Month: February 2016

An Even

http://www.newindianexpress.com/cities/chennai/An-Evening-of-All-Things-English-in-Chennai/2016/02/20/article3286298.ece

The word ‘special’ doesn’t even begin to describe the birthday party held at Nungambakkam on Friday. First, it was held to mark Queen Elizabeth II’s 90th birthday on April 21. Second, it celebrated the fact that the Queen became the longest serving British monarch last September, and third, it marks the 400th year since the death of the Bard, William Shakespeare.

“Unlike other countries, the UK doesn’t have a national day, so we celebrate the Queen’s birthday. This year, it’s on a bigger scale,” Bharat Joshi, British Deputy High Commissioner Chennai, told City Express.

With a host of diverse performances — which had some connection to Britain — lined up, there was never a dull moment. First, Stagefright Productions had a tongue-in-cheek, five-minute rendition of the Bard’s Romeo and Juliet. This was followed by High Kicks, an all-girls dance group, performing a James Bond special theatre-ish dance piece, with dialogues and music from 007 movies playing on the screen in the background.The ‘Bond girls’ set the stage on fire and even mingled with the audience for a while during their performance. They also used their guns to blast enemies and enacted action sequences. “What we did today was something called ‘Dirty Contemporary’. It’s a mix of contemporary dance with elements of street jazz,” Aparna Nagesh of High Kicks told City Express.

After this, all guests stood at attention as violin sisters, Lalitha and Nandini, who are cultural ambassadors to the US and UK, performed the national anthems of both India and Great Britain.

The tempo then picked up, with Zimbabwean band Zimboita’s high-energy performance using traditional instruments like Marimba. With their music, dance and antics, the endearing band told the audience to work hard, but added, “If you feel like shaking and moving, please go on!” A collective sigh descended on the audience when the band announced their last song. DJ Eddie and his group then belted out popular songs to wind up the evening.

Thanking them for their performances, Joshi, in his speech said it was “hard to believe” that just a couple of months ago, this city was recovering from the floods. Highlighting that the UK was proud to support the Tamil Nadu government as a partner at the Global Investors meet in September, Joshi said that in all, £2.43 billion worth of MoUs and business deals had been signed.

Lauding the “extraordinary achievement” of the Queen and her consort Prince Philip’s service to the British crown, Joshi raised a toast to the monarch and drew everyone’s attention to UK’s most popular dish — the “exalted” chicken tikka masala!

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http://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/a-slice-of-britain/article8264527.ece?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=RSS_Syndication

Last weekend, Cottingley, home to the British Deputy High Commissioner, Chennai, was packed with guests gathered to celebrate the 90th birthday of Britain’s longest-reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, and the 400th death anniversary of playwright, poet and actor, William Shakespeare.

The event, hosted by Bharat Joshi, British Deputy High Commissioner, showcased vignettes from Queen Elizabeth’s visit to India, especially Madras, and promotions from the Best of Britain to the guests drawn from the worlds of business, academics and the arts.

The evening’s entertainment kicked off with city-based theatre group Stagefright Productions’ five-minute tongue-in-cheek presentation of Romeo and Juliet. The all-girl dance ensemble High Kicks, which performs contemporary dance moves and has won global acclaim, took the stage next. They staged an interactive act to the James Bond theme songs from over the years, with clips and dialogues from the films filling the screen backstage.

Kalaimamani awardees and violinist-sisters, M. Lalitha and M. Nandini, renowned for their Indian as well as Western classical and fusion music, played the national anthems of India and Britain, much to the delight of the audience.

This was followed by a speech and a toast raised to Queen Elizabeth by Joshi, who also commended the resilience of Chennai during the floods.

The evening ended with music from around the globe — Blessing Chimanga and his band played jazz and rock, inspired by their roots in Zimbabwe, where Chimanga started his career as a percussion and piano player. DJ Exodus kept the music flowing with his acoustic and acapella fest.

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LN Sisters Dr M Lalitha and M Nandini, Lec Dem on Violin Techniques in Western and Carnatic Music for Music Academy on Dec 19th.With Sri Pappu Venugopala Rao – Secretary, Music Academy and Sri T V Gopalakrishnan, the Sangeetha Kalanidhi Designate

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