| Bharata
Natyam Training - My Experience
I
was asked to compare my Bharata Natyam training in the
UK and that which I experienced in India. Eight or nine
years ago my report would have been a lot different
to today.
My
earlier training was solely UK based under the guidance
of Kiran Ratna, with the occasional summer school lead
by eminent artists from India. I was besotted with the
form and everything to do with it. I wanted to inhale
everything indiscriminately, the good, the bad. I was
not a discerning student. I loved it all because of
what it was. I believed my teachers. I wanted to be
like them. It was perfect. Heady, intoxicating, consuming.
But as with most things, time and experiences change
that rose-tinted world, the innocence that laid the
basis for the love of the dance.
Now
my feelings about training in India versus training
in the UK are quite different. Earlier, I was happy
with what I was learning, but always nervous that India
was the centre of my dance universe and I would always
be outside. Experiences of certain artists visiting
from India galvanised that feeling of inadequacy.
The
fact that I was born here, raised here, my mother tongue
laced with a British accent. What was I ever going to
know about Indian dance? These feelings didn't hinder
my pursuit of the form in the slightest, but I was scared
of India. The very place that was enticing me with promises
of greatness. I felt my dancing would be inferior to
all the dancers in India. Not as a reflection of my
teacher, but of my circumstances and so-called misfortune
of being born here.
After
going to Chennai for five months with the help of the
Lisa Ullmann Travel Scholarship fund to study dance,
my views changed. It was a life changing experience.
My
current teacher here in the UK, Mavin Khoo, helped me
find the right teachers and thus gave me this great
opportunity to experience Bharata Natyam training the
way he had. My time in India wasn't transient, I wasn't
half there half here; I wasn't passing through, or waiting
for an end. Within days I felt I was there, living;
breathing; it felt more like home than I could imagine.
All my teachers taking me in like family. I had nothing
to think about or do other than dance and sing and live
life there. I finally understood why people felt that
it was impossible to really know and do the form if
you weren't immersed in the culture it came from.
But
I didn't agree. This time I felt I had the information
to be able to understand my fears of having trained
in the UK and overcome them. India wasn't far away,
I was there....dancing. For the purposes of this article,
my thoughts about training in the UK and training in
India, a couple of points are recurrently salient in
my mind.
The
first being the inadequacy in the appreciation and understanding
of music. The ISTD syllabus has addressed this issue,
and from my experience it provides a basic grounding.
But I felt in India, music was a part of life. The teachers
I worked with had sufficient knowledge to be able to
incorporate music into regular classes, not in a compartmentalised
manner, but seamlessly, almost unnoticeably.
I
feel the ISTD syllabus has tried to make musical knowledge
for dance training more prominent, but classical Indian
music is not (for most of us) inherent in our training
or our lives.
Apart
from this technical point, the other very noticeable
thought is that of time and space. Not in the Einsteinian
sense, but the practical sense. It would be easy to
say training in India is vastly better than the UK etc
etc, but I don't believe that. I went to India for five
months to do absolutely nothing but dance, sing and
learn. It was affordable, life was simple for that quantum
of time. My mind had the space; I had nothing to worry
about. Not money; not work; not my real life. I could
immerse myself completely. My return to London brought
me back to the rat race and my reality. I had to find
work, a home, pay the rent. All things an autonomous
adult has to do. How is it possible to immerse yourself
into anything when you are surrounded with the responsibilities
that come with your life and your home?
The
study time in India and the return to London brought
to light the most important distinction between my training
here and my training there. As important I think it
is to see India in the flesh if you are a classical
Indian dancer, I think it is possible to learn the things
you can in India here in the UK.
However,
it is a harder journey with many obstacles. Classes
are expensive, people are busy, and there are fewer
artists in the field. It's about logistics. Being an
adult free-lance dancer pursuing a full-time professional
career in dance, is very different to being a child
living at home being driven to dance class by ever-devoted
parents. There is a responsibility both to the art form
and the learning of it. It is futile to be a martyr
to your birthplace and circumstance.
Something
else being in India showed me was that even with the
abundance of resources and knowledge, the proportion
of great dancers is not congruent. To me the learning
process isn't so linear. Whether teaching is didactic
or interactive, a student needs to be inquisitive; discerning;
intelligent with regards to their learning process.
Resources are vital, but they are there all around us.
And sometimes deprivation and obstacles create a hunger
and need that is the driving force to achieve great
things.
My
views are very much that from an adult perspective,
however, I feel it is important to be taught from an
early age that obstacles in dance training in the UK
should and can be overcome. I finally feel I have reconciled
my circumstances and believe that I can be as good a
dancer as anyone, wherever they may be from.
Talent,
opportunity and circumstance are in the hands of Lady
Luck. The ability to learn is up to the individual,
and a responsibility that deserves due respect.
Seeta
Patel |
