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Tikekar on stage

The Northeast has some fabulous choirs that sing Gospel music. On the second day, contrast the renditions of Nagaland's Mokokchung Chancel Choir with a vocal recital by Carnatic singer Aruna Sayeeram. The purity of tone and clarity of her voice are not to be missed. The folk tradition of Baul sangeet comes alive with a group from Bangladesh whose mystic approach to humanism is well-known.

On the third day, there will be a qawwali by Asif Ali Khan of Pakistan sung in the tradition of the legend of this genre of music Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Also listen to a dhol group from Jhelum, as yet unknown, but capable of complex rhythms. In addition, Uday Bhawalkar will invoke Lord Shiva in the Dhrupad shaili (style) and Bhuvan Komkali will present Sagun-Nirguna bhajans. At Nehru Park.

-By S. Sahaya Ranjit

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Multi-faceted artist Hubert; her collage

-By S. Kalidas

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A still from Being Cyrus

With Being Cyrus, Homi Adajania originates a new genre: Parsi-noir. The film is dark, laced with blood, bodies and quintessentially Parsi eccentric humour. There is a pot-smoking sculptor gone to seed; his busty, weary wife who is double-cheating him; a hoary grandfather who owns a building but lives in a black room without much food or company; a mean brother who is sleeping with his sister-in-law; a cop who ends up with a pencil stuck in his cheek; and Cyrus, orphaned, troubled and absolutely at ease with plunging knives and shooting guns.

At times, Adajania takes the proceedings too seriously-there is a clichéd and unenlightening dream sequence but mostly he keeps a sure-footed pace. He also extracts fine performances from his superbly talented cast: Saif Ali Khan, in his first non-mainstream project, manages to be at once harmless and menacing. Being Cyrus is a competent, well-crafted debut.

-By Anupama Chopra

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A painting by Roy

KOLKATA Just as history is not limited to a single event, art is not limited to a single interpretation. That is why Samindranath Majumdar's work is so interesting. Majumdar, 40, in his mid-career as one of Bengal's finest abstractionists, evokes thoughts and feelings of a varied kind with his equally varied reinvention of lines and segments, layers and textures. It is probably because Majumdar, while at work, is torn between two of his own roles-art historian and artist. His works have a strange austerity about them. On show seven years after his last solo in the city at the Akar Prakar Gallery till April 16.

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Naithani's work

Her second and more recent series has images of miniature style paintings from as far back as the 16th century combined with classic Indian textile designs. Naithani has manipulated photographs to create images incongruous with the original impressions. The exhibition opens at the Jehangir Art Gallery in Mumbai on April 6 and continues till April 12.

-By Aditi Pai

Index