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Rasika Kumar
Rasika Kumar is the daughter of Mythili Kumar and has been her student since 1987. Since her arangetram in 1996, Rasika has toured with and performed in many of Abhinaya Dance Company's productions (1996-2000) with major roles in several of them. As a member and later president of Natya, MIT's classical dance club, Rasika organized, choreographed, and performed in various events in the greater Boston area. At Chennai , India , in the fall of 2004, Rasika took advanced training under renowned teachers Prof. C.V. Chandrasekar and Smt. Kalanidhi Narayanan. Since 2005, Rasika has been a featured soloist and, more recently, assistant choreographer for many of Abhinaya's recent productions (2005 - present). Rasika's choreography and performance have garnered attention from beyond the Indian dance community. "Varsha: the Rainy Season," jointly choreographed by Rasika Kumar and Mythili Kumar and performed by members of Abhinaya, was chosen to be performed at the 2007 Ethnic Dance Festival and also received an award and commission for the 2008 Festival. Rasika has been selected to perform her solo choreography for sjDANCEco's Annual ChoreoProject Award both in 2007 and 2008 and for the WestWave Dance Festival at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in 2008. She is also the recipient of the Arts Council of Silicon Valley Performing Arts Fellowship for 2008. Rasika currently resides in the Bay Area and works as a software engineer at Google, Inc while actively pursuing the dance form and developing as a solo artist and choreographer.
Visit Rasika's website
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Malavika Kumar
Malavika Kumar is the daughter of Mythili Kumar and has been her student since 1990. She has performed in many of Abhinaya Dance Company's productions in the Bay Area since 1992 and has toured with the company to India and around the U.S.A. She performed her arangetram in July 1998 and since then has been dancing regularly in Abhinaya's productions. She also helps to teach classes for Abhinaya. She has performed nattuvangam for the company in numerous performances, including in India and Los Angeles. In a performance in Chennai, she was lauded by a critic as 'the star of the show' for her 'precise, well-intoned nattuvangam'. Her solo choreography has been presented by arangetram students in 2006, 2007, and 2008. As an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley, she was also involved in choreographing and performing in several group presentations of Bharatanatyam. She is studying law at UC Davis.
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Preeti Vissa
Preeti Vissa has been learning Bharatanatyam from Mythili Kumar for over ten years. During this time, she has participated in a number of Abhinaya productions, such as Revelations, The Life of Annamacharya, Mayiladum Alagan, and The Power of Saturn. She performed her arangetram in April 1999. Preeti performed with the company in the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles, and in Chennai, India in 2002. She recently graduated with a MS in social work from Columbia University. Preeti currently resides in the Bay Area and works as a program manager of community reinvestment at The Greenlining Institute at Berkeley.
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Sharada
Moorthy Sripadam
Sharada Moorthy Sripadam has studied with Guru Adyar Lakshman and had her arangetram in 1976. She has participated in fund-raisers for the Hindu Temple Livermore since 1989, and has been a teacher and company member for Abhinaya since 1991. She participated in Abhinaya collaborative performance with San Jose Taiko in 1993 and in Abhinaya's performance of Kutrala Kuravanji in May 2004 and Timeless Traditions in November 2004. Recently Sharada participated in Abhinaya's production of Multi-Splendor Ramayana in 2006, and the San Francisco Ethnic Dance festival in 2008.
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Madhav Vissa
Madhav Vissa has been learning Bharatanatyam for over ten years and performed his arangetram in January 2002. He has toured with the company to India in 2003, to the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles, and to Boise, Idaho in 2004. In 2007, he toured with the company to New York and New Jersey and danced in the SF Ethnic Dance Festival. He has also performed nattuvangam for Abhinaya's Fall 2006 performance series, and in New York in 2007. He is a graduate student at Columbia University.
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Swati Buch
Swati Buch (Arangetram - September 2002)
has been participating in Abhinaya Dance
Company productions for several years, and
helps train students at the Fremont branch
for Abhinaya Dance Company. She has toured
with the company to Lansing, Chicago, Los
Angeles, and Idaho
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Anjana Dasu
Anjana Dasu performed her arangetram in 2005 after training with Abhinaya for over seven years. She has been actively performing in Abhinaya's productions since then and has assisted in training students towards their arangetrams. She performed recently at the San Francisco Ethnic Dance festival and toured with the company to New York and New Jersey. She was praised by a critic as .an exquisite dancer. for her performance in Abhinaya's 2007 fall production. She was awarded the first prize in the Papanasam Sivan competition held in San Jose in 2008. She is an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley and is actively involved in presentations of Bharatanatyam on the campus.
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Vaibhavi
Umesh
Vaibhavi started her training in Bharatanatyam in 1994 under Mythili Kumar. She relocated to India where she continued her training and performed her arangetram in July 2004 under Guru Bhanumathi's direction in Bangalore. She returned to the Bay Area and performed in Abhinaya's 2004 fall concert, Timeless Traditions, and other company presentations from 2006 to 2008. She is an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley.
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Yatrika Ajaya
Yatrika Ajaya has participated actively in several community events and in Abhinaya productions since 1999. She is a regular performer in schools through Young Audiences of the Bay Area along with Mythili Kumar. She also performed in the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles in 2004. She had the opportunity to train with visiting guru Sri. C.V. Chandrasekhar and performed his choreography in the fall 2006 production of Ritu Samharam. She presented her arangetram to great acclaim in August 2007. She also teaches classes for Abhinaya.
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Anjali Thakkar
Anjali Thakkar performed her arangetram in 2006 after training with Abhinaya for over ten years. Anjali has performed in numerous community events, demonstrations, and fundraisers and in several of Abhinaya's productions since 2000. She toured with the company to the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles in 2004. She has been teaching younger students at Abhinaya for a few years and is currently an undergraduate at MIT.
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Sushma Umesh
Sushma Umesh performed her arangetram in 2006 after training for ten years. She has participated actively in community events and in Abhinaya productions since 2001, including the fall 2006 production of Ritu Samharam, and the fall 2007 production of Prithvi- the Earth. She is an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley.
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Neeraja Venkat
Neeraja Venkat trained in Bharatanatyam for five years and performed her arangetram in February 2007. She has participated in several productions since 2004 such as Poetry n Motion, Timeless Traditions, and Ritu Samharam. She performed recently at the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival and in Abhinaya's touring production of Gandhi-the Mahatma and Jagriti in New York and New Jersey. She is an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley.
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Pooja Sohoni
Pooja Sohoni performed her arangetram in August 2007 after training for nine years. She has participated in many Abhinaya student recitals and company productions. Pooja most recently participated in Abhinaya's 2008 Fall production Rivers- A mystical Journey. She is also a teacher for Abhinaya Dance Company's beginner students. Pooja is currently a senior at Cupertino High School.
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Lakshmi Venkatesan
Lakshmi Venkatesan learned Bharathanatyam for the past ten years from Smt. Mythili Kumar, and performed her arangetram in May 2005. She has participated in several Abhinaya's dance productions since her arangetram. Most recently she performed in Abhinaya's 2008 fall production Rivers- A mystical Journey. In addition, she has performed Bharathanatyam pieces for various local community and non-profit organizations and events, schools, and temples. She also teaches classes for Abhinaya. Lakshmi is an undergraduate student at San Jose State University.
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