Blending clssical Indian and New Age forms, Tanusree Shankar embarks on a spiritual exploration through dance

In celebration of their 20th anniversary, The UK based Tagore Centre undertook their first tour of Britain. Central to this tour was the dance ‘Chirantan’, meaning ‘Eternal’, performed by the Tanusree Shankar Dance Company. ‘Chirantan’ began in London at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, South Bank, and went on to venues in Glasgow, Kent, Durham and Birmingham.  This dance piece blends classical Indian styles and Western New Age forms, a fusion typical of the principal choreographer, Tanusree Shankar.

The Tagore Centre, based in London, is an organisation dedicated to upholding the legacy of the nobel prize winning Rabindranath Tagore (the first awardee outside Europe). ‘The Visva-Bharati University’, or Santiniketan, was established by Tagore in 1922 to bring cultures, in Tagore’s words, “into more intimate relation with one another for a common fellowship meeting of East and West, which would strengthen the fundamental conditions of world peace”. In keeping with this sentiment, the Tagore Centre is interested in encouraging dialogue between cultures through education and cultural activities, including contemporary Bengali literature, music and dance. Henceforth, the centre’s multi-lingual library contains translations of Tagore’s work from Bengali into Urdu, Hindi, Gujurati, German, Serb-Croat, Polish, Russian, Spanish, French and Japanese.

Tanusree Shankar, based in Kolkata, India, trained as a dancer for seven years under Amala Shankar, wife of the esteemed Uday Shankar. She has developed a style of choreography stemming from music composed by her late husband, Ananda Shankar, whom she married in 1974. Ananda Shankar, nephew of Ravi Shankar, was keenly interested in fusing Western and Indian instrumentation and styles. He counted Jimi Hendrix among his pupils and more recently his music has been sought and sampled by West Coast rappers and Anglo-Asian breakbeat artists. In his later years, he collaborated with Tanusree  composing music for her dance troupe’s productions.

Tanusree Shankar bases her compositions on the Uday Shankar Technique of ‘New Age Dance’ and still performs today in her dance pieces. She has established herself as a leading choreographer and has toured extensively to more than thirty five countries over the years. At the South Bank, Tanusree Shankar presented the performance ‘Akash’ followed by ‘Chirantan’. The Dance Troupe performed to a full house, comprising a majority Bengali crowd. The evening began with ‘Akash’, in which the music, composed by Ananda Shankar and Taufiq Qureshi, was a mixture of contemporary riffs and classical sounds. The programme reads:
“Thousands of years ago, sages of India had conceived of the idea of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam – which means ‘the world is one family’. Science and technology have now converted what was once only a vision in the minds of sages into a reality…unfortunately, we human beings have divided our mother earth with boundaries and walls- but it is only the sky that has no demarcation line. The sky is a symbol of oneness, one world – suggesting the old vedic Indian truth – Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam.”

The different aspects of the sky are presented in a series of performances with the dancers dressing to fit the corresponding mood and emotion. In the energetic and physical ‘Storm/Thunder/Lightning’, five male dancers are dressed in baggy silken clothes, headbands and silver cummerbunds. Across the chests of their costumes were thunder signs. The combination of costume and new age dance moves, gave ‘Akash’ a particularly  eighties feel. This continued throughout the piece as we moved through green velveteen, red and gold trimmed costumes, dark capes, and more headbands. For ‘Morning’, beautiful male vocals and a vibrant red backdrop set the scene  for three saree clad dancers. The backdrop then becomes a warm orange accentuating the dancers gentle flowing movements. In ‘Sunny/Celebration’, the costumes are very colourful as the dancers pair up and perform a more celebratory, fun piece with connotations of rural, harvest festivities. The performance ends with ‘Yearning Love’ with Tanusree Shankar in the lead role, accompanied by five male dancers. The voiceover for the dance contextualising the narrative:
“The oneness of the eternal sky inspires the future generation to seek a spiritual awakening… They feel they are all one, but wait for the day when fragmentation and division will make way for a united and a peaceful world – a world of harmony, friendship and love. Love is supreme and has the power to heal the world. Pratiksha or yearning signifies the longing to be united with the loves ones”
The concept for ‘Chirantan’, her most recent production, is taken from Tagore’s work, with the unmistakeable voice of the actor, Amitabh Bachchan, narrating Tagore’s lines. Debajyoti Mishra arranged the music, combining elements of Latin American, Japanese, Baroque and Tagore’s tunes to create the score. The performance opens with the sound of a  prayer, then Bachchan speaks:

“God’s creation is truly marvelous and our world ever so beautiful. Reality however, is  hatred, war and intolerance all around. There is turmoil and strife among the people…”

A ’sea’ of  red veils fill the stage within which the dancers collapse. They emerge anew to their surroundings and appear grief stricken and full of despair. As the stage becomes drenched in orange, the movements of the dancers are imbued with strength and appear more peaceful. Again a prayer fills the air as Bachchan says:

“Through the darkness and desolation a flicker of light emerges. Hope shines like the Morning Star. It lifts the veil of the desperate night to let the illuminating Love light up our lives. Love so eternal, pervades all things and shines on. It lights up our lives and brightens the darkest of times. Love, like the morning sun scatters the darkness of the the night…Love begets peace, tranquillity and universal harmony.”

During this narration, the sun appears on the backdrop, a large orange circle. The dancers look like they are involved in a worshipping of the Sun. The movements of the dancers on stage are synchronised and they appear united.  The piece ends with a ‘chunni’ thrown by each member, filled with small pieces of paper that fill the air of the stage. The acting was melodramatic throughout, lending a high drama to both ‘Akash’ and ‘Chirantan’.

The performances both had a strong spiritual base, taking as their central theme how we can overcome the harshness of contemporary living by remaining true to our paths of spiritual exploration. This journey and belief in God and  Love are here offered as a means of  coping, even of salvation. If these are beliefs that resonate with your own, no doubt this is a very inspiring and affirming piece of work. Without this belief system, however, these performances can appear overwhelmingly like an ode to God and the spiritual zeal that accompanies this. Interestingly, although firmly rooted in traditions of classical Indian movements, the dances at times appeared a little dated, this perhaps reflecting the New age wing of the fusion.

In choosing the dances of Tanusree Shankar, the Tagore Centre have selected work that is imbued not only with great beauty and grace, but also with heavy overtones of God and religious belief.  Internationalism and sensitivity to the fundamental unity of man is perhaps Tagore’s lasting legacy to the world.  In his poetry, plays, music and painting, Tagore commented on humanity. ‘Chirantan’ explores elements of this rich legacy but perhaps limits itself to appealing to ‘believers’ alone. Tagore’s explorations of humanity seem to allow for a wider stroke of the brush.

Nov/Dec 2005
Ritu Sood is an artist and writer based in London.
www.ritu-sood.com