150th anniversary of Jorasanko Theatre celebrated in Kolkata

'Jorasanko Manchagatha’ was inaugurated by Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury, Chairman, West Bengal State Akademi of Dance Drama Music and Visual Arts, and also Vice Chancellor, Rabindra Bharati University.

‘Jorasanko Manchagatha’ was organised by the West Bengal State Akademi of Dance Drama Music and Visual Arts, Rabindra Bharati University, as a part of its celebrations of the 150th anniversary of Jorasanko Theatre, and as a tribute to the members of the Tagore family and others who contributed significantly to its growth and popularity.

It was a presentation of a representative selection of Bengali theatre songs (manchagatha) of plays staged at, and readily associated with, the ancestral house of the Tagores at Jorasanko, and with playwrights like Madhusudan Dutt, Ramnarayan Tarkaratna, Jyotirindranath Tagore, Swarnakumari Devi, Rabindranath Tagore, Dwijendralal Roy, Abanindranath Tagore, Indira Devi Chaudhurani and several others in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The songs of ‘Jorasanko Manchagatha’ were presented by Riddhi Bandyopadhyay and Devajit Bandyopadhyay of Academy Theatre, with narrations by Debashis Bose, based on scripts prepared by Devajit Bandyopadhyay who conceived, and also directed, the entire presentation.

There was an exhibition of visuals relevant to ‘Jorasanko Manchagatha’, as also the release by Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury, in the presence of Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, former Vice Chancellor of Visva Bharati – of the book ‘Jyotirindranather Jibansmriti’, the reminiscences of Jyotirindranath Tagore in Bengali. This book, edited by Devajit Bandyopadhyay, has been published by Dey’s Publishing.