Kuchipudi By Ananda Shankar Jayant: Events in Hyderabad

REVIEW FOR KUCHIPUDI BY ANANDA SHANKAR...

Tonite, the last of the big divas takes stage at Ravindra Bharathi - catch one of the few Kuchipudi Padmasris live.

The Department Of Culture, in association with Nritya Kinnera, is organising a three-day dance festival of the vaggeyakaras, from 15th to 17th June, in which the country's topmost Kuchipudi dancers such as Dr Alekhya Punjala, Deepika Reddy and Dr Ananda Shankar-Jayanth, are participating. Today, the last day, Dr Ananda Shankara Jayanth will perform some solo Kuchipudi items, with importance to abhinayas.

A choreographer who needs no introduction, Ananda has directed and presented six path-breaking dance ballets including Sri Krishnam Vande Jagadgurum, Buddham Saranam Gachchami, Dancing Tales... Panchatantra, and Jonathan Livingston Seagull. She graduated in Bharatanatyam from the world renowned Kalakshetra, and learnt Kuchipudi from Pasumarti Ramalinga Sastry. She is a top-graded artiste of Doordarshan and an established artiste of the ICCR, featuring in many dance festivals in India and abroad.

Among her innumerous collection of awards, the prestigious Kalaimamani award of the Tamil Nadu government in Nov 2003 for her contributions as a Bharata Natyam dancer, Nritya Choodamani from Sri Krishna Gana Sabha in Dec 2006 and the Padmasri in March 2007, rank foremost. She is the director and architect of the famous dance academy Shankarananda Kalakshetra.

Please contact The Department of Culture at 2324-2482 or Usha Gayathri at 99890-41777 for further details.