Swang (dance drama)
Swang, also Svang (Hindi स्वांग, Svang ), Sang (Hindi सांग, Sang ), in the narrow sense is a folk dance theater in the northern Indian states of Punjab, Rajasthan and Malwa region in Madhya Pradesh. The focus is on dialogues and stories in prose form, the songs are sung in a broad stylistic range, which range from the melodic structures of the semi-classical Indian music to contemporary film music. The topics come from widespread mythical tales or historical hero stories of Punjabi folklore.
Swang as a parent style is the most popular folk theater tradition for entertainment in northern India. From this ancient blend of dance, theater, song, staged dialogue and monologic narrative as independent forms, such as the widespread throughout northern India nautanki style, the regional styles sang in Haryana, bhagat in Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan in khyal developed. Apart from this historical and geographical differentiation, the terms swang, sang and nautanki partially used interchangeably.
History
In addition to the religious ritual theaters, the Bhakti cult belonging devotional forms of theater Ram purple and ras lila, that the worship of Rama and Krishna with partially unterhaltendem character, parties with spectacles and other performances have been handed a pleasure since ancient Indian times. In the companies belonging to the Yajurveda texts of Shatapatha - Brahmana is beside instructions for the sacrificial ritual is a list of entertainers: professional singers, musicians, dancers, acrobats and jesters. According to the in the period between 200 BC and 200 AD. written treatise on the performing arts Natyashastra it must at this time have already been popular forms of entertainment theater in regional languages as theater should have stood for all castes including the lower Shudras available and Shudras were kept away from the sacred language of Sanskrit. From the Harivamsa, a ranked as a supplement to the Mahabharata Scripture is given also that there were ancient Indian plays in regional languages.
Terms like samaj ( Samaja, " Community"), often in Arthashastra ( ancient Indian theory of the state ), the Jatakas ( instructive stories from the life of Buddha), Sanskrit dramas and inscriptions occur, for which the earliest, written in Sanskrit preforms of today's Swang. From the 5th to the 11th century immersed in Sanskrit texts on the concept sangītaka provided by Sangita ( "Music" ) or Sangeet (meaning a " composed song " ) is derived and can be viewed as a popular development from the classical Sanskrit drama. The Maithili poet Vidyapati ( about 1352 - about 1448 ) described his 1425 piece authored Goraksha Vijaya as sangitaka.
The words Swang, Svang and sang "disguise ", " drama " are probably from Sanskrit svānga, " camouflage " in the meaning " drama" derived. Sang is also written sangit in the regional languages. Sang with these detectable for centuries importance of the dialect word descent directly from Sanskrit Sangeet ( "Music" ) is unlikely. Today's sangeet notation instead of singing could have been composed of singing and Sanskrit Gita ( "Song " ), ie " Sang- song" mean.
According to different assumptions ( 1) developed the popular Swang from Sanskrit drama sangitaka, (2) those classic form of theater goes back to earlier folk traditions, (3) there was an independent parallel development without major influence instead or (4) the Sanskrit theater was built from earlier traditional shapes and formed after its demise in turn the basis for a popular theater.
None of the popular theater traditions can be traced back as to the 16th century in its concrete form on. Malik Muhammad Jayasi (late 15th to the first half of the 16th century) Swang mentioned in his poem Padmavat of 1540, as Sabalsingh Chauhan, another Hindi poet of the 17th century, in his work Mahabharata. The British administrative officer Richard Carnac Temple (1850-1931) published his three-volume 1883-1890 poetry collection The Legend of the Panjab. In it are three Swang poems, which were performed every year during Holi festival in Jagadhari in Ambala district in Haryana. In the Punjab the Swang tradition may have existed at least since the 18th century. The modern version was created nautanki in Kanpur ( Uttar Pradesh ) and spread in the early 20th century, northern India.
The last Nawab of Avadh, the deposed by the British East India Company Wajid Ali Shah (reigned 1847-1856 ) wrote plays, in which he of bhagat, swang elements and ras purple and mixed his own style as Rahas designated. In his palace in Lucknow district he left specifically for the performance of these pieces a building ( Rahas Manzil ) build. Of these, the Urdu poet Agha Hasan Amanat (1815-1858) was inspired. He wrote the play Indians Sabha, which was first performed in 1854 and became so popular that it took up the Parsis in their theater repertoire and the Orientalist Friedrich August Rosen ( 1805-1837 ) translated it into German. The new style again freshened the Swang tradition. Sang in Haryana to have been developed around 1750 by Kishan Lal Bhaat.
In 1870 reached the Swang theater, influenced by Rahas and bhagat from Vrindavan in Uttar Pradesh Hathras City to the west of this federal state. There, particularly the love story between Jamal, the daughter of a Turkish minister, and Gabru, a young trader from Central Asia came to the performance. A play by Vasudev Basam on the same subject called Syah Posh, according to the so-called population Kafiristans, quickly became famous and made sure that in this region produced numerous Swang theater groups and Syah Posh was later listed on Nautanki stages. A student of Basam, Murlidhar Rai, wrote the play Shahjadi Nautanki, at the end of the 19th century Nautanki developed the contents and style of performance in the cities of Kanpur and Lucknow as an independent form of Swang and took over the leading role as a North Indian folk theater. Hathras and Kanpur are the two most important centers today, where Nautanki is maintained in different performance styles.
The main difference between Swang and Nautanki is that the older style was staged in the open field and the new development from the European-influenced Parsi theater took over a limited by a curtain to the back stage. In addition to that the Swang the story from verse was sung with dialogues, while the Nautanki the performers recite prose. In Nautanki won the previously unappreciated costumes, the makeup and the dramatic actions during the louder accompanying orchestra with kettledrums ( nagara, also Nakkara ) in importance.
After the highlight was exceeded early 20th century, disappointed always trivial, pushed between the action song and dance routines along the lines of Bollywood film lovers demanding music, to obscene scenes that occasionally the plot altogether repressed and reputation the performer let down. Another disadvantage is today next to the competition from the film industry, the lack of professionalism of many Nautanki theater troops. Contrast, are efforts to preserve the art form of Nautanki as old folk tradition and aligned with the changing viewing patterns of the audience, such as by shortening the performance period of eight to three to four hours.
Performances
In Swang straight stories are told, sung dressed in verse and prose presented as dialogs. Look Playful act occurs in contrast to the background. Previously entered the Performer to everyday clothes, and only occasionally in costumes and makeup. The professional theater troops withdraw from village to village after the festive calendar and find yourself at a social and religious events. Previously featured male performers also represents the female roles in the late 1930s, women began to appear. Women's built from mainly dance routines to self scenic units, by taking over the tradition of the nautch - girl. These were professional entertainers in the palaces. As a nautch -girl, the British colonialists called the temple dancers ( devadasis ), the word is of Sanskrit verballhornt nritya via Prakrit nachcha ( "dance", " dancing " ).
Nine to twelve male actors belong to a troupe today's Swang ( khara ), of which four instrumentalists which the boiler drums tabla and nagara, the string lute sarangi, harmonium and occasionally play cymbals. The troupe travels a Brahmin caste belonging to cook, the other members of khara do not belong to a particular caste and not necessarily inherit their profession. Hindus and Muslims belong equally to the troops, the latter can be found mostly among the instrumentalists. The Swang troupe led by a khareband which is recognized by the members as a guru. It organizes the performances, composed the dialogues and usually occurs in one of the lead roles.
The performers operate the Swang theater outdoors without curtains and backdrops, with the audience seated in a circle around the stage. This practice also characterizes the traditional performances of singing, bhagat, khyal and bhavai of Gujarat, some ( "stage" ) in Madhya Pradesh and jatra in Bengal. Jatra generally stands for a people without a theater backdrop, a religious ceremony or procession. In Maharashtra tamasha is a massive, returning to the development of the Swang folk theater today. There is another stylistic relationship to some South Indian dance theater styles. In Karnataka bayalata general performances that take place outdoors means particular yakshagana. In most theaters the stage consists of a slightly raised wooden platform, the musicians take place before or at its edge.
Swang shall mean a regional theater forms as a broad term, the idea of a single entertainer. An actor who takes on the role of a deity can say that he has the " swang " believed this deity. In the most general case is swang for every performance of popular actors who appear in different roles.
In Himachal Pradesh which occur during religious festivals like Dashahara years and Shivaratri Swang theater are also called Jhanki ( " Glance" ). Thus, the formation of the Gods performer is otherwise called to a still scene image so that the audience come forward and give them to the honor in the religious theater. When Lohadi hard go on all night costumed boy from house to house, disguised as a deer, the other drums and sing. For more ritualized, designated as swang dance forms in Himachal Pradesh are chandroli, jhamakada and Googa. In addition to dancers and singers occurs a clown who makes crude jokes. In swang tegi - dance at the Divali festival animals are imitated, the dancers wear wooden tiger masks. Jhamakada (also nanoo vinayaka ) are dances in the Swang tradition that are listed at weddings and other celebrations transition.
Stories
Many of the stories are from the Punjabi folklore, partly fictional topics for today's social situation occur. Popular is the tragic ending love story between the rich and beautiful Hir from the Jat ethnic group and the roving Ranjha who is employed at her father's court as a cowherd and her on his flute ( bansuri, regional wanjhli ) auditions. The spread in numerous versions of history also forms the theme for the bawdy Dhapa songs, from which developed the refined classical tappa - singing style.
Another story about a mythical and romantic lovers of the Pakistani province of Sindh is called Sassui Punnhun ( Sassi Punnu ). The outcast as an infant daughter of Raja of Banbhore, Sassui, grows up with a simple scrubber until the news of her beauty reached the son of the ruler of Makran, Punnhun. The two find each other and are separated by fraudulent means.
In Sohini Mahiwal ( Suhini - Mehar ) the beautiful Sohini is the daughter of a potter. The rich merchants Izzat Baig of Bukhara loses from carelessness and love to her all his money and becomes a simple buffalo herders - hence the name Mehar, later brings to an ascetic on the other side of the river, the Sohini food. You can find together until they drown together in the river.
Puran Bhagat was a son of the king Sulwahan (Raja Salban ), who once ruled in Sialkot in Pakistan's Punjab. The childless first wife of King claimed that after she had tried in vain to start a relationship with the Prince that he wanted to rape her. The enraged king ordered his son to cut off hands and feet and throw him into a well. A guru rescued Puran and built for him at the fountain accommodation, where he was soon himself to a wise man and his place to a place of pilgrimage. At the site of the fountain near Sialkot today is a tomb, a pilgrimage to the women who want children. The famous story has often been told and processed. Rudyard Kipling wrote in 1895, published in English short story, " The Miracle of Puran Bhagat ".
In the well-known throughout northern India story cycle Raja Bharathari is the title character of the king of Ujjain in the 1st century AD After he had gained deep insight into the world that he gave his royal crown from his brother and retired to the forest to reflect on the true meaning of life. Several episodes of his life have the illusory manifestations of earthly existence to the topic.