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| Ravi Shankar Storyboard |
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Satyajit Ray designed a storyboard of Ravi Shankar, the great sitar maestro and Ray's contemporary and friend, before he launched his filmmaking career. Ray first saw Ravi Shankar play the sitar in 1945, and an abiding, long-lasting friendship formed between the two.
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It is unclear what prompted Ray to make this storyboard. Perhaps Ray wished to make a documentary on Shankar, or visually capture Shankar playing a complete raga from beginning to end, or perhaps a film incorporating both.
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Shankar is represented in the storyboard playing the Todi Raga, which is usually played in the late morning. It is noted for its great power, pathos and dignity.
Although there are many ragas, some say thousands, they can be classified as six male ragas with six female counterparts known as raginis.
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| At his residence in Benaras, Ravi Shankar with Satyajit Ray and Soumitra Chatterjee, Ray's principal actor, in 1978. |
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The aesthetic, emotional, sensual and seasonal elements in the system of pairs of ragas and raginis greatly appealed to painters, who saw in it a potential feast for the eye. Ragamalas , miniature paintings inspired by such music, were popular in the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries.
Ray attempts to show the ragamalas that Shankar's recital of the Todi formed in the listener's imagination. |
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