15th Annual Festival of India Sept.15th

[Guest guest]

Utah Valley¹s KHQN Radio and Krishna Temple, located on South Main St. in

Spanish Fork, will host the 15th Annual Festival of India on Saturday,

September 15th from 4 pm. The newly opened Krishna Temple provides an

expanded festival site and facilites for the popular event.

 

After 14 increasingly successful editions of the India Fest, few people in

Utah County are ignorant of the fact that, once a year, you can go to India

without spending a lot of money. You can have India right in the middle, of

all places, ... Spanish Fork!

 

Over 4,000 people attended last year¹s celebration, and India Fest 2001

could be the biggest one yet, thanks to the enthusiastic increase of

promotional efforts on the part of the organizers, the majestic, overlooking

presence of the Krishna temple at the festival site, and a natural

amphitheatre which can accomodate thousands.

 

Underneath multicolored Indian wedding tents, the ten acre festival site

will feature world class entertainment, cuisine, a gift shop, art,

photography, and cultural exhibits on India.

 

Delicious hot four course meals of Indian curry with home made cheese

(paneer), blueberry hallava, spicy Bengali rice, and giant lentil chips

(papadams) will be served throughout the evening. There will be Indian

drinks such as Peach lassi, and Nimbu pani, as well as sweets and pizza for

the less adventurous.

 

Everyone is invited to enjoy this unique and exotic event, which has been

growing in public attendance year after year.

 

Admission is $2.00 person/$1.00 children.

 

For more information, contact Charu or Vai at (801)798-3559/787-1510

 

Schedule of Stage entertainment

 

4:30 pm Vishal Ailawadhi, brilliant young classical and popular Indian

vocalist from Torrance, Cal. Plays harmonium and tabla accompaniment by

Hemant Ekbote..

5:30 pm Aloke Dasgupta on sitar and Sashanka Bakshi, tablas. ³Aloke is among

the most outstanding and original sitar players in the North Indian

classical style. With a maturity of compostion all his own, he has won the

hearts of critics and audiences worldwide.² Debashish Bannerji, critic:Times

of India.

6:30 pm, Anjani Ambegoaker, teacher, with students: Sohini Sengupta, Aparna

Singh, & Vibha Jain. Kathak dance presentation.

³Los Angeles Times² ŒKathak Troupe Presents Tales of Classical Indian

Splendor¹

Country music has the Judds, opera has Montserrats Caballe and Marti: and

kathak, a classical dance form of Northern India, has, in the Southland, the

Ambegaokers-Anjani and Amrapali-a mother-daughter team that is helping to

keep the elegant Moghul court dance alive and well. Anjani¹s kathak dance of

India, made up of the Ambegoakers and four other dancers, presented a hyper

exuberant show of song, dance, and music Saturday at El Camino College....

You had to know something about kathak, a classical dance form of Northern

India, to know why Anjani Ambegaoker jokingly prayed for the help of any

mathematicians Saturday night. But you didn¹t have to understand complex

counts of the flashy percussive footwork to appreciate it.

Although kathak performers are fond of trying to explain the dance¹s

byzantine numerical formulae, sometimes-as with rapid footwork of tap or

flamenco-it¹s better just to sit back and be amazed. There was so much to

hear and see: the quick, dense slaps of bare-footed dancers whose torsos

remained elegantly still as they shifted slightly from side-to-side, bright

jangling of so many tiny bells circling their ankles, and the pop-pop

thrumming of the tabla.

As founder of Anjani¹s Kathak dance of India, the veteran Anjani took on

the extended solo storytelling passages which traditionally accompany ³pure²

dance. In ³Karna Janma² taken from the epic ŒMahabharata¹, she mimed a

mother who must part from her new-born son, transforming what might be

melodramatic gestures elsewhere into heartfelt grief....

In ten dances, the troupe, in colorful silk costumes, negotiated difficult

beats effortlessly, sometimes improvising and vamping, creating a wall of

sound with their stamping feet and a vision of startling grace with their

arms.

Anjani is not only a commanding dancer but a fine teacher as well, as her

company-who, no doubt, could have ³kathaked² all night-showed.

7:30 pm: Main event, Pageant of the Ramayana, spectacular burning of Ravana

after dark with flaming arrows and fireworks.

All entertainment made possible in part by a grant from the Utah Arts

Council & The National Endowment for the Arts

 

Visit our web site at http://www.iskcon.net/utah.

Best wishes,

Caru das and Vaibhavi