The only opera written by sitar maestro Pundit Ravi Shankar when he was 90, had premiered at the Symphony Hall in Birmingham on the 11th May and at the Royal Opera House in London on the 12th May. The opera Sukanya, named after his second wife and Anoushka Shankar's mother, is a light-hearted musical love letter about the deep love between couples, even though the wife was 34 years younger than the protagonist. The playscript by the Indian novelist Amit Chaudhuri, dispelled by a bustle of energetically rhythmical dancing does seem to be the maestro's last ode about love and life, music and spectacle.
The opera is western, with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and BBC singers sharing the stage with five Indian instrumentalists and Indian dancers from the Aakash Odedra Company. The vocal lines were delivered by the principle singers including Susanna Hurrell (title role), Alok Kumar (old sage he loves) and Njabulo Madlala and Micheal de Souza (mischevious demigods) in tune with the Broadway musical style.
Critics have praised offstage performers M Balachandar and Pirashanna Thevarajah and conductor David Murphy, who pulled together the bits that Ravi Shankar had left unfinished, have done some fabulous work.
Anoushka Shankar (Ravi Shankar's daughter and most illustrious pupil), along with conductor David Murphy had struggled for months to prepare the 100-plus singers, dancers and instrumentalists for the show's UK premiere.
In an interview to The Times, Anoushka Shanker said that his father had been thinking about the opera much earlier, but hadn't shared the ideas with them, mainly because it was written for her mum.
“My mum and her sisters were all named after the wives of legendary sages... The legend of Sukanya in the Mahabharata is about this young princess, who for various reasons ends up marrying an old sage and takes care of him faithfully and devotedly... its almost as if, thanks to her love, the old sage gets a second life.
“Of course this parable is very striking in the context of my parents' age difference and the lovely twilight relationship that they had.”
The details of the show can be found at sukanyaopera.com
