{"id":6103,"date":"2021-05-02T13:26:10","date_gmt":"2021-05-02T07:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/?p=6103"},"modified":"2021-05-02T22:19:04","modified_gmt":"2021-05-02T16:49:04","slug":"dancing-with-satyajit-ray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/dancing-with-satyajit-ray\/","title":{"rendered":"Dancing with Ray… An Unparalleled Celluloid Experience"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Satyajit<\/a>

Satyajit Ray by Subrata Gangopadhyay (Pic courtesy: Subrata Gangopadhyay, Copyright Protected)<\/p><\/div>\n

A few years ago I was preparing for my talk on Dance in Hindi Films, given to the Film Appreciation students at the Film and Television Institute of India in Pune. I noticed that every major director in the earlier years, beginning with Uday Shankar (Kalpana<\/em>, 1948) and going on to the likes of V Shantaram (Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baje,\u00a0<\/em>1955), K Asif (Mughal-e-Azam,<\/em> 1960), Guru Dutt (Saheb Bibi Aur Ghulam,<\/em> 1962), K A Abbas (Pardesi,<\/em> 1957), Sohrab Modi (Mirza Ghalib<\/em> 1954), and Bimal Roy (Parineeta,\u00a0<\/em>1953), had started with Indian classical dance in its purest form \u2013 Kathak – and leading ladies Vyjayantimala, Waheeda Rahman and Padmini came equipped with the dance of the Devadasis, Bharatanatyam. However, most subsequent filmmakers diluted the purity of these dances – perhaps to suit the situation in their films. And in recent years that dilution has gone further to take the form of fusion dance, westernised dancing, and group dance to add volume to the glamorous visual of female torsos in movement.<\/p>\n

That is when I realized what level of genius is required to create a dance that becomes a visual statement on the history of the land. I am talking now about the Dance of the Ghosts in Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne<\/em> (1969). Satyajit Ray, born on this very day precisely a hundred years ago, was the \u2018choreographer\u2019 of this dance which has simply no parallel in the world of cinema. Yes, the director – who had also penned the lyrics besides screenwriting his grandfather\u2019s adventure story for young readers of the family-run magazine\u00a0Sandesh<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 had diluted Indian classical dances like Kathakali and Manipuri, but he fused in many more art forms like masks, paper cutouts, shadow art, pantomime, and special effects to create a celluloid experience nonpareil.<\/p>\n

Ray\u2019s journey with BhavaRagaTala \u2013 the three basic elements of dance that are said to have given Bharata Muni, author of Natya Shastra<\/em>, his name \u2013 had begun ten years before this, with Jalsaghar<\/em> (1958). The films prior to this \u2013 Parash Pathar, <\/em>1958 and Aparajito,<\/em> 1956 in particular \u2013 had not got him returns at the box office and though he had got international acclaim, the director desperately needed a hit. Hearsay has it that he was \u2018advised\u2019 by distributors to use some \u2018song and dance\u2019 in his films. Ray being Ray, he picked up Tarashankar Bandopadhyay\u2019s elegiac short story about the feudal aristocracy in Bengal of colonial India \u2013 symbolised by an elegant elephant and a white stallion – giving way to a coarser, machine dominated social order imaged by a truck. And in this tug of war the Music Room became the battlefield between zamindar Biswambar Roy and contractor Mahim Ganguli.<\/p>\n

\"Murjra<\/a>

‘Homage to Jalsaghar – Murjra’ oil painting by Subrata Gangopadhyay (Pic courtesy: Subrata Gangopadhyay, Copyright Protected)<\/p><\/div>\n

By early twentieth century, especially after a captive Wajid Ali Shah of Lucknow had been brought to Calcutta\u2019s Metiaburz along with his bawarchis, khansamas, darzis, hookawalas, tabalchis, sarangi <\/em>players, tawaifs <\/em>and baijis<\/em>, an entire lifestyle had come to be seen as the signature of the aristocrats in the British Raj. A group of professional singers and dancers primarily experienced in the royal courts of north India \u2013 the \u2018nautch girls\u2019, as they were dubbed by the firangees<\/em> \u2013 delighted with their performances the Babus<\/em> of bonedi<\/em> lineage and the moneyed Seths<\/em>. They would recline against velvet covered bolsters on soft mattresses spread out on the marble floor of the dance rooms that were tastefully appointed with multi-tiered chandeliers, erotic images of semi-nude women – painted sometimes by European artistes, sometimes by Kalighat patuas<\/em>. These dance halls could be the outhouse of the family homes as can be seen even today in Andul Rajbari; or it could be in the kotha<\/em> in designated areas like Chitpore.<\/p>\n

The patrons would drink sherbet and sip whisky from crystal glasses, smoke from silver hookahs, and admire the heaving bosom of the beauties, their slim midriffs and thrust of hips, their coquettish air and erotic expressions. Above all, their entranced whirling to the beat of tablas and song of sarangis would mesmerize the zamindars and their hangers on, and when the dancers arrived on ‘sam’<\/em>, they would break into appreciative \u2018wah wah\u2019<\/em> and shower them with silver coins or even gold mohurs<\/em>. This was the ultimate mark of aristocracy: a person who had \u2018arrived\u2019 in the club of wealth and fame would necessarily be a kadardaan<\/em>, an aficionado who was passionate about the arts purveyed by these ladies. Hence they would host mujras<\/em> on any given occasion, to mark the birth of a child or marriage of a daughter, the first rice ceremony or the sacred thread ceremony, or \u2013 at the height of frivolity \u2013 for the \u2018marriage of the pet cat.\u2019<\/p>\n

With the consolidation of the British rule, the dancers came to be seen as prostitutes. The noveau riche<\/em> had little understanding of thumris<\/em> and ghazals<\/em> or of parans<\/em> and chakkars<\/em>. Jalsaghar<\/em> has to be seen, understood and admired against this background.<\/p>\n

\"Biswambhar<\/a>

Chhabi Biswas as Biswambhar Roy in Jalsaghar<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

It unfolds around Biswambar Roy, a 1920s aristocrat whose passion for music has already ruined him, and his neighbor, the nouveau riche Mahim Ganguly. Their rivalry leads the zamindar to pawn his wife\u2019s jewels, reopen his jalsaghar<\/em>, roll out the carpet, polish the chandeliers, and pour wine in decanter to host its swansong: a lavish soiree in the crumbling opulence of the music room decorated with ivory chess boards and portraits of his ancestors. At the end of the concert, when his upstart rival tries to reward the danseuse, the zamindar restrains him with the grand gesture of gifting her the last bag of sovereigns in his treasure chest.<\/p>\n

Ray may have chosen the literary classic for its scope to incorporate music and dance. And what a set of artistes he worked with! His composer was Vilayat Khan, the Gouripur born classical sitarist credited with the introduction of gayaki ang<\/em> of playing the stringed instrument. (This might be a diversion but I am tempted to add here that Gouripur, about 150 km from Dhaka in Bangladesh, still has a century-old haveli<\/em> built by the then zamindar Brajendra Kishore Roy Chowdhury who was renowned for his interest in classical music).<\/p>\n

Ray used the signature shehnai of Bismillah Khan, the ustad<\/em> who would later be awarded the country\u2019s highest honour, Bharat Ratna, for transforming the Indian wind instrument \u2013 till then only a \u2018folk instrument\u2019 \u2013 into the voice of every auspicious occasion in the land and Festivals of India across the world.<\/p>\n

\"Akhtari<\/a>

Begum Akhtar singing a Dadra in Raag Pilu in Jalsaghar<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

That was not all: Ray got\u00a0Mallika-e-Ghazal\u2019 Begum Akhtar to sing a Dadra in Raag Pilu layered with viraha<\/em>, the longing and ache of separation, for a sequence in the music room. Long before this\u00a0Akhtari Bai Faizabadi had won acclaim as an actress for her performance in Mehboob Khan\u2019s Roti<\/em> (1942) but she forsook glamour to pursue artistry in pure classicism.<\/p>\n

There was also a Mian ki Malhar sung by Salamat Ali Khan, brother of Nazakat Ali and father of the younger voice Shafqat Ali of Pakistan. The torch bearer of Shyam Chaurasi gharana, the vocalist \u2013 like the other classical musicians in Jalsaghar<\/em>, had a Calcutta connection before he made his home in Lahore. Given his repertoire of Sufiana singing, he continued to be invited to perform for All India Radio as well as the Hindustani music conferences that were a hallmark of classicism in the subcontinent.<\/p>\n

\"Chhabi<\/a>

Biswambhar Roy in Satyajit Ray\u2019s masterpiece Jalsaghar<\/em> (1958) enjoying ‘Miyan Ki Malhar’ rendition by Ustad Salamat Ali Khan<\/p><\/div>\n

Of course, the finale of Jalsaghar <\/em>was the riveting Kathak by Roshan Kumari, perhaps the foremost exponent of Jaipur gharana, in the role of a dancer who was the new rage among the music connoisseur zamindar\u2019s peers. She danced to a composition that used pakhawaj<\/em> syllables in place of conventional song text. For half of the eight-minute sequence, the camera watched in long-shot and mid-shot the explosive nritta<\/em> of the vigorous danseuse who was born to Zohrabai Ambalewali.<\/p>\n

Roshan Kumari’s Kathak recital in Jalsaghar<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n