http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/goa/the-glorious-reinvention-of-goan-culture/articleshow/57337257.cms
After centuries of neglect and abandonment, different aspects of Goa's spectacular cultural legacy are finding renewal amidst a host of bold, original initiatives. Both, government and private ventures in various heritage locations have begun to host first-rate international collaborations in India's smallest state, with immense positive effects for the local talent base. Where very little existed just a few years ago, a new culture capital for India is rapidly developing in a set of superbly adapted and renovated venues along River Mandovi. The highly impressive Ketevan World Sacred Music Festival's second editionheld over the last fortnightcomprised brilliant concerts starring musicians from around the world. Participants included Spain's Vandalia Vocal Ensemble, Hungary's St Efrem Ferfikar Male Choir, soloists from Portugal, Spain, Australia, Iraq, Argentina, Germany and Austria besides the Goa University Choir and several other musicians from the state. The main venue was the stunningly renovated Chapel of the Weeping Cross at the 16th century Santa Monica convent (the largest in Asia), but also utilized was the spectacularly located Penha de Franca church. Both these venues have been polished to high sheen by loving restoration work undertaken to high standards by meticulous experts and consultants. The Ketevan concerts were deeply moving to experience, not only because of the undeniable calibre of the music, but also because of the terrific collaborative energy the musicians and their audiences brought into lovely spaces being utilized in an entirely new way. Particularly affecting was the seamless, beautiful East-West harmony exemplified in 'Songs of Kindness', performed by Joana Amorim on flute and Rebecca Csalog on harp alongside Goa's own Mayank Bodekar on tabla and vocalist Rupesh Gawas. Earlier in the month, the Monte Music Festival featured a similarly poignant interplay between Eastern and Western cultural strands, including a series of superb female voices. Sufi music luminary Ragini Rainu alternated with Goa and Sangolda's homegrown young soprano star, Joanne D'Mello (she is currently based in Germany), followed by a characteristically powerhouse recital by Patricia Rozario, the formidable London-based Goan diva. But perhaps the most poignant moment of this 15th edition of the festival came during Sonia Shirsat's fantastic concert of fado, when this most beloved of singers combined melodiously with Naresh Madgaonkar on flute and santoor. Such cross-cultural artistic dialogue is perfectly suited for Goa, where genre-bending experimentation is embodied in the heritage locations themselves. Natasha Fernandes, curator of Old Goa's fine Museum of Christian Art says, "Goa's marvellous legacy of Indo-Portuguese art was created by working across traditions. At one time, during the 16th and 17th centuries, there was a formal ban to forbid Hindu artisans from creating church artefacts, but it was never rigorously followed. In fact, it is precisely that kind of cross-cultural, broad-minded artistry that created Goa's marvellous and unique heritage of architecture, furniture, altars and pulpits, liturgical objects and textiles, and iconography." Downriver on the Panaji waterfront, another stunning and culturally fluid building has been launched back to significance by an assemblage of India's best art curators. In many ways, the Palacio Idalcao (Adil Shah palace), or Old Secretariat, is the architectural embodiment of Goa's many-layered culture. It was built long before there was a Panaji, the summer palace of sybaritic Yusuf Adil Shah, who was himself from the Mediterranean. Then came another layer of meaning when it became seat of power for the Portuguese colonial state. On December 19, 1961, the colonial flag came down outside its windows to be replaced by India's tricolour for the first time. The building was again re-purposed to be the legislature and home of the new state's polity. After being expensively restored into soaring, outstanding gallery spaces in 2011, and then inexplicably lying vacant and forsaken for several years, the building has been masterfully utilized by the brand new Serendipity Arts Festival to display curated exhibitions by Ranjit Hoskote, Prashant Panjiar, Jyotindra Jain and others. It is a huge palace, with thousands of pieces mounted, and the result is perhaps understandably uneven. But, some of it is absolutely sublime. Baiju Parthan's kaleidoscopic 'Arpeggio for Abbe Faria' is one of the great meetings of venue, subject and artwork. In the main entrance, hundreds of historic photographs bring the vast hall alive with Goan characters, from some of the earliest portraits ever taken in the state, to family pictures from across the diaspora. It's an arts experience as stellar as can be, anywhere in the world. [And it's open to the public for another month, until the end of March. Do not miss!]
