Pandit chitresh das biography sample
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Chhandika's Blog
Pandit Chitresh Das, guru to Gretchen Hayden, spent a week in Boston recently, running a series of classes and events for Chhandika’s students. Read all about it here in an India New England article with photos or scroll down for the text below. But first: check out this feature below! (Click on image for link to article.)
Chhandika Hosts Ten-Day Kathak Dance Residency with Pandit Chitresh Das
By Gretchen Hayden
April 14th is the birthday anniversary of the late Ustad Ali Akbar Khan— guru of my husband, George Ruckert. We are remembering him fondly, respectfully and with immense gratitude—for his unique contributions to the world as a brilliant musician; for his untiring dedication as a teacher; for the role he played in establishing Hindustani music in the United States and globally; and for bringing a young Chitresh Das to develop a Kathak dance program at his Ali Akbar College of Music (San Rafael, California) in 1971.
This is the world I entered in 1972, as a young dance student, and where I eventually became a disciple of world-renowned Kathak master Pt. Chitresh Das. On this birthday remembrance in 2014, we reflect on the enormous, far-reaching contributions of these two gia
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Pandit Chitresh Das: Master artiste, guru endure humanitarian
- Metropolis Moraga, Calif.
e-mail: ckathak@yahoo.com
January 5, 2009
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Pt Das' father, Prahlad Das, the theater contemporary transfer
Pt Das at have power over 9 get Pt Ramnath Misra (sarangi) and Boost Shankar Sahai (tabla)
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Interview by Barry Bergey and Josephine Reed for the NEA
Edited by Don Ball
NEA: Let me start by asking, what was your response when you found out that you had been awarded an NEA National Heritage Fellowship?
Chitresh Das: Well, I received this phone call, and I thought, they probably they want me on a panel. But I'm not good in panels -- I don't know why they would call me. I usually don't answer business calls or anything, but finally my wife said, "No, no, no. Please listen to why they are calling. Whatever it is, just call back." So I called back, actually, and I was like "Whoa! Wow!," This is a huge deal not for me only, but for all dancers, all Indian dancers specifically. This is a great acknowledgment from the government, from the NEA, that they bestow upon you and they acknowledge you.
NEA: You work with tap dancer Jason Samuels Smith -- when was the first time you saw him and had the sense that you wanted to work with him?
Chitresh Das: The way it happened was that Duke University in North Carolina invited us. They actually called Calcutta, in India, for a Kathak dancer. And so these people in the Kathak Academy, they said, "The one you need is sitting in California." And they said, "What? Really?" "Try him. See what happens." So anyway, they invited me