[ad_1]
Judith Ravin, Consul General, U.S. Consulate General, Chennai, and N. Murali, president, The Music Academy, with the Nritya Kalanidhi awardees at the event on Monday.
| Photo Credit: R. Ragu
The 16 th Dance Festival of The Music Academy got under way here on Tuesday with the presentation of the Nritya Kalanidhi Awards to eminent dance exponents and gurus Rama Vaidyanathan (2020), Narthaki Nataraj (2021) and Bragha Bessell (2022).
Speaking after presenting the awards, Judith Ravin, Consul General, U.S. Consulate General, Chennai, said music, art, and culture bridged the connect between people, communities and countries. They created bonds that transcend barriers and boundaries. Talking about artists from India and the U.S. travelling to learn, teach, collaborate and perform, she said artists played a critical role in further strengthening the U.S.-India cultural and people-to-people ties.
The Music Academy, Ms. Ravin said, was among her early discoveries when researching about life in Chennai prior to her arrival here. A city that celebrates traditional art forms during each December Music Season, convening the public for several thousand music and dance performances throughout the day across multiple venues in the city, said much about the soul of the place and its inhabitants, she added.
In his address, N. Murali, president of The Music Academy, said during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Academy had to skip its annual dance festival in January in 2021 and had conducted an online, shortened, three-day dance festival in January 2022. The Academy, dance fraternity, connoisseurs and rasikas had been eagerly looking forward to the resumption of its in-person festival with all its features.
Without the physical festival, the prestigious Nritya Kalanidhi Award could not be given. The Executive Committee, therefore, decided to give the awards for the missed years along with that of the year 2022. The 16 th edition of the dance festival will feature several genres of the classical art form, including Bharathanatyam, Kuchipudi, Kathakali, Mohiniattam, Odissi and Kathak, he added.
Committee members N. Ramji, Sujatha Vijayaraghavan, Chithra Madhavan and S. Raghavan were present.
[ad_2]
Source link