As part of the Shivarathri celebrations at the Sri Lakshmi Temple in Ashland, students of local dance teachers presented  a delightful bouquet of dances as an offering to the God of Dance “Lord Shiva”  on Saturday March 5th.

Titled Nrityanjali, the event is unique. Conducted in the basement of the Sri Lakshmi Temple, the dancers perform in a very small space, where the dancers perform to an audience who is a discerning group of fellow dancers. One can clearly see the passion for classical dance in every performer. The performers range from the young five year old to senior practitioners of the art. On this day the dancers consider their dance as an “Archana” or an offering to Lord Shiva.

The temple has been conducting this event for nearly thirteen years. Shobha Shastry conducted the event on behalf of the temple.  The event opened with a pushpanjali by Neha Pillai (student of Jeyanthi Ramamurthy) . Maithryi Shankar and Nishanthi Kulenthirarajan (students of Ranjani Saigal) followed with Natanam Adinar. Tara (student of Sunanda Naryanan) presented a Ganesha Kavituam. This was follwed by Shabdam by Samita Mohanasundaram (student of Preeta Arun).

The program ran into a small technical hitch as Poornima Risbud’s students Anshuleena Vipparala and Shachi Risbud proceeded to present Vatapi Ganapathim. But the two children are to be commended for keeping their cool and beautifully re-presenting their item. Meena Subramanyam’s students Neha Vaidyanathan,Ananya Jagdish,Meera Kallupurakal,Christina Kallupurakal and Needhi Singhal presented Ganesh Kaauthuam. Shakti Nochur (student of Neena Gulhati ) presented Todaya Mangalam. This was followed by Yar Adinar by Vanisha Patel,Komal Patel,Nivedita Muralidhar andNidhi Garg. Nithisha Prasad presented Natya Arangam and Amrita Mangalat presented Mallari and Karpagame.  Kriti Subramanyam presented Bho Shambho. Amrita Saigal and Abritee Dhal presented Nadar Mudi Mel. Other performers included Anisha Shenai, Kriti Raghunathan, Anusha Prasad, Prerna Patil,Richa Singh,Shruthi Srinivasan,Smriti Varadarajan, Sushrita Rajanala, Shalini Jayarama,Rekha Selvanayagam and Shriraga Tadi. Anisha Vishwanathan,Ashwin Aravinthan,Suhasini Aravinthan,Prasanthi Suresh,Thivya Raghupathy,Neha Kumar,Nityasree Sankar,Apoorva Vijayakumar, Sowmya Varada,Praneetha Melippeddu,Sribhavna Vadlamani,Shweta Bhatt,Ramya Ghantasala and Nisha Acharya (students of Jothi Raghavan) also took part.

Soumya Ramanathan, a student of Kalakshetra & Savithri Jagannatha Rao who teaches Bharatanatyam in the Boston area, presented a beautiful Pushpaanjali dedicated to Lord Shiva in Gambiranaatai The music was composed by Lalgudi Jayaraman.This was followed by Alarippu in thisram. Soumya’s dance is always very neat and graceful and a pleasure to watch.

The quality of the presentations was very high. It was great to see the passion and dedication for dance amongst the  children growing up outside India.  The temple should be thanked for conducting this event every year and providing great support for the arts.

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