Mylapore is the seat of traditional fine arts like Bharathanatyam and Sastriya sangeethams. The Mylapore Sabhas are nowadays are behind the classical dancers who are ready to pay their way for their chance. See what these dancers have done to this art. You can see in the above pictures that one of the dancer is dancing without any accompanying artistes! Yes she has chosen to do her steps to recorded music played from background!!
One of the Sabha secretary lamented that it is like playing cricket match with bowling machine for bowlers. The artistes see it as saving on their expense but fail to notice that they are doing it at the cost of the loss of value and esteem for this art. Moreover the artistes also think that they are paying unnecessarily to their Guru for the Nattuvangam rather than seeing it as Gurudakshina for supporting them to perform on the stage. Is it not disservice to the art and disloyalty to the profession?
Who is to blame for this? The artistes who do it or the Sabhas that permit it?
This is certainly bad. Bharathanatyam performance are meant to be a healthy and creative competition between the dancer and the accompaniments. But the cost of doing a performance has escalated multiple fold and neither the artistes nor the sabhas have any control over it. It is only the auditorium / hall owners who have to be blamed for exploiting the artistes and rasikas for their vested interest.
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