Where does one begin an interview with a Bharatanatyam practitioner of five decades vintage? Bragha Besell comes with years of training and grooming under a generation of dedicated gurus who were not mere teachers, but were passionate about the dance, and, therefore, driven by the idea of passing it on to succeeding generations. “Did that Guru who knocked on the doors of my parental home and announce that he had come to teach me dance ever foresee this journey of mine? Unlikely. After that it has been a succession of teachers who have literally groomed me, given off themselves seeking no rewards, that has seen me attain this proficiency,” is how Bragha, her eyes moist, speaks of her art.
The classical art forms have the power to subsume the individual, and what emerges after years of training is an individual with reverence, dedication and humility – the effect of understanding the vastness of art. Bragha is a personification of this combination. When she takes you through her years in dance one realises it is perfectly justified.
How does ‘abhinaya’ become the forte of a dancer? Bragha who is now more into conducting workshops clarifies, “For a dancer, angashudhi and abhinaya are two sides of a coin. Without abhinaya, physical movements do not acquire grace, and the body becomes a mere skeleton.”
Speaking of the evolution of the teacher in her, she takes you back to her years with various gurus. “Till my 36th year I went to Kalanidhi Narayan for abhinaya and Adyar Lakshaman for pure dance. Marriage took me away to Saudi Arabia, initially for two years, and then a long spell of 13 years. I took it that my career in dance was over.”
She adds: “It is difficult to describe the emotions I experienced when I got a call from Leela- akka [Leela Samson who was heading the Kalakshetra] asking me to teach abhinaya at an eight-week long session at the Kalakshetra. This request came at a time when she was looking at points where the courses could be enriched.”
The trigger for re-locating to Chennai, she says, was the phone call. “It really set the ball rolling for me. After a long break and being totally cut off from dance, here I was pulling out my notebooks to revive the dormant talent, the legacy of Rukmini Arundale’s vision for dance. Excitement, confusion and apprehensions about my ability to pick up threads from the past troubled me. When I gleaned the pages of my books I realised this was the kairotic moment. If I did not pass this rich legacy on to the next generation it would die with me. Thus began my new avatar in dance as visiting faculty at the Kalakshetra,” recalls Besell.
There definitely was an uphill task awaiting the dancer when she returned to a ‘teacher’s role. Being a dancer does not necessarily mean you can be a good teacher. She was back to the drawing board, working out methods to acquire teaching skills. “I went back to ‘thattu adavus’ to commence my re-learning. I have to thank Leela- akka for drawing me back and to Kalanidhi- mami for insisting that we have to open ourselves – mind and body – up if we had to grow in dance.”
A regular at the Cleveland Aradhana in United States, Bragha’s workshops take her places too. Choreography she continues, often for her students who are all performers with their own circuits. True to her instincts as a teacher her exhortation to the student is, “I tell them, ‘After 10 years don’t show me a small plant to convey your growth, I want to see you flower’.”
Besell, it seems, never forgets to remind herself that she is the composite product of the strengths her gurus have passed down to her. The protective mantle of the gurus began with “the 75-five-year old Mangudi Dorairaju who would cycle 12 km, one way thrice a week, to train me as far as ‘Gajapuja’, Kunchitapadam who taught me how to dance, Adayar Lakshman cleaned up the movements and gave clarity to the performance, and topping it all up was Kalanidhi mami who gave that ultimate glow to the art with the abhinaya training. Is there anything more to add than, ‘Blessings all way’.”
