Dada's Ballet Master with Prakriti Ananda
On returning to Kolkata, I went to meet Dada immediately. Rehearsals had already begun in Film Service studios which were on the ground floor of Dada’s house. When I went in, Dada was just coming down the stairs for the rehearsals. I touched his feet and paid my respects. Dada embraced me joyfully and thumped my back enthusiastically with the Geetobitan that he was carrying in his hand. This rare display of affection and the emotion behind it is something that I cherish with immense fondness and gratitude even today.
Within a few days of our rehearsals, Dada appointed me as the Ballet Master of his troupe. My responsibilities included coaching the troupe and perfecting their movements, as well as composing and choreographing a few of the dances for the new production.
The production this time round was to be Prakriti - Ananda. Based on a Budhhist Jataka tale, Rabindranath Tagore’s dance drama Chandalika and his poem by the name Prakriti Ananda formed the basis of this production.
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When I had joined Dada’s troupe in 1960 for Samanya Kshati, or even during our preparations for our 1968 tour, I had witnessed Uday Shankar as a teacher and a dancer. I did not have the opportunity to see him work on his choreography or compose since most of the items had already been composed and were just handed over to the dancers; and then of course, perfected painstakingly. This was the first time that I got to see up close Dada in his creative avatar.
The dance-drama used to begin with the three main characters appearing on stage one at a time, under the centre spotlight to different sets of music which defined their characters. First came Prakriti’s mother, then Ananda and finally Prakriti herself. This gave way to the first dance of the dance drama.
The first dance, “Nabo bashontero danero daali”, which celebrates the joyous ambience of spring, was composed in a unique way. This dance saw Dada extract from his dancers their creative best. Like the improvisation classes, he gave every dancer the song and told them to think about it and create their own movements for that particular piece. He then called in each dancer individually and asked them to demonstrate their composition. After they had performed, Dada would add his creative inputs to improve the dance, and then ask the dancer to remember the movements. He would then call in the next dancer. This was repeated for all the dancers. Dada then asked everyone to get up and perform their individual compositions in tandem with the song. The impression that this created on stage was that everyone, inspired by the beauty of spring, was expressing their joy through dance in their own special way.
As far as the choreography was concerned in terms of usage of space, the dancers used to sit on the stage, facing each other in vertically parallel lines from the audience. The girls would sit on one side near the wings, while the boys sat on the other side near the opposite set of wings. The first part of the song would be performed by the girls alone in the manner described above. The second half of the song was performed in pairs. There were 4 pairs. A male and a female dancer would get up from their respective sides, perform a duet to a verse and then go and sit in their respective places. In the third and final part of the song, the boys exited the stage, and only the girls performed in the same way as in the first part.
The next group dance was “Mati toder daak diyeche”. Apart from a few new movements, this dance included folk movements of Dada’s own style, which he had previously used in Harvest Dance, Grass Cutter, Khadya and Bramhaputra. Apart from this dance based on Tagore’s song, Dada had added another piece of folk dance based purely on instrumental music, which preceded this song. Here again the vigour and the liveliness of the movements set it apart and gave it a distinct rural flavor when compared to the spirited dance of the first scene and later on the rigorous dances in the ‘mantra’ scenes of the dance-drama.
But the best composition of this dance-drama was probably the two dances that Dada had composed for the songs of the Buddhist monks. Dada used purely decorative and spiritual movements for this composition keeping in mind while composing, the melody and the spirit of the songs. I still feel that no other composition or choreography can better what he did for these two songs of “Jo sannisinno barabodhimule” and “Swarnobarne samujjalo nabo champadole”.
The last major group dance sequence was the ‘mantra’ portion which portrays Prakriti’s mother using her maya or special powers to bring Anando to Prakriti, in order to fulfill her daughter’s unrequited love. To reflect the power of the magic Dada created and added to Tagore’s creativity. In a few instances he did away with the songs and the lyrics and sought to depict the strength of the sorcery through the vigorous and intoxicating movements of Madia, a folk dance of Madhya Pradesh. He sought to interpret the heightened trance created by this magic through a bewitching swaying movement, an inspiration from his childhood days in Rajasthan where he had witnessed up-close the practice of black magic.
Another aspect that Dada added to Tagore’s work was in showcasing the power of the mirror that reflected the torment created on Ananda as he was being slowly but irrevocably pulled towards Prakriti by the force of her mother’s maya. Any mirror that had the power to reflect this torment was undoubtedly extraordinarily powerful. To convey the strength of this mirror, he created a separate dance around it.
I incorporated many of Dada’s own movements, while composing the dance for the mantra scenes, like for example, movements from Labour and Machinery. In a few instances, Dada asked me to change the sequence of the steps, and truly the dance became more enhanced. This was the hallmark of Dada’s choreography – small movements should precede larger movements or else the impact created by the big movement would be lost. I also incorporated a few movements from Kathakali, while composing the scene where Prakriti’s mother dances with her disciples as I felt the style’s inherent boldness would add to the scene. Dada not only approved of these compositions, but also appreciated them as well.
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Images: Private collection of Shanti Bose
Dada also added a new dimension through his interpretation of two other smaller roles in the dance-drama − the characters of the Curd Seller and the Bangle Seller. Neither of them sold their wares to Prakriti when they realized that she was an Untouchable. However, Dada portrayed through his composition, a difference in their reactions. The Curd Seller was shown to react by cursing her, while the Bangle Seller was depicted to be compassionate and expressed his sympathy for her. These small touches somehow gave these characters a personality of their own in these otherwise relatively small roles.
I used to perform the role of the Bangle Seller. The entry step was a step from a Naga dance taught by our Manipuri Guruji during my days at the Academy. Dada used to love watching me perform this step. He used to say, “You float in the air – your feet don’t seem to touch the stage when you perform that step.” So much so, that despite the fact that he himself used to enact the role of Lord Buddha at the end of the ballet, he used to sit in the front row of the audience till I had finished my role as the Bangle Seller. This kind of encouragement and the knowledge that Dada was out there in the audience, inspired me to put in better than my best.
Another addition that Dada made to the original version of Tagore’s Chandalika was that the mother’s disciples were shown to drag in Ananda, enchained in the forces of black magic and temptation. The appearance of Lord Buddha at the end of the dance-drama to recall Ananda to his spiritual life was also another novel interpretation made by Dada.
The IBT dancers, who joined Dada’s troupe at this point, apart from me, included Dhurjati, Shankaranda, Jharna Dutta, Shubhra Ghosh, Bani Bandana and Sunanda Sen Gupta. Sunanda and I later got married in 1970, just prior to our preparations for Shankarscope. Other than the dancers from IBT, the dancers who joined the troupe were Sadhan Guha and Polly Guha, Chandranath and Pranati Sen Gupta. Pranati had been a part of Dada’s troupe during Samanya Kshati in 1962. A magnificent dancer, with a very strong base in Kathakali, Dada had sent for Pranati to enact the role of Prakriti’s mother.
About a year before Prakriti Ananda, renowned Rabindrasangeet artist Subinoy Roy had presented Chandalika. I was in charge of the dance direction. Jharna had played the role of Prakriti in this presentation of Chandalika. When I informed Dada about this, Dada agreed to let Jharna enact the role of Prakriti in his production too. We rehearsed painstakingly for almost three months. During this period Dada was not financially strong enough to maintain a troupe. Nonetheless, the troupe members, out of their sheer love and respect for Dada and his art form, dedicated themselves to the production without any salary unlike previous times. They only received a very nominal sum by way of conveyance fare.
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The instrumental music for the Prakriti Ananda was composed after the dance compositions had been completed. The emphasis on music was laid not only to give a free flow to dance as compared to the limitations that can be faced due to the lyrics of the song, but also because, whenever Dada composed, he always did so keeping an international audience in mind. The lyrics of the song could not be understood by non-Bengalis. For the same reason, he shortened many of Prakriti’s songs as well, but the basic outline of the story of Chandalika remained unchanged.
The musicians for Prakriti Ananda comprised Kamalesh Maitra on the sarod, Barun Dutta on the tabla and percussion, Vishnudas Sadhukhan on the flute, Soumen Ghosh on the taarsanai and Kishore Ghosh on the sitar. As far as the vocals were concerned, Arghya Sen used to render the part of Ananda and the Bangle Seller, Krishna Gupta used to sing the part of Prakriti’s mother, Papia Bagchi used to impart her voice for Prakriti, and Kamal Gupta the Curd Seller. These artists other than singing for their respective characters also sang in unison for the group songs.
Before composing the music for Prakriti Ananda, Kamaleshda used to note down the counting and the repetitions for each movement. Then he would compose the music and play it for Dada. Sometimes Dada made him rewrite the music even thrice because he did not get what he had in mind, or if he felt that they did not suit the movements of the dance. This was evident even more so in the mantra scene, where Dada wanted various kinds of effect music. A perfectionist to the core, Dada never compromised or settled for anything less than perfect for his production and that applied to music as well. Apart from extracting the exact music that he wanted from Kamaleshda, Dada would also extract different rhythms from Barunda’s tabla. Barunda not only played the tabla, but various other percussion items in Dada’s collection. It was amazing to see the dexterity with which his hands moved from one instrument to another, all arranged around him as per his convenience.
Partly due to financial reasons and partly due to the novelty it would cause, we did not have any costumes in the true sense of the term like we did in our previous productions. The girls would be donned in everyday colourful cotton saris, while the men would wear white dhoti kurtas in the first sequence and continue in the same dress for the folk dance. Only the Buddhist monks and Ananda would be dressed in saffron robes. Of course, later in the mantra scene, we changed into a different set of costumes.
A very interesting incident happened at the rehearsals one day. I am narrating this as an example to show how Dada got his ideas from very simple everyday events, but when incorporated on stage, they added on a whole new dimension. Sunanda used to have and still has very thick, long and curly hair. One day, during our rehearsals of the mantra scene, her plait opened. Sunanda continued dancing without stopping to redo her hair. At the end of the dance, Dada said that for the mantra scene, all the girls would dance with their hair left open as it gave an additional sway to their movements, and this truly enhanced the dance. Of course, it implied more rehearsals for now the head movements too had to be coordinated minutely so that swaying of the hair was also completely synchronized.
We started our stage rehearsals at Mahajati Sadan three or four days before our performance with full costume and stage lights. Unlike Samanya Kshati, where the musicians handled the lights, for Prakriti Ananda, that was not the case as the music was not recorded. The lights, which were Dada’s own, were handled by Golok Sheel and Shambhu Mukherjee. Of course, supervising them was Dada’s own trusted Shahji.
We staged Prakriti Ananda in Mahajati Sadan for almost four months at a stretch. We performed one show every evening during the weekdays and two shows during weekends – both on Saturdays as well as Sundays. After performing continuously for four months, Dada gave us a break for about a month. We returned from our break and started rehearsing Prakriti Ananda again at Birla Academy, but this time for a tour of Assam. Before we left for our tour of Assam, we also performed in a few places like Ranchi and Burnpur. Our first show in Assam was held in the city of Guwahati, and our last performance in Dimapur. Dada fell ill after our performance at Dimapur. Later we got to know that he had suffered a mild stroke. We returned to Calcutta by train. Dada flew in after a few days once he had recovered enough to travel. This was in December, 1966.
Boudi had ceased to be a part of Dada’s productions from Prakriti Ananda. She was not even a part of our tour of the USA in 1968, nor for Shankarscope in 1970, 1971 and 1972.
