Bharatanatyam Alarippu at Granary Warf, Leeds

This Kalakshetra choreographed Alarippu, literally 'opening', was danced by me, Nick Proctor, with Smt Shanta Rao. Shantha-ji was training witht the same teacher, Sheila Cove (Shakuthala) at the time. About mid 90s when I was much slimmer. The Alarippu might well be the shortest most tiring item in a Bharatanatyam repertoire & is the FIRST, usually.
A few hiccups but not too bad. My teacher was trained by Smt Balasundari in the early 70s in London. Bala was a class mate of the world famous Dhananjayans at Kalakshetra, Madras, in the 1950s/60s.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Bharatanatyam
• alarippu
• tripmonk0
• world music
• Indian classical dance

[ConorRyan22]

Hare Kṛṣṇa! this is great to see, we are just starting to learn bharatanatyam, a week into the training and our legs are like jelly / concrete. How long have you been dancing?

[tripmonk0]

I actually had to stop training as my teacher moved to the south of England & I live near Manchester. That was about 7-8 years ago. I really should get back into it as I was looking at my old class footage & getting withdrawal symptoms!!!

Nick

[ConorRyan22]

Does the pain in the legs go. :)

I've never experienced such a work out.

Hare Kṛṣṇa!

[tripmonk0]

Yes the pain goes but isn't it a glorious pain in the meantime???

Nick

[ConorRyan22]

LOL it's all for Kṛṣṇa so it's very glorious. ouch ouch ouch!!

[tripmonk0]

LOL

Masichism is not necessary in Indian dancing. I presume you're with the Hari Krishna Conciousness group. How do you feel about all the Lord Shiva pieces you'll be learning? The main deity of Bharatanatyam is Lord Shiva as this style is from South India & Shiva is the most prominent delity there.

Nick

[ConorRyan22]

Lord Shiva is an expansion of Lord Kṛṣṇa in contact with the material energy. So we have no problems with that. We are going to learn this style of dance and adapt it to spread the pass times of Lord Chaitanya, very esoteric and unknown in most of South India.

[tripmonk0]

Will you pass through Varanasi at all??

Nick

[sirensongsindia]

Hi Nick, yep I am in Kathmandu now and will be in India on Oct 23. Probably down south by December!

[monkeymind09]

its beautiful