Yes! I have been invited to be interviewed on the Indian Satellite radio "World space" as a guest. They want to know about Gujarati culture in USA. You know I am going to open my big mouth and talk about American Raas (as I call it) and other dance forms that our kids (young adults) are performing in colleges and keeping the culture alive. I plan to talk about Rutger's use of "pink panther theme, BU's use of Boston tea party theme, Batata nu Shak etc. along with the usual serious stuff about how our culture is evolving in the west. I will try to get a voice recoding and post it here if they would let me.
India is crazy as ever. Mumbai is exploding with wealth. Now Bollywood defines Indian culture. It used to be the other way around. Culture used to define Bollywood.
Congrats to BU (my daughter's team). They were second, but I heard that the Boston competition was not terribly well organized. No comments on judges since my daughter is the captain.
I will attend Maryland Masti. I have heard that it is a good up and coming program, well organized. See you there. This will be my first Raas competition to attend this year.
Monday, December 17, 2007
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Where is the real A.R. Rehman?
June 16 2007
I went to See the A.R. Rehman concert held in Dallas TX last night. I had seen one other concert here at the Nokia theater two years ago.
Remember I am talking about A.R. here, not some fly by night Bollywood concerts of drunks and concubines. I expected great sound, great singers singing their hearts out, and some serious live music.
I was very disappointed. Here is why. If you plan to plunk down one hundred bucks to see this guy, take this into consideration.
1 Sound: Local sound guy is a reputable one and has always done well. He has done many a Bollywood concerts, but the way he was asked to sit, he could not see the artists. Results were disastrous. When ever female singers were singing, their mike volume was too low for first five seconds. Volume would be raised and then in the next stanza it was properly adjusted. You would think that A.R. would get upset and do something as he was sitting right near the sound board. The ushers who have worked at the venue for a long time commented that these guys adjusted their own sound and it was not good. (Many of them were wearing their ear plugs that day. Several commented that this was bad and the previous week's Asha concert was worse.) Mind you, I have attended my share of Indian concerts and other concerts. Being an A.R. fan, I would have thought that his sound engineer would have done a better job. I know the local sound man they had hired and he has a high standard. I have used him for fairly complex situations and he tends to be precise, but he will not leave any microphone on that is not being used. May be it was his fault.
2 Music: Here is the real problem. There was no orchestra, which makes A.R. what he is. There was too much recorded music. You would hear large drum sounds when shiv Mani was not moving his hands? May be I am ignorant but some thing was not right. There was one violin and one cello player but the "violin sound" was so rich that it can only be produced by an prchestra or a synthesizer. Volume of the music was not proportionate to the singing (instruments being too loud), base was out of control. Some thing was not right. He brought in some "local" talent, which was really no talent to speak of and I did not pay to listen to some local talent of low quality.
3 Dances: Horrible.
I went to See the A.R. Rehman concert held in Dallas TX last night. I had seen one other concert here at the Nokia theater two years ago.
Remember I am talking about A.R. here, not some fly by night Bollywood concerts of drunks and concubines. I expected great sound, great singers singing their hearts out, and some serious live music.
I was very disappointed. Here is why. If you plan to plunk down one hundred bucks to see this guy, take this into consideration.
1 Sound: Local sound guy is a reputable one and has always done well. He has done many a Bollywood concerts, but the way he was asked to sit, he could not see the artists. Results were disastrous. When ever female singers were singing, their mike volume was too low for first five seconds. Volume would be raised and then in the next stanza it was properly adjusted. You would think that A.R. would get upset and do something as he was sitting right near the sound board. The ushers who have worked at the venue for a long time commented that these guys adjusted their own sound and it was not good. (Many of them were wearing their ear plugs that day. Several commented that this was bad and the previous week's Asha concert was worse.) Mind you, I have attended my share of Indian concerts and other concerts. Being an A.R. fan, I would have thought that his sound engineer would have done a better job. I know the local sound man they had hired and he has a high standard. I have used him for fairly complex situations and he tends to be precise, but he will not leave any microphone on that is not being used. May be it was his fault.
2 Music: Here is the real problem. There was no orchestra, which makes A.R. what he is. There was too much recorded music. You would hear large drum sounds when shiv Mani was not moving his hands? May be I am ignorant but some thing was not right. There was one violin and one cello player but the "violin sound" was so rich that it can only be produced by an prchestra or a synthesizer. Volume of the music was not proportionate to the singing (instruments being too loud), base was out of control. Some thing was not right. He brought in some "local" talent, which was really no talent to speak of and I did not pay to listen to some local talent of low quality.
3 Dances: Horrible.
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Retired from college choreography?
Now that is a novel idea. If you are involved with Raas, Bhangra or any other Indian dance form, you might want to consider this idea. This summer we were having a problem with young boy's Raas team. They were very conscious and needed a lot of time. Young boys dancing for the first time are the hardest to train, especially if they do not know each other well. Our esteemed choreographer (to whom I am married) thought that she would ask for some one's help. She asked our son, but he was too busy doing nothing. Then came a break through. A 15 year old student who has danced with our group since he was a baby sad the Raas. He was horrified to see how the young boys were doing. He started taking their practice and things went much better. So, if you are done with the college season, find some aunties dance school or some temple or church or what ever, collect a bunch of kids and start teaching. I promise you it will be fun. That is what I do. I get involved with "polishing" items, giving them objective feed back and encourage the groups that are performing. Here is a picture of boys from 2004 Bhangra. I promise you this will be as rewarding as any good activity.
Friday, May 11, 2007
FUTURE DANCERS
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My wife runs a dance school. Here is a little plug for her. She will have about 150 participants dancing at Irving Arts Center. As usual there is Bhangra, Raas, Garba, other folk dances and bunch of classical dances. Participants are from age 4 to above 50. Many of these participants have gone on to dance at college level (UT, SMU, BU, UCLA, GW to mention a few). Some have become choreographers. The show will start at 3:30 PM (NOT INDIAN TIME) on May 19. Yours truly will be compering and running lights and sound and partially manage the stage at the same time. Make up will start around noon. Some one donated food, others donated drinks (not the funny kind, just juice), some one gave cash other one donated trophies. Entry fee is 10 bucks (used to be as low as three bucks for seniors a few years back).
If you are in Dallas, come see it. It will be a bot boring in the beginning when the little ones are dancing, but by the time the 15-18 year old will be doing Bhangra, audience will be going nuts. There is one Garba item that I hope to post on U tube some day. Amazing choreography. There is a 20 minute Ramayan piece done by the school teachers. There is a true "auntie dance" where all the aunties are dancing (I won't say which one, but if you see it you will know. I call it Aunties gone wild). Here is a picture of "Rangoli" on the stage and a youngster being helped by a volunteer with picture session.
Website "nrutyashala.org" check it out.
Comments from Pann State team
I have completely screwed this one up. I was trying to post the comments of Penn State "Head choreographer" but I will just have to copy them here.
Hey just want to let you know that I'm the head coreographer of Penn State. I'm not Guju, I'm Goan/Mangalorean and Catholic as well. I graduated already, but I read some of your blogs about the history and the proper Raas/Garba moves. I wish I knew that earlier, otherwise I would've taught that with my team. I joined the Raas team my Junior year and knew nothing about raas, garba, nor gujarati culture. I was very much ABCD. They only style of dance I did was Hip Hop, which I'm well known for. I joined the team because my friend wanted me to try it (He’s guju). The first year was fun, but we didn't do well at Raas Chaos 2004, here’s the performance - http://konkan.tv/view/e35291c6fa7fcf881949 . It was my first exposure of desi dance competition. I got discouraged that we didn’t place and that's when I lost interest in raas because 1)performance was not up to par 2)moves were poor 3)this team had no RHYTHM nor style. Next year, Junior year, someone spreads rumors in the first week of school that I was going to choreograph raas. So I was pressured. I wanted to do bhangra because I love the atmosphere and hype of the shows, even though we weren’t great. I didn’t want to do raas because the way practices were handle, but I knew that there had to be a team. So I took the offer. 1) I made sure our dance stood out 2)proper music selections 3) teaching them the proper dance steps with rhythm. I did my best with video research on raas/garba and reading articles about it. It was difficult for me as a leader because my teammates would hardly listen to me. I also edited the music mix. I added my own drumline and bass tune because it didn’t have that booming sound. Regardless of struggle, I made sure this team could dance, be presentable, and make history. We were the underdogs and no one expected us to win. You can check the youtube of Raas Chaos 2005 performance - http://konkan.tv/view/f5d19ec61575114d8a2d - we won this competition and got the Bid for B.O.B. In the past years, this tean has never done more than one competition nor done shows in the spring, so this was a learning experience for us. I was very worried about our performance because I thought our dance was not the same level as teams on the Midwest and west coast. So I decided to change up some moves and added one more song. To my concern, it hurt us by changing it. Instead of practicing over and over again, we did more changing than rehearsing. We placed third at Garden State Garba and did poorly at B.O.B. NYC. I haven’t seen our video performance from BOB NYC, but here’s our GSG performance - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz1RYCci1Hw - Now my Super Senior semester, 90% of our team graduated (my close friends graduated) and we recruited majority freshmen. These are the worst to handle at practice, but luckily practices wasn’t as bad because I learned a lot from last year as a leader. Choreographed again and made the mix again with 11 songs with better drumline and bassline that I created. Our theme was Ride the Beat from Day to Night. A lot of people didn’t understand that until after Raas Chaos 2006. Here’s our performance - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjb37ImSdt4 - unfortunately I didn’t perform with them because I was helping out Maryland Masti. I will tell you that story later. Anyways, I had high doubts on this team because our choreography and music was very different. I thought this team wouldn’t place, until I got a call. They shocked me and once again got a Bid to B.O.B. Chicago. We also place 1st at Garbafest in Boston, and that’s where I joined them in this performance, you will notice my long hair and me sliding on my barefeet - http://konkan.tv/view/0848a542e57d1595f58e . One thing I learned was not to change the dance, but instead practice hard at being flawless and perfection. And it paid off well at B.O.B. - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhbKKbruO90 - This was a successful year for my Penn State team, and although we didn’t place at Garden State Garba after BOB Chicago, we still manage to have fun and entertain the audience. You’ll also notice in our dance that we didn’t do any stunts nor flips. We made sure the music, dance, and tradition stood out. Now I co-organized Dance-Fusion (bollywood dance competition) and Maryland Masti, which is a Raas/Garba Competition and I enjoy every minute of these teams perform. One most important thing that I taught my team is sportsmanship. We made sure we cheer’d, congratulated, and supported every team that performs on stage. The joy that they get when they hear chants from other teams makes them perform even better. Well I know this was really long, but I wanted to share my experience with someone who was knowledgeable in that dance era. Thank You, and I hope you enjoyed our dance.Also here is our Intro Videos (which I also produced):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLgvyl0wTgEhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76w1qb1eR5M
MY RESPONSE:
Well, Goan?Menglori choreographer is quite welcome. I hope you read my comment on "Lahori choreographer". The only Raas team that won the B.O.B. "Best item" (not just Raas) for G.W. was a Pakistani guy who was originally a Bhangra man. He did get a lot of help from the team, but he put it all together. Us Gujjus have to eat a humble pie, since Raas may have originated in North, but it appears that "Garba" probably came from south India. So, it is natural that our friend would do wellat choreography. Goa has some of the most fascinating dances (now I know why you did so well with even slow movements, it is the Goan and Menglori element). Here are some of my comments about your team from an earlier blog. "Penn: Very good choreography. Choreographer is not afraid to "go slow". She or he knows that his dancers are able to show grace no matter what is the speed of execution. Best music selection. a traditional judge would score them high." I thought you guys would win, and I did insinuated that in my previous blog "out on the limb". If the judges were "california style" and if Berkeley team did their usual energetic stuff, they could have won. What I also like is the spirit of these two teams. By the way, my daughter is from BU and they won Maryland Masti. As far as "all time best team", here are my thoughts: "All time best team" must win against other catagories in B.O.B. The team would have place first or second in majore competitions, and should have won on both coasts. I do not want to get into that all time best stuff. All I know is that your item was very good and you did deserve to win. I suspect next year will be difficult. Don't be disappointed if you don't win next year as long as you can make a good dancer out of some ordinary guy who is on the team because his girlfriend dragged him there. Only other issue I have with all these teams is that they are all like their parents. "win, win, win". Why not "experience, learn, grow, keep tradition alive, make new friends". Well I was going to tear down my blog, but since some one was kind enough to write, I will keep it up for a while.
P.S. I bet our Goan?Menglori Catholic choreographer has a Gujju girlfriend whose last name starts with a P and first name is five letter long! (Just a wild guess).
Hey just want to let you know that I'm the head coreographer of Penn State. I'm not Guju, I'm Goan/Mangalorean and Catholic as well. I graduated already, but I read some of your blogs about the history and the proper Raas/Garba moves. I wish I knew that earlier, otherwise I would've taught that with my team. I joined the Raas team my Junior year and knew nothing about raas, garba, nor gujarati culture. I was very much ABCD. They only style of dance I did was Hip Hop, which I'm well known for. I joined the team because my friend wanted me to try it (He’s guju). The first year was fun, but we didn't do well at Raas Chaos 2004, here’s the performance - http://konkan.tv/view/e35291c6fa7fcf881949 . It was my first exposure of desi dance competition. I got discouraged that we didn’t place and that's when I lost interest in raas because 1)performance was not up to par 2)moves were poor 3)this team had no RHYTHM nor style. Next year, Junior year, someone spreads rumors in the first week of school that I was going to choreograph raas. So I was pressured. I wanted to do bhangra because I love the atmosphere and hype of the shows, even though we weren’t great. I didn’t want to do raas because the way practices were handle, but I knew that there had to be a team. So I took the offer. 1) I made sure our dance stood out 2)proper music selections 3) teaching them the proper dance steps with rhythm. I did my best with video research on raas/garba and reading articles about it. It was difficult for me as a leader because my teammates would hardly listen to me. I also edited the music mix. I added my own drumline and bass tune because it didn’t have that booming sound. Regardless of struggle, I made sure this team could dance, be presentable, and make history. We were the underdogs and no one expected us to win. You can check the youtube of Raas Chaos 2005 performance - http://konkan.tv/view/f5d19ec61575114d8a2d - we won this competition and got the Bid for B.O.B. In the past years, this tean has never done more than one competition nor done shows in the spring, so this was a learning experience for us. I was very worried about our performance because I thought our dance was not the same level as teams on the Midwest and west coast. So I decided to change up some moves and added one more song. To my concern, it hurt us by changing it. Instead of practicing over and over again, we did more changing than rehearsing. We placed third at Garden State Garba and did poorly at B.O.B. NYC. I haven’t seen our video performance from BOB NYC, but here’s our GSG performance - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz1RYCci1Hw - Now my Super Senior semester, 90% of our team graduated (my close friends graduated) and we recruited majority freshmen. These are the worst to handle at practice, but luckily practices wasn’t as bad because I learned a lot from last year as a leader. Choreographed again and made the mix again with 11 songs with better drumline and bassline that I created. Our theme was Ride the Beat from Day to Night. A lot of people didn’t understand that until after Raas Chaos 2006. Here’s our performance - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjb37ImSdt4 - unfortunately I didn’t perform with them because I was helping out Maryland Masti. I will tell you that story later. Anyways, I had high doubts on this team because our choreography and music was very different. I thought this team wouldn’t place, until I got a call. They shocked me and once again got a Bid to B.O.B. Chicago. We also place 1st at Garbafest in Boston, and that’s where I joined them in this performance, you will notice my long hair and me sliding on my barefeet - http://konkan.tv/view/0848a542e57d1595f58e . One thing I learned was not to change the dance, but instead practice hard at being flawless and perfection. And it paid off well at B.O.B. - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhbKKbruO90 - This was a successful year for my Penn State team, and although we didn’t place at Garden State Garba after BOB Chicago, we still manage to have fun and entertain the audience. You’ll also notice in our dance that we didn’t do any stunts nor flips. We made sure the music, dance, and tradition stood out. Now I co-organized Dance-Fusion (bollywood dance competition) and Maryland Masti, which is a Raas/Garba Competition and I enjoy every minute of these teams perform. One most important thing that I taught my team is sportsmanship. We made sure we cheer’d, congratulated, and supported every team that performs on stage. The joy that they get when they hear chants from other teams makes them perform even better. Well I know this was really long, but I wanted to share my experience with someone who was knowledgeable in that dance era. Thank You, and I hope you enjoyed our dance.Also here is our Intro Videos (which I also produced):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLgvyl0wTgEhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76w1qb1eR5M
MY RESPONSE:
Well, Goan?Menglori choreographer is quite welcome. I hope you read my comment on "Lahori choreographer". The only Raas team that won the B.O.B. "Best item" (not just Raas) for G.W. was a Pakistani guy who was originally a Bhangra man. He did get a lot of help from the team, but he put it all together. Us Gujjus have to eat a humble pie, since Raas may have originated in North, but it appears that "Garba" probably came from south India. So, it is natural that our friend would do wellat choreography. Goa has some of the most fascinating dances (now I know why you did so well with even slow movements, it is the Goan and Menglori element). Here are some of my comments about your team from an earlier blog. "Penn: Very good choreography. Choreographer is not afraid to "go slow". She or he knows that his dancers are able to show grace no matter what is the speed of execution. Best music selection. a traditional judge would score them high." I thought you guys would win, and I did insinuated that in my previous blog "out on the limb". If the judges were "california style" and if Berkeley team did their usual energetic stuff, they could have won. What I also like is the spirit of these two teams. By the way, my daughter is from BU and they won Maryland Masti. As far as "all time best team", here are my thoughts: "All time best team" must win against other catagories in B.O.B. The team would have place first or second in majore competitions, and should have won on both coasts. I do not want to get into that all time best stuff. All I know is that your item was very good and you did deserve to win. I suspect next year will be difficult. Don't be disappointed if you don't win next year as long as you can make a good dancer out of some ordinary guy who is on the team because his girlfriend dragged him there. Only other issue I have with all these teams is that they are all like their parents. "win, win, win". Why not "experience, learn, grow, keep tradition alive, make new friends". Well I was going to tear down my blog, but since some one was kind enough to write, I will keep it up for a while.
P.S. I bet our Goan?Menglori Catholic choreographer has a Gujju girlfriend whose last name starts with a P and first name is five letter long! (Just a wild guess).
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Who is afraid of Virginia Wolf?
There was this old play about these two couples, who were emotionally cruel to each other. One of the women developed pseudo pregnancy and all. What I am about to say has nothing to do with Raas, but it needs to be said.
I am referring to what happened at Virginia tech. It is very relevant to Indian community along with other South Asian communities.
When Indians develop mental problems, they don't get help. Often they wait for a long time or deny that a problem exists. Generally it has been my experience that Indians and other immigrants, especially young college students who experience a break with reality, are very hard to treat. Parents often don't believe that their child has a problem. More often the college student is in complete denial and tries to avoid getting help. We Indians are just as susceptible to Depression, schizophrenia and alcohol abuse. Our communities have Bollywood Pollyanna view of life. We are obsessed with financial success. Parents are more concerned about the grades and salary that their children make than their happiness. This only fosters the denial.
What happened to Cho can happen to any one. Case that lead to the "duty to warn" rules involved an Indian with mental illness who killed some one. A young Indian fellow allegedly sufffering from mental illness (from a very successful, happy, reasonable well adjusted family that my friends know) killed his mother not too long ago. We also hear about uncles bumping off aunties. Aunties upset with uncles over drinking. We would like to believe that because we have good family support, we are immune from serious emotional problems. We blame bad luck and evil spirits. Our spiritual foundation is sometimes hollow because many of us grow up in families that don't teach spirituality or they are hyper religious. Indian kids and their parents often don't talk. Kids live two lives; one for parents and one for themselves. Most reasonable Indian parents can listen to their children but generally there is peer pressure to not talk to parents and keep secrets. This only hurts our young people when they get in trouble. This is the also case in India. Famous places like IIT are besieged with suicidal depressed brilliant students. Why do you think that the faith healers advertise so heavily on Indian TV here in USA? They make a lot of money off unhappy people looking for magical solution. If you know of someone who needs help, talk to them.
I am referring to what happened at Virginia tech. It is very relevant to Indian community along with other South Asian communities.
When Indians develop mental problems, they don't get help. Often they wait for a long time or deny that a problem exists. Generally it has been my experience that Indians and other immigrants, especially young college students who experience a break with reality, are very hard to treat. Parents often don't believe that their child has a problem. More often the college student is in complete denial and tries to avoid getting help. We Indians are just as susceptible to Depression, schizophrenia and alcohol abuse. Our communities have Bollywood Pollyanna view of life. We are obsessed with financial success. Parents are more concerned about the grades and salary that their children make than their happiness. This only fosters the denial.
What happened to Cho can happen to any one. Case that lead to the "duty to warn" rules involved an Indian with mental illness who killed some one. A young Indian fellow allegedly sufffering from mental illness (from a very successful, happy, reasonable well adjusted family that my friends know) killed his mother not too long ago. We also hear about uncles bumping off aunties. Aunties upset with uncles over drinking. We would like to believe that because we have good family support, we are immune from serious emotional problems. We blame bad luck and evil spirits. Our spiritual foundation is sometimes hollow because many of us grow up in families that don't teach spirituality or they are hyper religious. Indian kids and their parents often don't talk. Kids live two lives; one for parents and one for themselves. Most reasonable Indian parents can listen to their children but generally there is peer pressure to not talk to parents and keep secrets. This only hurts our young people when they get in trouble. This is the also case in India. Famous places like IIT are besieged with suicidal depressed brilliant students. Why do you think that the faith healers advertise so heavily on Indian TV here in USA? They make a lot of money off unhappy people looking for magical solution. If you know of someone who needs help, talk to them.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
I TOLD YOU SO
Few months ago I proposed a theory that the California Raas teams fail to perform well at national level (BOB). It turns out that I was right one more time. Winner of GWA (Garba with attitude) did not win at BOB Chicago. It was Penn state that won. Why? Again the judges in California are out of touch with the national level of judging. They tends to disregard the basic connection between the old Raas and the new Raas. The result is that teams that win GWA consistently fail to win BOB.
I don't know who the judges were at BOB Chicago. I bet they they were more traditional judges. Having watched the Penn State video (Thanks youtube,own some shares of Google and have done well over the years) I had predicted that if the judges were traditional, they would win. As some one from Berkeley team had mentioned, they did have great "moves" but remember Raas is not an African American phenomenon. It is Indian. "Moves" do matter but over all flow takes precedence.
Ineresting tit bit: Of all places Iowa had a Raas competition right in late March. Now I know that Iowa is in the middle of no where. If Raas madness starts there in March, there is something big going on that most Americans don't know about. It is called Raas !
In summery, GWA need to revamp its judging, so that California teams win nationally.
I am not sure if any one really reads the rantings of this old man as I have not gotten much feed back lately, so I will probably kill this blog unless some one out there responds. Since this blog may die, I thoought I would post my picture so that you can connect my name to my face. Please don't beat me up or Taunt me when you see me at the next dance competition!
Berkley team, you were good, but you were too off the wall to win B.O.B. If you need help next year, my son is free and willing to travel! (He sneaked into the Iowa competition even though he is not in college. Never mind how that happened!)
I don't know who the judges were at BOB Chicago. I bet they they were more traditional judges. Having watched the Penn State video (Thanks youtube,own some shares of Google and have done well over the years) I had predicted that if the judges were traditional, they would win. As some one from Berkeley team had mentioned, they did have great "moves" but remember Raas is not an African American phenomenon. It is Indian. "Moves" do matter but over all flow takes precedence.
Ineresting tit bit: Of all places Iowa had a Raas competition right in late March. Now I know that Iowa is in the middle of no where. If Raas madness starts there in March, there is something big going on that most Americans don't know about. It is called Raas !
In summery, GWA need to revamp its judging, so that California teams win nationally.
I am not sure if any one really reads the rantings of this old man as I have not gotten much feed back lately, so I will probably kill this blog unless some one out there responds. Since this blog may die, I thoought I would post my picture so that you can connect my name to my face. Please don't beat me up or Taunt me when you see me at the next dance competition!
Berkley team, you were good, but you were too off the wall to win B.O.B. If you need help next year, my son is free and willing to travel! (He sneaked into the Iowa competition even though he is not in college. Never mind how that happened!)
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