Ahh... delicious exhaustion
Jul. 19th, 2005 11:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bethlakshmiDentist - a-OK. Mouth did hurt after novicaine, but nailed it with Motrin real fast. Ate rice & bread and mushy stuff, and drank ice water at dinner, not a problem. Had Dentist, Senior, not Dentist, Junior (father and son practice) - on which some credit might be laid. He's super-slick - of course, he's been doing this for 30 or 40 years... I don't think Dentist Junior messed up, just that if you have to go in to the dentist - super terrified and in pain - then it's nice to know that the guy could probably do this half-asleep and has 30 years of good judgement calls behind him.
Best part of day - Aparna's class. Oh the humility. :) The expert becomes the student, and gets totally exhausted. Luckily, survived humidity OK, and so my screw-ups are all mine. Lots of mistakes, but the latest peice, pushpanjali, hasn't slipped and is ready for hardcore work. And, best of all, I got to pick the next peice to work on - a choice of more abhinaya (expression) or more rhythm (nritta). I felt like I was being offered a big plate of pate or a Godiva chocolate sunday. How can you loose? :) I decided on the sunday - the expressive stuff. It's less physical work, and a whole lot of theatrical work, which will carry well into both SCA life and Middle Eastern dance. Even if it won't burn calories so well. That's why it's dessert. :)
After being a teacher for a dedicated class I have a new appreciation for two things:
- how hard it is to wrap your brain around new concepts as a student
- how hard it is to hit on the right words for these concepts as a teacher
And... mostly, an appreciation of how damn good Aparna is. I look spiff... next to folks how have just started this journey. Take that delta and multiply it by 100 and you get how much better Aparna looks than me. Wow. I'm having trouble not just gazing in awe as we do the new piece. Boy, I missed her.
Wrapped the class up with dinner at Helmond - Afghani food - which is out of my way... unless I'm at dance class. Mmmm.... happiness. And did the traditional post-dance-dinner activity of scribbling moves down furiously in my notebook, while trying to eat delicately. Ummm... trying. "Delicate" is difficult when you are trying not to scarf down yummy, just out of clay oven, flatbread.
And just hammered out the last roundup for the exam tomorrow. Even more happiness. Stupid, evil class will be OVER. No more logistical pains! YAY!! No more thinking about this stuff. Yay! Several brain cells freed up for Pennsic. Phew!
Best part of day - Aparna's class. Oh the humility. :) The expert becomes the student, and gets totally exhausted. Luckily, survived humidity OK, and so my screw-ups are all mine. Lots of mistakes, but the latest peice, pushpanjali, hasn't slipped and is ready for hardcore work. And, best of all, I got to pick the next peice to work on - a choice of more abhinaya (expression) or more rhythm (nritta). I felt like I was being offered a big plate of pate or a Godiva chocolate sunday. How can you loose? :) I decided on the sunday - the expressive stuff. It's less physical work, and a whole lot of theatrical work, which will carry well into both SCA life and Middle Eastern dance. Even if it won't burn calories so well. That's why it's dessert. :)
After being a teacher for a dedicated class I have a new appreciation for two things:
- how hard it is to wrap your brain around new concepts as a student
- how hard it is to hit on the right words for these concepts as a teacher
And... mostly, an appreciation of how damn good Aparna is. I look spiff... next to folks how have just started this journey. Take that delta and multiply it by 100 and you get how much better Aparna looks than me. Wow. I'm having trouble not just gazing in awe as we do the new piece. Boy, I missed her.
Wrapped the class up with dinner at Helmond - Afghani food - which is out of my way... unless I'm at dance class. Mmmm.... happiness. And did the traditional post-dance-dinner activity of scribbling moves down furiously in my notebook, while trying to eat delicately. Ummm... trying. "Delicate" is difficult when you are trying not to scarf down yummy, just out of clay oven, flatbread.
And just hammered out the last roundup for the exam tomorrow. Even more happiness. Stupid, evil class will be OVER. No more logistical pains! YAY!! No more thinking about this stuff. Yay! Several brain cells freed up for Pennsic. Phew!
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no subject
Date: 2005-07-20 04:02 am (UTC)Semantics in Dance
Date: 2005-07-20 05:02 am (UTC)Re: Semantics in Dance
Date: 2005-07-20 01:19 pm (UTC)As a matter of fact, the composition in question was a tillana, and thus extremely rhythmic, as well as being nritta.
Tillana
Date: 2005-07-20 01:29 pm (UTC)Re: Tillana
Date: 2005-07-20 04:03 pm (UTC)For reference:
http://www.nadanam.com/bharatnatyam/b_tillana.htm
http://www.kpoursine.com/INTRO.HTM
Are pretty good descriptions of the dance. I particularly like Kay Poursine's - but then she speaks in comforting Western musician jargon.
Of note - the winner was a javali, also on Kay's page, just above tillana. That gives us the chance to squeeze the kinks out of the pushpanjali before hitting another high-stamina endeavor.
Western music is of no comfort
Date: 2005-07-20 04:24 pm (UTC)It is interesting to see how Tarana has moved from our Northern music to the Carnatic form and changed so little.
Re: Western music is of no comfort
Date: 2005-07-20 05:32 pm (UTC)Like I said, though, just conjecture. I have a few Natya Shastra translations sitting around, and a couple other reasonably decent history of Indian music books. But haven't really had the time and research energy to dig into them.
I assume that by "sol-fa", she means the Carnatic swara - sa/re/ga/ma/pa/da/ni/sa - as the equivalent concept to Italian solfegge - do/re/mi/fa/sol/la/ti/do - since the two concepts are nearly identical - sing the name of the note to the pitch of the note. So that it's a mix of melodic note singing (sa, re, ga...) and the singing of rythmic syllables (ta, di, gi, na...).
At this point, I expect that everyone reading has lapsed off into a confused coma on this thread. :) Hang in there, guys, if you want me to explain, ask me in person. This really makes a lot more sense when I can sing it.
Re: Western music is of no comfort
Date: 2005-07-20 08:33 pm (UTC)Judging by your response, I'm not sure of you aren't familiar with the term I used, Sargam, the "sol-fa" system (which is not Carnatic by the way but used in both systems -- although the specific positioning of shruti depends both on raga and the musical system).
Mudras are quite another thing, considering that the "unbroken linage of devidasi dance" is largely mythological. All of the forms were significanctly re-invented around the time of Uday Shankar's observation of European Ballet, and so it was with a modern eye that mudras were freely shared/copied. This isn't entirely true in the case of Odissi mudras, which has more in common with devadasi dance than any of the other forms -- but also was enormously reinvented less than 60 years ago.
Re: Western music is of no comfort
Date: 2005-07-20 09:38 pm (UTC)He's Ravi Shankar's brother...
Date: 2005-07-20 09:43 pm (UTC)Re: He's Ravi Shankar's brother...
Date: 2005-07-20 09:48 pm (UTC)(So many shankars, so little time... *laugh*)
Re: Semantics in Dance
Date: 2005-07-20 01:41 pm (UTC)And we appreciate it. : )
no subject
Date: 2005-07-20 12:21 pm (UTC)Where is this Afghani restaurant? (Hmm, cuisine we haven't tried. Must remedy that.)
no subject
Date: 2005-07-20 04:10 pm (UTC)143 1st St, Cambridge, MA 02142
(617) 492-4646
Located just around the corner (literally) from the Cambridge Side Galleria's Best Buy entrance. It runs about $20-25 for dinner + appetizer. They have some level of vegetarian, but also alot of meat dishes. They tend to book up in prime time - Friday/Saturday nights, make reservations in the morning, or even the day before. Mon-Wed - peak hours may have 30 minutes wait, off-peak you can walk in.
My favorite thing is - they know what to do with a vegetable, as well as with meat. And it's not just kabobs. Desserts are OK, and they do real Turkish style coffee (buzz...). And yes, they still have the divine kaddo (pumpkin) dish. There's quite alot of unmentionable things I would do for that pumpkin dish.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-20 04:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-20 04:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-20 02:44 pm (UTC)Aren't you planning to be in town later this month? Perhaps a dinner excursion could be planned...