Blog Hiatus, a Rare Simkie Photo, and Distinguishing Kuchipudi

Hello dear readers and friends!  Well...it has been some time since I have posted or updated this blog.  My how time flies!  Long overdue is a post letting folks know that this blog is on an indefinite hiatus.

My posts on this blog have always been fueled and energized by elation, joy, and excitement in the subject matter--purely felt and honestly channeled into writings in a medium that allowed me to share whatever bliss I was experiencing with likeminded people around the globe.   And I have never posted unless I felt that enthusiasm. For various reasons, some known and others unknown to me, my engagement and enthusiasm have waned, and in that mindset I simply can't post in the same way as I have in the past, at least in good conscience.

The blog is on an indefinite hiatus, and who knows what the future will bring.  I don't want to make any promises that I can't keep, a defect of which I have been guilty of in the past, though I've always had the best, though misguided, intentions!  Should the passion of my past return, I will certainly resume the little mini-research projects I call posts. :D

This blog really blossomed in late 2010, continued the exuberance through 2016, and had a last hurrah in 2017.  I am extremely proud of the work that I did, archived here, hopefully forever, for anyone to see, cherish, and enjoy.  I have had the great fortune of having certain posts graced with comments by famous dancers, academics, and family members of post subjects.  I have met, virtually and in real life, amazing people who have enriched my knowledge, shared my passions, and became my friends. I have disappointed a few, and perhaps treaded not very lightly into contentious and problematic topics and subjects in the history of dance, class, and politics in India. But, I hope that my genuine interest and sympathy for the "underdog" and marginalized has come through.

I realize that as time passes that more broken links, outdated videos, and web maintenance tasks left undone will cause the blog to become harder to use, and as I'm able I will try to keep things up to date.  The fonts aren't always easy to read, and the formatting is goofed up in places. But, please have patience in the meantime. And feel free to drop me a line with any requests to fix things!

So in the low pressure environment of this hiatus post, where I don't have to spend weeks gathering information, making connections, and extensively citing my sources, I thought it would be fun to browse through my draft posts that have never been published and pull out a couple bits of material to finally give it the light of day.

A Rare Photo of Simkie

Simkie, that elusive and mysterious French dance partner of Uday Shanker, most prolifically in the late 1920s and 1930s. I tried for some time to try to figure out a timeline of her later years and what happened to her.

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4 comments Bharatanatyam, Kuchipudi, Simkie

Simkie's Choreography in the Awara Dream Sequence (Hindi, 1951)

When I first heard that Uday Shankar's early dance partner Simkie choreographed the famous dream sequence in Awara (Hindi, 1951), I was quite surprised!  That song and dance sequence is one of the most iconic and well-known from the "golden era" of Hindi cinema.  But the real eye-opener was seeing that Simkie's choreography is taken straight from the Uday Shankar playbook as evidenced by the dances in his 1948 dance film Kalpana (which we can now watch in full thanks to Pad.ma!).  A few sources had mentioned the influence of Kalpana on Awara's dream sequence before, but now we can see the evidence for our own eyes.  And what an influence; it's direct and unmistakable! 

Awara's dream sequence is comprised of three segments filmed in three different spaces which Gayatri Chatterjee in her National Award-winning book Awara sees as representing the "Earth-Hell-Heaven triptych."  "Tere Bina Aag Yeh Chandni" is the name of the song for the first two segments (earth and hell) though some have listed the second hell segment as a separate song "Mujhko Chahiye Bahar." "Ghar Aya Mera Pardesi" is the song for the last segment (heaven).

The "Earth" and "Heaven" Segments

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12 comments Little Ballet Troupe, Simkie, Uday Shankar

Rare Video Clips of Devadasis, Uday Shankar & Simkie, Ram Gopal, and More

What a stunning find!  The wonderful commenter Gaddeswarup recently sent me a video from the site BritishPathé.com, and I'm grateful he did because when I explored the site further I found it houses some priceless footage of Indian dance.

British Pathé, a former film and newsreel company that "documented almost every aspect of everyday life in Britain and around the world in the 20th century" (BBC), has digitised its extensive archive ("90,000 videos from 1897-1970") online with free and full-length viewing for any visitor.  Given that Britain ruled the Indian subcontinent until 1947, the archive has a substantial number of clips of Indian events and every day life from the first half of the 20th century: independence, visits from British royalty, disorder and protests, ceremonies and weddings, festivals, politicians, dances, and much more.  Much of the older footage has a strong Orientalist tone; pictured on the left is a nice dance-related example from Indian Peeps (1930).

All of the videos can be purchased and downloaded, but since the listed duration of the videos for purchase are the same as their previews, I don't see any incentive to purchase them at exorbitant prices (30 Euros for a one-minute clip!).  What's most entertaining about the site is the descriptions; the catalogers given the job of dutifully describing each scene in every video must have gotten tired at some point because some of their phrasings are hilarious!  But I'm glad they went to that trouble because it allows the video events to be text searchable.

Unfortunately, none of the videos can be embedded, so you'll have to click on the lovely preview images to link to the video. Update: Now that BritishPathe transferred all its videos to YouTube, I've embedded them all below. Enjoy!

Devadasi Footage from the 1930s

The most important find has been a silent clip titled "Maharanee of Baroda" circa 1930-1935.  Starting at 8:06, two devadasi dancers perform in front of their musical ensemble.  The footage is stunning - the dancers are dressed exactly like those in old archival photos from this time period and before; it's as if the old photos have come to life!  They begin by dancing what looks like the alarippu portion of a Sadir/present-day Bharatanatyam performance, then move onto a more free-flowing, folksy dance style, and then return to Sadir/Bharatanatyam around 11:30.  The musicians and their instruments are fascinating; I've read accounts of how bagpipes used to be part of Sadir performances before the dance form was recreated as Bharatanatyam- I wonder if the musician on the right is an example of what is meant by "bagpipe."  Last, we must of course remember that this was a staged performance for the camera, but its historical value is immense.

Dancers appear 8:07

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18 comments Bulbul Chowdhury, Devadasis, Male Dance, Ram Gopal, Rare Real-Life Footage, Simkie, Uday Shankar

A Documentary on Simkie, Uday Shankar's Dance Partner

I recently came across the documentary Simkie Paris-Delhi made in 2008 by Charlotte Arrighi de Casanova and was thrilled by what it contained!  The documentary's subject is Simkie, the French woman who was Uday Shankar's dance partner for some 20 years.  She is the woman often seen in stills dancing next to Uday, and in articles about Uday she generally gets at least a passing mention and at most  the revelation that her real name was Simone Barbier and she transitioned from being a pianist to being Uday's closest dance partner.  But I've never been able to find more about her personal life such as who she was, how she as a European became interested in Indian dance, how people reacted to her, what she herself thought of Uday's dance style, authenticity issues, etc.  This documentary, made by Simkie's niece, helps shed a bit more light on the elusive figure.  Here it is:

Update: Unfortunately the full length video has been
made private and only a brief trailer is viewable

The documentary is comprised almost entirely of interviews of Simkie's relatives and former dance associates interspersed with rare photos and shots of modern Indian street life and dance practice.  While the first half is mostly in French with no subtitles, most of the interviewees in the second half speak English.  The cinematography is lovely, the pace reflective and languid, and the mood a bit sad, almost forlorn.

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16 comments Documentary, Simkie, Uday Shankar, Zohra Segal