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DECEMBER 4, 2001 SAMUDRA CENTRE FOR PERFORMING ARTS “The Sound of Silence” Madhu Gopinath, Vakkom Sajeev and Kalamandalam Anand are the founders of Samudra Centre for Performing Arts and are leading figures in the field of contemporary Indian dance and music. Madhu & Sajeev are trained in various classical dance forms and martial arts. They express their creativity through innovative items that, going beyond the boundaries of tradition, seek a powerful, contemporary, yet unique Indian idiom of dance. “The Sound of Silence”, a recent work, is an innovative and original dialogue between movement and sound, body and soul, tradition and modernity. The Samudra dancers and musicians explore through “The Mother”, the contradictions and sensuality of the life force that governs us all. Acclaimed in India and abroad, the work reveals the various stages of the Life Chakra or the Wheel of Life. Recently the group toured France (Iddac Theatre Festival), Italy (Spoleto Festival) and United Kingdom (Royal Opera House, London). The performance started with the Gayathri mantra, an artiste swung on a rope in an ode to creation. A sloka from the Soundaryalahiri, Asatoma Sat Gamaya was followed by live music. Movements ranged from kalari to near acrobatics, moods changed from war to sensuality, worship to trance, birth to death. Dancers: Madhu Gopinath, Vakkom Sajeev, Deepa.M.S, Ajikumar.K Musicians: Kalamandalam Anand, S.Dasan, Sreekumar.A.S

Why's your production called 'Sounds of Silence'?
When there's no sound, there's peace. From the sounds of silence, your life can see the soul. Hence the title.

Can you explain the different stages of transition in your performance? The physical, gymnastic kind of movements with the artist descending from the top, then some spiritual dimensions, then ritual, all ended ultimately in a hynotising effect.
We start with the Gayatri mantram, which is a universal mantram. The tough descent from the rope is like a rebirth and then the energy comes to normal state. That's when we do the floor movements. After that, we used the Revati raga to denote a woman symbolising love. We changed the raga to show her transition to a powerful woman. Then, the 2 male bodies come in, like 2 members of 2 different families. Each has his own energy, and has to create his own movements. It's just 2 entities coming together, fighting and making friends.

Then comes the sensual aspect. We didn't show the full section but touched on it lightly. After that is the universal rhythm. The ta ka di mi ta ka ta ki ta are the 9 beats that symbolise the 9 planets, that universal rhythm is very powerful like a heartbeat.

Then comes the masked character to denote a creature of the earth like snake, elephant etc. From life, it's trance and then death. We took inspiration from our ritual dance Theyyam and Padayani and created new movements for that section. The person dies but the soul is still alive.

How did you create the music?
Anand, Dasan, Lazar and I have been trained in different fields. I'm from Kalamandalam, Dasan is a mridangist and Lazar is a violinist. Today, Sreekumaran played the violin. We wanted to create music from Kerala, it's a land rich in music. We argued a lot and pushed each other, exchanged our ideas on music and this is our final creation, something that suits our movements on stage.

What's the significance of tying the mask to the back of the other person's head and then throwing it away?
Actually, tying the mask to the back of my head signifies his transferring his heart and soul to me. I don't actually need to throw the mask, but I need the space to dance and also, I don't want to stamp on the mask and smash it!

Would you call this a blend of Kalari, Bharatanatyam and modern - movements that you probably studied under other western dancers?
We're still training in Kalaripayattu. We are from Kerala, we're Malayalis, we're the sons of that soil. So we can go deep into Kalari and show the movements, especially use our energy to show the nice animal movements.

Do you improvise also, on the spot on the stage?
Yes, sometimes when I'm doing solo, the movements are different each time. Like in the trance scene. But in group dance, it's systematic movements.

The coconut resins that you swished around in frenzy, is associated with the fertility cult. How did this fit into your frenzied dance?
When we tried to work out the frenzy movements, Sajeev and I went to see some Theyyam performances in Kannur. We found inspiration for our movements but still felt something was missing. I used some leaves to swish around but was not happy. I tried the movements with broom also. Then I remembered the bajra plant seed is used for snake worship. When I went into trance, the seeds fell and this effect made me happy. I really do go into a trance.

e-mail: ms_samudra@hotmail.com


The Other Festival Q & A: Audience Artist Interface