captivated.

One thing that struck me about the Santali dances that I didn’t expect at first was that, while the men – who were mainly the musicians, too – did a relatively free-form kind of dancing (sometimes accompanied by acrobatics), the women did a dance of a very distinct and recognizable kind that I had seen many times before. Of course, if I had paid closer attention to the details of Shawn’s description (rather than just catching his enthusiasm), I would have realized what I would find:

The women lined up according to height, with hands linked and forearms laid against each other. The remained in this closed formation, the steps advancing and retreating, with a continuous progression to the left, and a marked pulse throughout the whole body which proceeded from the knees – not a hip movement or a shoulder movement, as one would first analyze it, but the movement of the body as a whole . . . .

All this time the women kept up their advancing and retreating steps with their arms joined, and by progressing always to the left, described a huge circumference around the dancing field. At times they bent low and made rhythmic motions as of gathering something from the ground.

The kind of dance that Shawn described – and that I recognized – is what’s known as a chain dance or circle dance. I had seen these dances performed mainly by Arabs from the Middle East and also by certain tribes in Turkey, most notably the Kurds.

Wikipedia contains a pretty good description of the chain dance/circle dance and its history:

Circle dance, or chain dance, is a style of dance done in a circle or semicircle to musical accompaniment, such as rhythm instruments and singing. Circle dancing is probably the oldest known dance formation and was part of community life from when people first started to dance.

Dancing in a circle is an ancient tradition common to many cultures for marking special occasions, rituals, strengthening community and encouraging togetherness. The dance can also be enjoyed as an uplifting group experience or as part of a meditation. Circle dances are choreographed to many different styles of music and rhythms.

Unlike line dancing, circle dancers are in physical contact with each other; the connection is made by hand-to-hand, finger-to-finger or hands-on-shoulders. It is a type of dance where anyone can join in without the need of partners. Generally, the participants follow a leader around the dance floor while holding the hand of the dancers beside them. The dance can be gentle or energetic.

For a couple of the reasons described above, I find the circle/chain dances to be refreshingly different from most dances that I have known. I appreciate that they are dances that do not require people to select partners, do not focus on one-to-one romances, and are open to everyone (or everyone of one or another gender, depending on the group that is dancing, etc.). Moreover, though they often have a leader, the circle/chain dances do not have individuals taking the proverbial spotlight more than anyone else. At the same time, there is a constant physical contact between all the dancers, but it is not the kind of contact associated with two people in a romance or anyone having an exclusive  connection with each other; it is all-inclusive and community-oriented (but, at the same time, I think, very warm).

The Wikipedia entry goes on to describe many places where circle dances and chain dances can be found, but, unless I’m missing something, it does not mention India. I guess that a lot of people don’t know that there are native tribes in India that take part in ancient chain dances, and it wasn’t something that I was aware of before, either. But after looking at some Indian chain dances, I am convinced that the Adivasis do this best.

As I mentioned  several paragraphs ago, in addition to dances labeled as Santali, I discovered a group of dances called dhimsa. The Oraons do dhimsa dancing, but so do several other tribes. And judging by the videos that I have seen, the dhimsa dances are even better – livelier and more varied, but still always kept within very tight chains or circles.

Below is a small selection of both Santali dances and dhimsa dances (alternating). I do not know if any of these scenes are particularly prominent or well known; they are just live dances put on YouTube that I saw and liked. And, of course, I hope the people who are reading this will like them a lot, too.

Cuckoo Did Get A Mention Here On Her Birthday This Year…

Well, it’s February 5, so it’s no longer Cuckoo’s birthday, and I didn’t get a Cuckoo birthday post up in time. But she did actually get a mention here on her birthday. If you go to the comments listed in the sidebar (though I should add, this will apply only if you’re reading this post while it’s relatively new), you’ll see new comments to the old post Discussion, Info and Great Pics Related to the Earliest Appearances of Cuckoo (thanks to Mel!), This is because there is a new person visiting the post who is going to try to follow a new lead (from family sources) to find out more information quite possibly regarding Cuckoo’s husband, K.S. More (or Moray).

It will be great if we end up getting some new information to add to the huge amount of Cuckoo-related info that’s accumulated in this post (and prior ones), but even if that doesn’t work, I am delighted that people keep returning to the Cuckoo post(s), and I’d be happy to see that go on forever.

But meanwhile, as I have said, I have ideas for some more new posts going in a slightly different direction from the old movie topics, and I think another one will be up soon…

 

Odd(itie)s and Ends, Joys of Fusion, and Blogging Restlessness

Within the past year, I think I have written about half a dozen posts that I didn’t ever finish. One problem I have had, as I see it, is that I have gotten too stuck on the idea that I have to write a comprehensive – or at least cohesive – post on one thing that is somehow related to the area where this blog has been most concentrated over the past few years. But, at the same time, I guess I have gotten a little restless. I post a lot of different things on Facebook (in addition to the things related to the stuff people are so used to here), but Facebook posts are by nature very fleeting. The answer to this problem, I think, is either to start a new blog (in addition to this one, that is) or to change the direction of this blog somewhat. Well, actually, I already have started changing it again; the question is how far to go.

For this month, I have decided to write a post that is a little more scattered and eclectic than usual, which may signal a direction for other posts to come. I also decided that I don’t have to work around one coherent theme, but it seems that I actually did end up with a theme (which I hope you also will see) . . .

For a long time, I have wanted to write a post about Tanya Wells. Ms. Wells is a British woman who has become somewhat renowned for her performance of ghazals and other music from the traditions of India and Pakistan. She is a great singer and deserves recognition just for that. But, of course, some people also make a big deal about the fact that a “white” woman has become so knowledgeable and accomplished in these styles. I have read interviews with Tanya in which she talked about how she has ghazals and other Indian or Pakistani music playing through her headphones all the time and doesn’t even want to listen to anything else. And I know exactly what that is like, because I was close to being that way for a while, myself. The big difference between us, of course, is that I can’t sing to save my life. (And that is kind of ironic, considering that my last name is Singer!) But one big thing that I do have in common with Tanya is that I also have this special kind of musical appreciation that some people have told me is “amazing” (though what they really might have meant was “freaky”), considering my own nationality and origins. I don’t really know why it should strike anybody as amazing, because it is very easy to find ghazals and old Indian and Pakistani film music – especially these days – even if you live in the U.S. or U.K. or in any of a whole lot of other countries far away from India. But anyway…

Here is Tanya Wells singing “Gulon Mein Rang Bhare” by Faiz Ahmed Faiz (and Mehdi Hassan).

By the way, if this makes you think about a North American qawwali group that I have written about previously called Fanna-Fi-Allah Sufi Qawwali, I believe they and Tanya have actually shared some of the same promotion and/or booking agents. So, they actually have more in common than their seemingly unusual musical affinities.

Of course, there are also a few contemporary “white” dancers who became famous for their accomplishments in Indian classical dance, and I might write about them or include them in another post sometime. But for now, I wanted to mention a phenomenon that is almost a converse of that (if not exactly): There are quite a few people of Indian origin who have been doing Indian classical dances to modern Western pop music. If you go to YouTube, you can probably find hundreds of examples of that.

More than a few people can be found on YouTube doing Bharatanatyam dances to Sia, who happens to be one of my favorite contemporary pop singers (at least among those who are very popular right now). I guess part of the reason for that is that Sia is an obvious choice for someone who wants to try out dance moves in general. Sia’s hits are intended to be dance music, and her videos and live performances are focused on dance. In fact, they feature excellent modern dancers, and they almost always star the highly talented – and now world-famous – American prodigy named Maddie Ziegler. (I can’t quite picture Maddie doing Bharatanatyam, but she still is very young, so I wouldn’t rule out the possibility – if she were given the right training.)

The Sia-based Bharatanatyam dance performances that I have seen cover a pretty wide range, too. I can think of one that I saw that combines Bharatanatyam with a very modern kind of dance and modern clothing, and another one in which the dancer is dressed in very full Indian dance attire. The one below falls somewhere in between, and it is my favorite. I like the way it combines a traditional Bharatanatyam approach (including very well performed storytelling elements) with a nice, gritty urban backdrop. I also like the fact that this dancer (identified on YouTube as Tanvi Karekar) keeps the focus on her dance, not depending on props, costuming, etc. And there is something very sweet about her performance, too; in fact, she’s damn near adorable.

I have recently read another book on dance and dance history (thanks again to the NY Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center), but this one isn’t about Indian dance or modern dance; it’s about Arab dance. Arab dance, of course, is another style that I have become very fond of, thanks in great part to my viewing of Golden Age films from Egypt. (As you may know, I always refer to this style as “belly dance” – which seems OK in most circles, though I understand that it is basically a Western and “colonialist” term.)

The book is Serpent of the Nile: Women and Dance in the Arab World, by Wendy Buonaventura. And it is quite informative about the history of that subject, though I wish it discussed the technique(s) a little more (like some of the books I’ve read on Indian dance). The writing also is not quite as intellectually intriguing to me as in some of the books that I’ve read on Indian dance, but it does make very interesting points, with highly quotable passages. Sometime in the future, I might write a more full review of this book and provide a few quotes. (I’ll do that right after I write the other longer reviews that I said I would write.) But right now I would like to include just one quote, because this is where Ms. Buonaventura makes a good point about the intermingling of Arab and Western cultures over the centuries. This quote makes for a very good answer to those who want to spend all their time talking about Western “colonialist” “appropriation” and the evils of Orientalism. Contradicting this sort of orthodoxy – which I have heard a lot of, myself, in recent times – Ms. Buonaventura says:

The current, widely held view of Orientalism derives from Edward Said’s thesis that the West has exploited, misunderstood and even invented the East for its own sinister purposes. From the wealth of material available, it is easy to select examples to suit this theory and ignore those which do not. However, Orientalist attitudes to the Middle East are as varied as human beings. An obsession with European colonialism has unfortunately blinded many critics to the complex interrelationship which has existed between Europe and the Arab-Islamic world for hundreds of years. This obsession has merely served to prolong the misunderstanding which exists between them. Many Europeans who went to the Arab world compared the life they found there favorably with that of Europe.

It is not that I would deny a lot of the evils of colonialism (nor imperialism or capitalism – your blogger here happens to be a leftist), but I am strongly opposed to those who are always protesting against artists in the West who adapt forms or genres that do not belong to their “own” (perceived or supposed) heritage. Unfortunately, some of those protesters are especially eager to target artists who are motivated (often by a love of multiple cultures) to attempt some kind of fusion.

Contemporary fusion actually contributed a lot to my own discovery of older, Eastern genres. Of course, Bollywood is, itself, a constant experiment in fusion. But I might not have gotten so much of a taste for old Indian film music had I not heard it being emulated and sampled so much in rock music and dance music originating in the U.S. and U.K. And I might never have grown up with a taste for Indian music in general if I had not heard George Harrison bringing it to the U.S. and U.K. when I was a small child.

When I first started a blog at this URL – all the way back in the summer of 2007 – my main intention was to blog about fusion music, especially the kind of fusion that mixes very contemporary pop (usually electronica) with the classical and folk music found in different parts of South Asia. (As some people know, this blog’s URL and original title were named after a line in an M.I.A. song. And there was actually a direct connection between M.I.A. and some of the Indian film music that I discovered. Never mind “Jimmy Aaja”; I would not have discovered Ilaiyaraaja in the summer of 2007 had I not traced a sample of his music from M.I.A.’s “Bamboo Banga.”) But then I became so enamored with old Indian films and film music – and also so caught up in talking about these things with other bloggers – that within six months, this became an Indian film blog. And by 2009, it became a blog devoted very much to Indian films from the Vintage Era and the Golden Age.

More recently, though (as I was saying above), I’ve gotten the urge to diversify again – at least somewhat. But unlike with some of my fellow “Bolly” bloggers, that doesn’t mean writing more about contemporary films or Hollywood films. I guess that’s because my primary interest was never cinema as much as it was music and dance. So, I might delve a little more into contemporary music, with a more eclectic range. That might mean taking this blog full circle, more or less (though in a much more informed way this time around). Or, it might mean avoiding so much disruption to the present blog by creating a new one that picks up where this one left off nine years ago. I haven’t predicted which way I’ll go in the long run because I have no idea yet, myself. If anyone out there has any opinions regarding how I should proceed, I’ll be happy to see them, whether in comments here or in private e-mail. But I’m not guaranteeing that I will follow anyone’s ideas because, ultimately, I do all of this blogging for one person – namely, me. And when other people get interested, too, that’s more or less a coincidence – though it has generally been happy one.

More Delicious Chutney Covers of Hindi Film Songs

At the height of the heat last summer, I wrote my introductory post on the delicious mix of Indian and Caribbean sounds known as Chutney. Since that time, I have enjoyed a lot more Chutney, and I hope to make it an ongoing subject in this blog. This time around, though, I just wanted to post a few more Chutney music or dance covers of Hindi film songs.

I am going to start out with the cover that inspired me to do this post. This is a real gem! Shirvani Sookhai (aka the Sunshine Girl) does a marvelously charming version of a song from one of the best Hindi films of the 1960s.

I decided not to post the originals for all the Hindi film songs that I’m including here (which would actually take a lot of effort, especially for the clips that include multiple songs). But in a couple of cases, I just can’t resist. Here is the classic original, from Teesri Kasam:

The Sunshine Girl is from Trinidad, and most Chutney music that I have found comes from either Trinidad or Guyana. But, of course, the Chutney performers don’t always have to be located in the Caribbean. There are several nice dances on YouTube from the Nrityarupa Dance Group in New York. They perform quite a few dances to Chutney music, but they are also obviously fond of Hindi film songs. Here’s their take on “Bumbro”:

This next video is form another event in New York, benefiting a charity in Guyana, I like this dancer a lot. It’s too bad I can’t identify the dancer right now (because neither does the video), but I will add her name to this post if/when I find out who she is. She dances to snippets of a few Hindi film songs, which may be somewhat Caribbeanized – or at least they are made to seem so via the bass-heavy sound system.

Drupatee (from Trinidad) is one of the major Chutney artists of the past few decades. In this contemporary live performance, she performs a few of her hits. At the beginning, though, she also performs a song made famous by Nazia Hassan. Unfortunately, the video is far from perfect – at one point, it even freezes up for a number of seconds – but it’s still well worth a look and listen.

Kavita Ramkissoon is referred to on several videos as the “Chutney Empress.” But unlike most of her Chutney numbers, this next one is not very Caribbean-sounding at all. On the other hand, I thought it would be great for a post in this blog, because it is an interesting cover of a beautiful classic Hindi film song from 1965.

And this, of course, is another case where I must post the original!

That’s about it for the present post, but there will be more Chutney soon enough. And one day, I might just write a whole post devoted to the Sunshine Girl.

A Few Words About the NYPL Library for the Performing Arts and Reviews of A Few Books That I Got There

I. The Library

I know I’ve posted about the vintage films I’ve been able to find at the New York Public Library’s Mid-Manhattan branch, but I am not sure I’ve given an appropriate tribute to the NYPL’s Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center. I have found a very good bunch of books at this library, and I am never disappointed by it.

I know that the Library for the Performing Arts was given deserved praise in an a blog post a couple of years ago – in Cinema Nryta Gharana, that is, where Cassidy Minai talked about her once-in-a-lifetime (so far) trip there, when she spent a whole day researching the library’s archives with Ragothaman of Bharatanatyam and the World Wide Web. I actually met them during that visit, but I arrived only for the last half hour, which is the usual amount of time that I give myself.

I will have to set aside a good several hours for that library sometime. It is a very nice environment to be in, much more aesthetically pleasing and comfortable than the branch at Midtown (as one would expect, since it is at Lincoln Center). But my visits usually end up being for no more than half an hour (and sometimes less than that) because I always end up rushing in too late after having to do other things and underestimating the time I would have and then having to check my stuff out in a hurry because it’s closing time. The “check my stuff out” part of that is also something significantly different from the experience of someone who goes there to research. I have spent time in the research room upstairs once in a long while (again, without giving myself enough time), but my main purpose for going there usually is to rush in to get something that I can read at home or, more importantly, read on the buses and subways. And, much to my surprise, even in those rushed visits, I always find good things.

II. The Books

Possibly by coincidence – or maybe as cause and effect – my increase in visits to the Library for Performing Arts has coincided with my desire to try to contribute a little more space on this blog to talking about things that I read. Of course, this is mainly a music, film, and dance blog, but sometimes my knowledge about all these things gets enhanced by a lot of reading, and sometimes it actually comes from old fashioned hard copy with a nice cover and a spine. So, I’d like to devote the second half of this post to just a few books that I have picked up at this library in the past year. These are not all books about Indian films (in fact, only one is, and it’s my least favorite), but three out of the four are mostly about Indian dance (and dancers) which I often consider to be just as important.

Actually, the first book that I want to write about discusses Indian dance and dancers in ways that are not only important but also unique…

1. Sweating Saris: Indian Dance as Transnational Labor by Priya Srinivasan: I had been planning to write a more full review of this book, and one day I will. But I need to set aside the time to write a review that will do it justice, because I was highly impressed by much of the splendid writing as well as the fascinating mix of social themes and the sometimes dazzling leaps of internal thought association. The book centers on a century or so of the social history of Indian classical dancers visiting the United States, performing in this country, and immigrating here (with different levels of difficulty, depending on the time in history). In its relation of that social history, it delves quite a lot into how much Indian classical dancing in the U.S. is a kind of immigrant labor (for the most part), unique in special ways but also very much like other kinds of immigrant labor. Sometimes the analysis touches on Marxism (even paraphrasing lines from Capital  at one point),  but other times, Srinivasan refers to the ideas of various more contemporary or postmodern social theorists who’ve written about national and ethnic identities.

One good chunk of the book actually is a kind of social mystery story, involving a search for the true roots of the dances of Ruth St. Denis, especially the sources of her dance education. The solution to this mystery turns out to be very different from the usual legends surrounding Ruth St. Denis; in fact, it turns into a kind of expose revealing likely blatant appropriation. (The nature of that appropriation is cultural and then some: We learn that some male Indian dancers who apparently tutored St. Denis were not at all recognized for the effort and were probably paid poorly and employed under bad conditions. The story does not reflect well on this pioneer of American modern dance.)

[Ruth St. Denis]

The chapter about St. Denis probably contains the most interesting factual content in this book, but the quality of the book comes less from the facts it relates than from Srinivasan’s imaginative analytical observations, which she often relates as thoughts that came into her mind while she was involved in very unspectacular activities, such as researching in the library, buying a sari, or watching a colleague’s dance performance. (A dance performance can be spectacular to watch, but she relates one instance in which she was actually half asleep while watching one, and she shows how her mind drifted in a half-dreamlike state into very interesting range of memories and associations.) Once in a while, the writing gets a bit too academic, but it seems that this was done deliberately in order to satisfy the demands of colleagues or maybe “superiors” from the university (something that I have seen happen a few times before). Fortunately, though, there is little of the repetition that we see in other academic works. The writing is surprisingly economical, as though Ms. Srinivasan really did contemplate the meaning and usefulness of every word.

Sometime in the future, when I am able to take time to review the book more thoroughly, I will bring out a bunch of quotes to illustrate why I like the writing here so much. But right now – especially since I am trying to stick to (relatively) short reviews – you’ll have to take my word for it – and/or try to find a copy of the book to look at, yourself, which I highly recommend.

[Ted Shawn]

2. Gods Who Dance by Ted Shawn: Speaking of Ruth St. Denis, I was pleased to find this book written in the mid to late 1920s by Ted Shawn, Ms. St. Denis’ then-husband as well as partner in dance and choreography. It is a somewhat quaint chronicle by Shawn of a tour with St. Denis’ dance company through Asia, North Africa, and Spain. A theme runs through the book about how all these cultures had dancing gods because dance was the first great art form of civilization (or something like that), but it’s related pretty minimally and is prominent out only in the first chapter, when Shawn talks a little about the dancing god Shiva. There are three chapters focused specifically on dances on the Indian mainland and a couple of more chapters on related countries (such as the one that was called Ceylon at the time). Out of all the dances, Shawn seemed to be most disappointed in the “nautch girls” of North India, probably because he expected so much of them (they had been a big inspiration for his work with Ruth St. Denis). Also, it’s clear that he wrote this book prior to the great 20th century revival of Indian classical dance and the production of so many films that featured it.

Shawn seems to have the most affection for Adivasi dancers such as the Santals and Kurukhs, as well as for some of the Devadasis in the Hindu temples. It’s clear that he has greater affection for dancers from societies that he considers more primitive, and in his descriptions of the Adivasi dancers, he clearly praises these tribes in terms of their being noble savages. His descriptions would be considered politically incorrect in the present day, but anybody reading this book will be very much aware that it’s a product of its times, and these descriptions add to the quaintness. Additionally, Shawn expresses a sense of wonder at the sight of all these dances that was probably very different from what any famous American dancer/choreographer would feel today, due to the fact today, any one of us (famous or not) could find these traditional dances on a video, or, if we’re lucky, witness them in some “global” show on a stage. Shawn actually was a good writer overall, so when we read his expressions of wonder, the wonder becomes contagious, helping to make many parts of this book enjoyable.

3. Indian Film by Erik Barnouw and S. Krishnaswamy: This is apparently a famous book. My blogging and Facebook friend Surjit Singh said that it was considered the main academic source on Indian films before a “flood” of other academic works that occurred in recent decades. It does contain a lot of information, but I found the writing to be very dry, and the book is cluttered with too many intricate details about the economics of the industry. I actually am someone who is interested in how the workers fare in any industry (hence my strong interest in the approach of Sweating Saris), but I am not that captivated by the sight of tedious charts showing the proportion of money going to each kind of worker and other charts listing every production company for numerous different languages and the company’s output, etc. Actually, I could have gotten more interested if the writing around those charts had some more life to it. I was happy to see details about some of the developing trends in periods that most interested me, like the ‘30s and ‘40s (and these decades are also the most extensively chronicled, even though this book was written in the early ‘60s). I was therefore glad to get all the information that I got from it, but at the same time, I wasn’t that unhappy when I had to part with it to check it back into the library.

4. Kathak by Shovana Narayan. This is actually one of several in a small series, Dances of India, published by Wisdom Tree. I saw some others in the series, and each was in the same nicely put together format, combining the text with very pretty photos by Avinash Pasricha. I flipped through the book on Bharatanatyam, but the Kathak edition was the one that caught my attention the most. Partly, I guess it is because I know about the author (she is renowned) and I had watched videos of her dances. But part of the reason is that Kathak really has become my favorite Indian classical dance, and I am very happy to learn all I can about it. The book informs about Kathak in a direct and basic way: It tells about the different features of the dance, and it also tells a little about the history. I must admit that I don’t remember any high points in the writing – no particular passages that really impressed me, etc. – but maybe that is partly because I borrowed this book close to a year ago, before all the others that I’m mentioning here. On the other hand, I know that I did learn from it. Shovana Narayan has apparently written quite a few books on Indian dance, so obviously, a good number of people like to read her (no doubt including some of the good number who like to see her dance). Thinking about this, I guess I would like to see some of the other books that she’s written. Maybe I will find them in future trips to this excellent library, where I will try, at least once, to set aside a more substantial amount of time to browse and even do research.