Scene from Sangam Dance Festival. Telegraph picture

Bhubaneswar, Sept. 14: Performing art lovers in the capital were in for a treat last week as they witnessed two back-to-back dance shows.

While two day long Ashtapadi Dance Festival celebrated the beauty of Geeta Govinda on Friday and Saturday, earlier on Thursday it was Art Vision’s Sangam Dance Festival that brought together two classical dance forms on the same stage at Rabindra Mandap.

Paying rich tributes to renowned choreographer, late Guru Gangadhar Pradhan, Odissi dancers Aruna Mohanty, Sharmila Biswas and Meera Das staged a few group and solo acts that mesmerised the audience. They depicted Radha and Krishna’s love in Jayadev’s Geeta Govinda through dance forms.

The choreography in Odissi was based on the adaptation of the original music composition of former state chief secretary Subhas Pani for Sampoorna Geeta Govinda, a set of five Audio CDs released in 2008. Artistes from Orissa Dance Academy and Odissi Vision and Movement Centre gave impressive performances. “It was a beautiful experience to watch the emotions of a devotee in love with Krishna during the two day festival,” said Anuradha Pradhan, a viewer.

Sangam Dance Festival was also well received by the audience. Conceptualised as a confluence of Odissi and other classical dance forms, Sangam features two major choreographies. This year the Odissi choreography was from the dance drama ‘Siddhartha’ presented by danseuse Illeana Citaristi, also the organiser of the festival. Based on the novel by Herman Hesse, the composition described the story of a young man who sought a deeper meaning of life. Illeana, along with her disciple Saswat Joshi, presented the sequence. Annada Pattanaik composed the music for the choreography, while Devdas Chhotray has penned the lyrics.

The other major choreography staged at the concert was an elaborate Mohiniattam item presented by Sreerangam. An item of pure dance, ‘Mukhachalam’ was an elegantly performed choreography with intricate movements and steps. Vinita Netungudi, who hails from Kerala and is a junior fellow of Sangeet Natak Akademi in New Delhi, choreographed it. The audience appreciated the dance items. Among other performances by artistes of Sreerangam were Gitanjali, translated from Tagore’s verses by famous Malayali poet G. Sankara Karup and ‘Kekiyattam’, a peacock dance based on a poem by Kavalam Narayana Panikkar.