May Day, the first of May celebrated all over India as a spring fertility festival; commemorated also as “International Worker’s Day” with its historical significance. Maharashtra and Gujarat celebrate their statehood on this day. Water and the sad story of Fatehpur Sikri: a magnificant city from 1585, abandoned shortly after its completion, due to a paucity of water, remaining as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Water and the future of Auroville: shall we heed anticipatory, long-term future planning options? Or repeat the FATE of FATEhpur Sikri? Read more

Last evening the bharath nivas auditorium was witness to a spectacular Hindustani Jugalbandhi from Pandit Shivnath Mishra and his family.Pandit Shivnath Mishra was accompanied by his son Deobrat Mishra on the sitar and his grandson Prashant Mishram was on the tabla. it was a perfect harmony of three generations on one platform. The beautiful ragas left the audience enthralled. The trio presented one of pandit shivnath's composition called "ma ganga". At the close of the event they played the bhairavi . Read more

Kalki a transgender rights activist with the Sahodari Foundation, was in Auroville to present a talk about the transgender community in India. Kalki spoke about the various difficulties that they face with the government, the law and the society. Kalki who has lived in Auroville for two years questioned their acceptance by the Auroville community. Kalki presented a documentary Sowndarya about lives and acceptance of transgenders in India. Lot of concerns and questions were asked by Aurovillians which Kalki answered in depth. Read more

Hemant Chauhan is considered one of Gujarat’'s best and most widely celebrated singer of bhajans and folk music. He is frequently referred to as the bhajan king of Gujarati music, and is also considered to be one of the best singers of Sugam Sangeet. He has a huge fan base in Gujarat and abroad for his divine music and singing. It is believed that his performances of bhajans and devotional music have the ability to carry the listener into a tranquil, relaxed and serene world. Read more

Parvathy Baul is a singer, painter and storyteller from West Bengal. After receiving her initial music and dance training during her childhood, she studied visual arts at the Kala Bhavan at Shantiniketan, the university founded by Rabindranath Tagore. Meeting with the living tradition of Baul prompted her to choose the path of self-training in the Baul order rather than an institutional degree. Impressive beauty, personality and intensity of her devotional chanting and rotating dance, make her unique. Read more

The Sufi singers Abdul Ghani, Ajah Maideen and Saburmaideen Babha Sabeer (Vocals and Rabahna percussion in the Qawwali style) from the Nagore Dargah usually perform at religious and social ceremonies at their sufi shrine in coastal Tamil Nadu. They recorded the song Ya Allah for Laya project movies and the album Nagore sessions for EarthSync. - www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXfPFxfy7ZM - www.layaproject.com - - www.earthsync.com/store-in.asp?catalogid=23 - - www.myspace.com/nagoresessions - Read more

Who walks? What flies? it's a collective exhibition about the Kabir poetry in Kala Kendra by 5 artists. They speak about their works in the interview, in chronological order: Audrey Wallace, Srivi Kalyan: drawings art works by the children of Udavi School; Orijit Sen, graphic designer from Delhi: Hair burn like a grass; Srivi presents her sister Sandhiya Kalyan's mix-media installation; Audrey Wallace Taylor: Rajasthan Kabir Yatra drawings series; Sandhya Gopinath: Maya's painting series; Srivi Kalyan: Playing with Kabir mix media installation. Read more

Next two afternoons we will concentrate on the water. As an introduction, today at 5:00 pm, at Cinema Paradiso in Town Hall they will screen the film "Water the Great Mystery", and tomorrow also at Cinema Paradiso at 5pm Gilles Boulicot (former head of "Harvest" for over 13 years) offers a special talk on the topic of water.There will be a Cultural program on Thursday, 12th of April 2012, at 7.00pm at the occasion of Tamil New Year at Sri Aurobindo Auditorium, Bharat Nivas in International Zone. At Pitanga on 15th at 5pm High Flyers choir. Read more

Just few hours before the first Kabir musical event in Kalabhumi. Listen to Parvathy Baul, Shabnam Virmani and Prahlad Tipanya sharing (in Hindi & English) their spiritual experiences. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Satsanga, Satsangam, Satsang (Sanskrit ??????? sat = true, sanga = company) in Indian philosophy means the company of the "highest truth," the company of a guru, or company with an assembly of persons who listen to, talk about, and assimilate the truth. Read more

Kalarippayat, Mohiniyattam and Theyyam were performed by the Udayan's Masters at Sri Aurobindo Auditorium. Kalarippayat is a great and ancient physical, cultural and martial art of Kerala, which was in prevalence from time immemorial. It is primarily an art of physical culture, well developed in a most scientific way. It aims at giving a practitioner of the art, perfect control over his body balance, flexibility, stamina and speed, and perfect neuro-muscular co-ordination, an ability of the body to react instinctively to the senses. Read more

She who Unspins, performed by Ashwini Kaarthikeyan, was presented at Sri Aurobindo Auditorium, Bharat Nivas. The performance was accompanied with live music by P.T. Narendran (Nattuvangam), G. Srikanth (Vocal), B.P. Haribabu (Mridangam), Easwar Ramakrishnan (Violin), Devaraj (Flute). This performance was a repertoire of purely Bharatanatyam classical recital dance in Tamil, Sanskrit & Telugu with simultaneous projected translations in English. Read more

The dance form of Mohiniyattam comes from Kerala. The name Mohiniyattam literally means 'Dance of the Enchantress, Gopika Varma's training in Mohiniyattam since the age of ten has been under eminent gurus senior students of Kalyani Kuttyamma whose student she continued to be for 10 years. And here she is, accompanied by three dancers and a group of musicians, performing in Bharat Nivas. Unfortunately, this recording contains only sound, but the live music is definitely worth listening to, and the pictures give a good impression of the evening. Read more

Children of Deepanam School prepared, as usual for the end of the year small cultural program to share with their parents, friends and community. Opening piece was by Keshava on tabla, accompanied by Nadaka on guitar, followed by bharatnatyam classical Indian dance of older and a bit younger children of the school. Songs were sung, this year, except the last one, all in Tamil. And that was also the language of two plays, one of an old fable, the other original piece by students, leaving us roaring with laughter; and third one in French. Read more

Last Saturday in SAWCHU in Bharat Nivas, the international children's theatre workshop on Tagore literature took place. Mainly given in Tamil, its purpose was to let the children from the villages around Auroville share knowledge, work together and feel as one. And not just the children, but the teachers and some experts in theatre and education as well. The day, facilitated by Dr. Velu Saravanan, consisted of reciting poems and songs, theatre classes and as finale, a small play performed by the children. Read more

On Friday 9th in Auditorium, Bharat Nivas, Aurofilm has presented 5 short films in collaboration with IAWRT (International Association of Women in Radio and Television) and Dept. of Electronic Media and Mass Communication-Pondicherry University. The showed projections, part of the 2nd Asian Women's Film Festival, were: Capsule by Shreen Soliman (Canada), 1, 2, 3 by Nazli Deniz Guler (Turkey), Yup, It's My Body by Kiki Febriyanti (Indonesia), It's the Same Story by Nina Sabnani and Superman of Malegaon by Faiza Ahmad Khan (India). Read more

The Auroville Community will have an opportunity on March 22 at 6pm at La Terrace to welcome back Mr N. Balabaskar, our new Secretary and at the same time, to bid farewell to Mr S. Loganathan, who has been the Acting-Secretary. Kabir festival of sacred music will happen here in Auroville on different location on 6th, 7th, 8th of April. In today's news we feature excerpt of interview with Moghan on it. On Saturday 24th at 7pm children of Deepanam School will share with us their annual cultural show in the form of musci, songs, dance and plays. Read more

Muthu Kumar plays tabla, and is a student of Ustad Allarakha and Ustad Zakir Hussain. The sitar was played by Sanjeev Korti, a musician schooled by Ustad Shafiq khan from Dharwad. It was a refreshing experience to have these artists play in Auroville for the first time. The sounds from both instruments were equally present, and the longer Muthu and Sanjeev played, the more they started to interact through their music. Combine that with great tabla solos, and the whole performance is a joy to hear! Read more

Frederick, a Working Committee member, spoke to us on some current issues. His overall view is that this will be a year of many changes, and as such a year of intensive work, outwardly as well as inwardly. The aims of the Working Committee are to create a process in which it will become a facilitating agent, and to be more proactive than reactive as it is now. Appointment of the community's friendly secretary Bala Baskhar is seen as a positive change. And we all should focus on renewing of our consciousness and do what we are here for.

Just as music crosses all boundaries, Nandita di has students of all ages learning Hindustani Vocal Music. They all came together at SAWCHU - Bharat Nivas on Wednesday, March 7, 2012, to present a Hindustani Music Concert. In this soiree, the audience experienced melodious classical Indian music on the beats of tabla accompanied by sitar, harmonium, and a whole lot joy and peace. Read more

On Sunday 26th at 19:30 in Auditorium of Bharat Nivas, Savitri Maya and Grace Gitadelila performed in the show "Nirantara Samarpanam". The performance is about the story of the Kolam through dance and multimedia with rhythmic music and Mantra. During the dance a video was projected on a huge screen. The sound Cymatic film projection was by Danny Becher. Sasikanth Somu provided Multimedia/ Videography. Costumes, light and set design by Grace Gitadelila with help of Sasikanth Somu and Jean Legrand. Read more

Last Monday night at Pitanga, the amazing sitar player Nikhil played along with Rashmi on his tabla. The equally gifted musicians were playing together for the first time ever. It was a true joy to the ears to witness them perform at Pitanga. Nikhil played ragas, melodic modes used in Indian classical music. This performance being the first where they were playing together, Rashmi fluently improvised to Nikhil's tunes. We are happy to say he did a flawless job. Complementing each other, they brought the concert to a musical climax. Read more

Beside many different types of events we also got a chance to see "cream de la creme" of current Indian cinematography starting with Friday 2nd until Sunday at Sri Aurobidno Auditorium, Bharat Nivas, Pavilion of Indian Culture in International Zone. This year, due to the intensive involvement of film makers in projects we will indulge ourselves only into watching films. Surya shared with us some interesting details on the preparation of the Panorama, and on films, directors and producers. Common to all films is quality, meaning, .. Read more

Celestine is an Aurovillian artist who came here twenty-five years ago. She wrote a touching poem about Krishna in order to express her feelings and to spread those deep emotions in Auroville and outside. She is giving us an interview about her inspiration, her love for dancing and the power of movement. Listen to her explanations and the poem itself which is called 'Krishna and piano'. 'My heart vibrates wildly, swells up tears in my eyes, fills up every nerve and fiber with joy... Even the Thane Cyclone couldnt move me...' Read more

Krishna Kumar, a musician and teacher of Carnatic music, through his band 'Krishna's Temple Rock' creates a new global music drawing its roots from traditional Carnatic ragas and songs sung for the divine in the temples, and setting them into new musical frames inspired by Western rock and jazz. The five musicians fuse their particular approaches and styles, their feelings and experiences into unique compositions, making Krishna's Temple Rock a contributor to world music. Read more

The full name of this concert is "Songs of Love Longing and Liberation beyond Borders", a fantastic performance by Parvathy Baul and Latif Bolat with the sound of Asian spiritual traditions. Overall an enchanting night, with candles on stage surrounding Parvathy. Her amazing voice and skill with playing multiple instruments at the same time: a Guggi (Drum) and an Ektara. Parvathy was altogether a beauty, a storm, a child or a tiger, with a voice coming from an other spiritual dimension. made it a performance to be remembered. Read more

Dr. Prema Nandkumar talked about the growing need for humanity to break the seal of the last chapter of the play she calls the 'evolutionary destiny of man'. With stories and poems ranging from Norwegian folklore to western legends, from Indian mythology to Greek mythology, Dr Prema spoke about the meaning of the cycle of life and death, and if a total transition of the matter is possible. Finally she draws our attention to relying on the power of the soul, not science, to explore matter.

As part of the "Matter Precipitates" program by Sri Aurobindo Centre for Studies, India and the World, we had a chance to experience a small preview of Anu's recently published book "God Enchanter : Beings in Transition" at Sri Aurobindo Auditorium, Bharat Nivas, Pavilion of Indian Culture in International Zone. This is a story that begins during the war in Iraq and is spoken by different people around the world as their lives transform when they come in touch with the God Enchanter. Read more

On Thursday 9th of February at 7.30 at Pitanga in Samasti we will have a chance to listen again to Jacky Mouvillat playing Chapman Stick, a 12 string electric guitar. This time he will be accompanied by Anaka (singing), Manosh Bardhan on tablas and by Matthew Littlewood on soprano saxophone. Jacky inspired trough his traveling all over the world in 2001 devoted himself to playing his own compositions on the Chapman Stick after meeting Ernett Chapman, the inventor of this unique instrument. He likes to share ideas with the fellow musicians. Read more

Loretta talks about her film ‘The teachings of Flowers; the Life and Work of the Mother of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. Aikido Wokshop 2012: Jean-Pierre Pigeau, offers a 12 day workshop. Auroville Marathon 2012 on February 12. A conference by Dr. Aster Patel: ‘Matter Precipitates… It is in a hurry to transform itself... ’beginning on 9 Feb. with a premiere of Loretta’s film. Ela for Insight Seminars: a one-day-workshop on the deeper level of the community: ‘An Introduction to the spiritual dimension of Auroville 9th February Center Guest House. Read more

During the homage celebrated past Sunday 22th at the SAWCHU in Bharas Nivas, Gordon performed some of the compositions of Saint Tyagaraja. Every year the commemorative music festival Tyagaraja Aradhana is held at Thiruvaiyaru in Tyagaraja's honour. This is a week-long festival of music where various Carnatic musicians from all over the world get together with their veenas, violins, flutes, nagasvarams, mridangams and ghatams. Read more