CMYK

METROPLUS8 THE HINDU FRIDAY NOVEMBER 15 2013CHENNAI

CH-CH

Continued from page 1

But itrsquos not just family thatreminds her of the city ldquoThe yel-low vishu flowers have had thebiggest impact on me actuallyEvery time I land in Chennaithatrsquos the first image of the citythat comes to mind And ofcourse the mallipoo overtakeseverything Filter coffee tooAnd sundal on the beach withkilimooku manga And the kada-la I call them soggiesrdquo

Usharsquos taste in music was in-fluenced by the radio and themusic that her family listened towhen she was a child ldquoVideo cannever kill radio I think radio willalways reignrdquo she says categor-ically ldquoMy influences at homewere huge My uncle listened toMozart Beethoven M Balam-uralikrishna and MS Subbu-lakshmi I would listen to TheBeatles Frank Sinatra ElvisPresley and so on So I was influ-enced by jazz and all these othergenres It made me the musicianI am today That apart I donrsquotthink you rank yourself by beinga good or bad singer but by beingan original onerdquo

When she began her career inthe late 1960s and early 1970sUsha often performed in a nightclub in Madras called NineGems where she sang popularEnglish covers of that time ldquoItwas here in a Madras night clubthat I learnt how importantlearning the local language isrdquosays Usha During one of herperformances she suddenlybroke into lsquoBambara Kannalersquoand says that the crowd wentwild ldquoThe audience loved itTherersquos something about singingin the local language people con-nect immediately While thisparticular session was coinci-dental I consciously began tobuild my repertoire after thisrdquoShe owes her fluency and theability to pick up languages toher schooling ldquoThere we hadEnglish as our first languageHindi Marathi and French assecond third and fourth lan-guages But I think Indians areblessed because wersquore born in acountry with so many languagesInstead of shying away we mustcelebrate themrdquo

She became popular withsongs such as lsquoVegam Vegam Po-gum Pogumrsquo (Anjali) lsquoDoston sepyar kiyarsquo (Shaan) lsquoRamba HoHo Horsquo (Armaan) lsquoKoi YahanAha Nache Nachersquo (Disco Danc-er) and more recently lsquoDarlingrsquo(7 Khoon Maaf) ldquoTamil is per-haps the most easy language toset to tune because you can cutthe words and it wonrsquot meansomething completely differ-entrdquo she explains ldquoBengali is ofcourse beautiful Gujarati iseasy to pick up and that is the

reason it has spread far be-yond our shores I think mylove for people made me learnall these languages reallyrdquoUsha has also sung in Kanna-da Telugu Marathi AssameseBhojpuri Oriya and Khasi ldquoIwrite the lyrics in Englishusually or sometimes in HindiI work very hard on my songsand I always maintain thatmusic is not my business butcommunication is I only thinkabout how better I can com-municate the song If I have tosing a song in another lan-guage yoursquoll usually find thatIrsquod have written down thelyrics at least three or fourtimes because I think the moreyou write the better youcommunicaterdquo she adds

Her 40-year career has not

just led to her receiving aPadma Shri but handling lan-guage workshops across theworld and inspiring manyyoung musicians to take upsinging in languages other thantheir mother tongue ldquoMusic isbeyond caste creed colourrace age and gender Why letsomething as trivial as lan-guage stop you from reachingout to all those people Theworkshops are about training anon-Tamil or non-Bengalispeaker to sing in that lan-guagerdquo she says

Having judged a number ofreality shows Usha is happyabout the amount of talentthat the country possessesnow ldquoItrsquos phenomenal Allthese performers are trainedand so clued in I tell all theseyoung performers that theymust sing in other languagesso that they can grow Irsquom soglad that many of them havelistened to merdquo

Usha confesses to being afan of Ilaiyaraaja ldquoI think heis still the king There isabsolutely no reason for himto be compared to anyone elseYou know there are somesongs that you can listen toand just cry His music doesthat to me I have a bigcollection of his compositionsrdquoshe says

Usha was in the city recent-ly to sing in an upcomingTamil film ldquoIrsquom always listen-ing to something or the otherrdquosays Usha ldquoWe have two holeson the sides of our face and ifyou want to listen well theonly way to do it is to listenwith your heartrdquo

TUNES FROM THE HEART Usha Uthup PHOTOS SS KUMAR

hellipFab 40

lsquoMusic is beyondcaste creedcolour race ageand gender Whylet something astrivial aslanguage stop youfrom reaching outto all thosepeople

whole This was a promenade per-formance The audience movedwith the actors mdash from the con-fines of the auditorium to the soft-ly lit canopy of the great banyantree and then to the lyrical sur-roundings of the lily pond in thesatin folds of the night

English and Hindi speech andsong the tragic and the comiccame seamlessly together in thenarrative The young directorsNeel Chaudhuri and Anirudh Nairskilfully stitched action and dia-logue in their bilingual visuallyarresting production The shear-ing festival brings colour gaietyacrobatics clowning and Bolly-wood type songs a wonderful me-dley that makes ShakespeareBilkul Hamara The grown-upprincess is wooed by her princewhile the pedlar-cheat-trickstermakes his way into our hearts

The pond offers the final mo-ments when the penitent king isreunited with his daughter andson-in-law (who is the son of hiswronged friend) And the ldquostatuerdquocomes to life in a magical climax

The costumes the lights andthe music all effectively contrib-uted to the playrsquos success Thedelivery of the lines in Englishwas good But some of the actorsneeded more voice training forthey could not throw their voiceswell essential in a Shakespeareanplay

And why art thou so poorly litup Kalakshetra It was a wonderno member of the audiencetripped or fell in the inky darknessas he or she stumbled around

King LearBadshah Pather in Kashmiri

was based on King Lear Directedwith sensitivity by M K Raina itwas presented in the folk theatrestyle mdash bhand pather mdash which thiswell-known theatre personalityhas helped revive in the State

The story of the king driven outof his mind by the cruelties per-petrated by his children has uni-versal application Shakespearersquosepic tale of kingly arrogance blindjudgment and a royal fall with thecruelty unleashed by Nature intune with the cruelty of man lent

itself eloquently to this folk theat-re style thanks to the directorrsquossensitive approach and the per-formersrsquo emotional involvementThe tragedy of two fathers mdash Learand Gloucester mdash was played outin epic proportions with the songand dance of the folk performerscoming in at the right moments

The music of the swarni thepipe typical of this form elo-quently underlined the mood asdid the taals of the dhol The songswere classical Sufi songs accord-ing to the directorrsquos note from the12th to the 15th century Thoughbhand pather is traditionally per-formed in the open air the playmetamorphosed well on the pro-scenium stage thanks to the finedirection and the costumes de-signed by the National School ofDrama students which gave theproduction a formal feel This isessentially a satirical form of the-atre the director pointed out butas the language was faintly com-prehensible only wherever it hadshades of Hindi one was not ableto gather much of this The jesters

endemic to the form made theplay a suitable vehicle for bhandpather the jesters here outdidthemselves

The lead actor made a fine LearWhen his whip the symbol of au-thority and oppression issnatched away from his hands hisdisbelieving gaze conveyed allthere was about loss of power

A unique touch here was thatthe daughters of Lear were re-placed by sons as the actors saiddaughters in Kashmir would nev-er disown their fathers The playdeals with the partition of landwhich the director explainedcould be related to by the actors asit expressed their apprehensionsThe storm scene was evocative

Those conversant with the dia-logues in Shakespearersquos textwould have appreciated the playmore than the others If only onehad the facility of translated sub-titles as it happens in leading the-atre festivals of the world whenmultilingual productions are pre-sented That would be fair to bothperformers and viewers

Twelfth NightldquoIf music be the food of love

play onrdquoAnd so they played on in Piya

Behrupiya the Hindi version ofTwelfth Night directed by AtulKumar

Translated into easy colloquialHindi by Amitosh Nagpal this wasa riotous comedy that provided agrand finale to the festival Theactors threw themselves with in-credible zest into their roles andtook the audience along on anevening of glorious fun and enter-tainment Mistaken identitiesunreciprocated love love sickdukes and drunken revels mdash allthe elements of the play were in-tact but touched with the alchemyof a different language and culturewith songs dances and tomfool-ery to liven it up The play lived inevery scene and Shakespeare nev-er seemed so Indian and cultur-ally relevant as here though againthose who did not know Hindiwould be at a disadvantage Thecomedy and farce often tipped in-to the burlesque and there was

little of the serious This was aplay that had decided to providethe maximum fun not all of itperhaps in keeping with the toneof the original but the audiencewent along since it was such amerry ride These were superblytalented actors whose expressionsseem to change like quicksilverand they all sang incredibly well mdasheither solo or in chorus Theamazingly gifted woman actorwho played Viola in male disguiseput in a stunning performanceThe artistes who played Duke Or-sino Olivia Sebastian Sir TobySir Andrew Maria Malvolio andFeste were all near perfect Theactors had perfect synergy and thedirector was in total commandThe costumes were colourfullyIndian and the musicians playedwith gusto in this evening of sheerentertainment where comedyruled An excellent example of aplay in this genre the productionwas commissioned for the Lon-don Olympics by the GlobeTheatre

KAUSALYA SANTHANAM

VISUALLY ARRESTING From The Winters Tale King Lear and Twelfth Night PHOTOS M KARUNAKARAN

The Bard with a desi twist THEATRE With theircolour gaiety andBollywood touches thethree plays presentedby Prakriti Foundationas part of its HamaraShakespeare festivalhad a distinctly Indianconnect

From the time Prakriti Foun-dation presented its firstHamara Shakespeare theatrefestival it has succeeded in

bringing an interesting range ofwork to audiences in Chennai

This year the fare was outstand-ing each troupe was true to theform in which it presented theplay

The Winterrsquos TaleIt is a tale of jealousy guilt ro-

mance and redemption The blindsuspicion of a king weaves a laby-rinth leading characters into thedark corridors of death and suf-fering Till youth brings with itlight and cheer love andreconciliation

The Winterrsquos Tale is a play thatis not staged often Tadpole andWide Aisle two of Delhirsquos theatretroupes presented it for this fes-tival And what a tale they made ofit The young cast worked in per-fect unison and succeeded in pull-ing off a work filled with vitalityThe acting the setting and the in-spired direction brought all theelements together into a cohesive

gree in Electrical Engineering Hevolunteered to teach less-privi-leged kids in the lsquoOpportunitySchoolrsquo set up by some ldquoenlight-ened facultyrdquo members inside thecollege campus For two years heand some of his friends ldquobunked aday a weekrdquo to teach there Arvinddescribes this as his ldquofirst adven-tures into educationrdquo

His life-changing adventurehowever happened after he meteducationist Anil SadgopalThrough Kishore Bharati an

As you read this a khadi kur-ta-clad 60-year-old could bebuilding a toy with the un-likeliest of materials in his

400 sq ft office room in PuneSoon it would find its way inside aclassroom in a remote corner ofthe world mdash it would teach Sci-ence the way no textbook can Ar-vind Gupta the man who showedthat a cycle tube can be used toteach how pumps work who usedstraws to teach centrifugal forceand taught geometrical structuresusing nothing but a rubber tubeand a few matchstickshellip is silentlycarrying out a revolution in edu-cation through his lsquotoys fromtrashrsquo He has shown that Sciencecan be made exciting using almostany object under the sun

For Arvind the journey beganin the early 70s when he joinedIIT Kanpur for a Bachelorrsquos de-

NGO Dr Sadgopal developed theHoshangabad Science TeachingProgramme to teach Science tovillage children who lacked expo-sure to well-equipped labs Bat-teries bulbs wireshellip programmeswere developed around productsfrom everyday life

Arvind who then worked forTelco took a break from his job ofmaking trucks to join KishoreBharati He was at a weekly bazaarin the village of Palia Piparia inMadhya Pradesh when an ideastruck him He shopped for local-ly-available objects and madesimple but effective lsquoScience toysrsquoFor the twenty-something Ar-vind this was ldquomuch better thanmaking trucksrdquo He has been onhis feet ever since taking thesetoys to government tribal ruraland urban schools in every nook

and corner of the country Arvindrsquos child-like curiosity

can perhaps be attributed to hismother As a little boy he was aldquotinkererrdquo who loved to take apartand put together objects ldquoI hadthe kindest mother who let meberdquo he says His best friend washis ldquobattered-up trunkrdquo withscrew-drivers and other equip-ment mdash when he was barely eightArvind opened up their ceiling fanfor repairs since they couldnrsquot af-ford an electrician

Such ldquolong hours of playrdquo are aluxury for a lot of kids these daysArvind feels that they are con-trolled by a ldquostring of degrees invarious waysrdquo at a young age andare tortured by an education sys-tem that awards marks based ontheir ability to memorise ldquoChil-dren must reject thisrdquo feels Ar-

vind ldquoWe need some disobedientchildren toordquo he laughs ldquoThosewho challenge authority to learnand do things at their own speedrdquo

Arvind translates with passionbooks from English to Hindi Foras a person from Uttar Pradeshhe is ldquodeeply aware of poverty ofmaterial in Hindirdquo He has so fardone 155 translations and has up-loaded them on his website Hehas written 23 books so far mostof which are available for freedownload on his website Theyare uploaded even before they gofor print Arvind believes in shar-ing ldquoLife is short We must makeit beautiful We arenrsquot going totake anything when we go arewerdquo

It has been ten years since Ar-vind was invited to work at theInter-University Center for As-tronomy amp Astrophysics in Puneby astrophysicist Jayant NarlikarHis team of four works here toldquoimbue the love for Science inchildrenrdquo A good toy accordingto Arvind is that which is de-signed such that a child can ldquoripapart and see what is inside thetummy and put it back togetherrdquoFor children are ever curious

The best thing about workingwith children ldquoTherersquos a gleam intheir eyes when they see a smallmotor work therersquos a smile intheir faces They are absolutelyenthralledrdquo Itrsquos ldquohunger in theireyesrdquo that has been driving himfor the past 30 years Childrenshould nurse the dream of doingsomething original ldquoIf they donrsquotachieve it so be it Theyrsquove dreamtitrdquo

AKILA KANNADASAN

The toymaker and his dreamMEET Science-innovator Arvind Gupta who has made Science exciting to millions ofchildren across the world through his lsquotoys from trashrsquo

STEP-BY-STEP (Clockwise) Learn tomake a simple straw centrifuge(above) Arvind Gupta

Arvind has been to over 1500

schools and impacted the lives of

millions of children across the

world through his experiments He

has uploaded over 4000 videos on

his website httparvindgupta-

toyscom they are available in 18

languages including Tamil Bangla

Odiya Latin American and Chi-

nese The best thing is that every-

thing is free Anybody can

download dub and use them to

teach children in their locality All

this so that ldquothe poorest kids can

learn Sciencerdquo

15112013