Culture in the city

This weekend, get your dose of culture as the Capital plays host to two arts festivals

Get a cultural high this weekend as the city plays host to two arts festivals - Legends of India, to be held at Kamani Auditorium, and The Park’s New Festival at The Park. Both festivals promise an array of traditional and contemporary performances from varied parts of India.

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The 13th edition of Legends of India kicked off yesterday with music and dance performances conceptualised to introduce youth to traditional Indian classical art forms. “Since we target the youth specially, we try to mix and match performances. Fusion is what we attempt,” says Krishna Bhadra, secretary, Legends of India. Day one of the festival saw a classical music-themed evening followed by a concert, Master of Winds, which had a fusion of blowing instruments such as flute, saxophone and clarinet.

Today, the festival will host a classical tabla jugalbandi by Grammy winning percussionist Bickram Ghosh and tabla maestro Pandit Shankar Ghosh. “We will play the teental and intend to perform interesting trade-offs in an improvisational format with sarangi accompaniments,” says Bickram Ghosh.

“The idea is to perform tabla jugalbandi in a manner that people won’t miss melody,” adds Ghosh. This will be followed by a Sufi kathak performance by Manjari Chaturvedi.

At the New Festival, there will be a performance by Parijat Yantra — a dance troupe from New York. Set to electronic music by South Asian American artists, the performance rewires the sculptural positions of Bharatanatyam using post-modern and modern dance techniques. But it’s the last day of the Legends of India festival that is a must-watch. A rare Ghazal and Classical jugalbandi will be performed by ghazal maestro Talat Aziz and iconic Indian classical musician Ustad Rashid Khan.