Raag Rang Holiday Concert 2024 Brochure

Asmi Haldar:  Yaman Bandish 
Amit Das will accompany her on tabla and Maitreyi Mehta will accompany her on harmonium.

Asmi is a young musician with a deep passion for the performing arts. She has been learning piano and classical music since kindergarten and began playing the viola from 4th grade. Under the mentorship of Ms. Mitali Bhowmik since 2nd grade, Asmi has started to recognize the value of discipline and hard work that artists possess. Currently, Asmi is a proud member of the Chamber Orchestra at Millburn Middle School. She has recently received few awards, including the Marathi Vishwa Committee’s Swaradhara 2024 Competition, the Sangeet Piyaasi Award in Calcutta, and the Charleston International Music Competition 2024. 

Nrityalina Center for Performing Arts: Shiva Panchakshara Strotram
Dance Performance by Haritha Kundoor, Tripti Vaishya and Bharti Yadav

Nrityalina Center for Performing Arts is a premier  Indian Classical dance institute based in New Jersey with branches at Jersey City, Livingston and North Edison. They specialize in Bharatanatyam, Kathak and Semi classical Bollywood. Under the able guidance of guru Paromita ji, students of Nrityalina have performed at various prestigious events and venues around the Tri-state area.

Raima Bhattacharjee:  Song Abhi na jao
Film - Hum Dono (1961); Music - Jaidev; Lyrics- Sahir Ludhianvi 
Singers - Modh Rafi, Asha Bhonsle

Raima is blessed with musical sense from a very young age, she used to sing even before she started talking with full sentences. Her musical journey began with her father, then she started taking musical lessons from Shri ParthaSarathi Mukhopadhyay at the age of 3. Currently she is learning Indian vocal classical from Smt Mitali Bhawmik and western vocal classical from West Minister Conservatory of Music. She is also a student of the honors music program of West Minister Conservatory of Music. 

Madhura Joshi: Kafi Bandish and Tagore song based on the raag, Mamo Chittey.
Amit Das will accompany her on tabla and Khemraj Singh will accompany her on harmonium. Khemraj is learning from Mitali ji for last five years.
 

Madhura is a sophomore at Hillsborough High School. She has a deep passion for music, particularly classical pieces, and enjoys both listening to and learning about the art form. Also a dedicated violinist, she is an active member of her school orchestra, where she continues to grow and refine her skills.  

Amulya Bisaria: Tabla solo
 

Amulya is Junior at BRHS. He has been learning tabla from Taalim School of Indian Music since 2013 under the guidance of Jin Won and Pandit Divyang Wakil. Amulya enjoys playing tabla at cultural events in the tri-state area. He is excited to be playing at Raag Rang for the first time. 

Amulya is accompanied by Ojas Srivastava on the harmonium. He is a freshman and also a tabla student of Taalim School of Indian Music. 

Ria Sharma: Song Aaoge Jab Tum
Movie: Jab We Met; Singer: Rashid Khan; Lyricist(s) names: Irshad Kamil, Faaiz Anwar
Music Director: Pritam Chakraborty, Sandesh Shandilya

Ria is a senior at Robbinsville High School. She has been singing for almost 10 years, learning from her guru, Indrani Chakraborty. She has an interest in both Indian classical and contemporary music, as well as Bollywood songs and films. Apart from this connection to her culture, she enjoys writing poetry, reading books, playing video games, performing in musical theatre, and dancing Kathak, a North Indian classical dance style. 

Rachel is a freshman at Robbinsville High School. She has been learning classical Hindustani music for almost 10 years with her guru, Indrani Chakraborty. She loves learning music and have been listening to and watching Bollywood media all her life. Apart from singing, she enjoys reading, gaming with her sister, acting in musical theatre, and hanging out with her friends.  

Atharva is a second year student at Rutgers University.  He has been singing Indian Classical Music for over a decade, and has recently joined the Rutgers Asian Acapella Group (RAAG).   

Maitreyi Mehta: Song Moh Moh ke dhage. It is a combination of three raags.

Maitreyi is 14 years old, in the ninth grade, and has been learning Hindustani Classical music from Smt. Mitaliji Bhawmik since the last 9 years. She is also finishing up her Madhyama Purna pre-diploma for Kathak dance and plays flute. She has performed and won accolades at various events including Sangeet Piyasi, Raag Rang,  Kal Ke Kalakar, Chhandayan, Rising Stars IAPA, Kallol, ArtisTree, Marathi Vishwa etc. over the years. 

Shreyansh Singh: Song Ka Karun Sajani (Raag Bhairavi)

Shreyansh is 11 yrs old and has been learning music for the last 4 yrs. Shreyansh is learning Hindustani classical from his guru Smt. Mitali Bhawmik. He also loves to play different instruments like Guitar, Piano, Violin and harmonium. 

Aarushi Mehta: Song Mohe Rang Do Lal (Raag Puriya Dhaneshree)

Aarushi is 11 years old, in the sixth grade, and has been learning Hindustani Classical music from Smt. Mitaliji Bhawmik since the last 5 years. She is also learning Piano RCM level 3, and plays Clarinet for her school band.  She has performed and won accolades at various events including Raag Rang,  Kal Ke Kalakar, Chhandayan, Rising Stars IAPA, Kallol, ArtisTree, Marathi Vishwa etc. over the years. 

Led by Vasanti Anand, Surabhi is a band that beautifully blends the rich traditions of Carnatic music with the vibrant tones of contemporary Western music and more. Our performance includes a medley of raags in a Carnatic and western based format using Carnatic violin, the flute, keyboard, and mridangam. 

Atanu Ghosh

An ardent music lover, Atanu (also known as Bappaditya) began his musical journey under the guidance of his mother. Later as an engineering student at Jadavpur University, he connected with like minded people and, they moved on to form their band DRISHTI which went on to compose some very meaningful music and perform at various events across the city. They finally released their album Drishti in 2012. This was followed by his solo album in 2013. He has performed in various cultural  and social events in India and abroad. He has done playback vocals for various TV serials and has also performed in various prestigious events in Kolkata.  

Sudipta Bhawmik: Excerpts from Dwapar Kotha

Sudipta Bhawmik is a bilingual playwright, actor and director and has written several plays in Bengali and English. Sudipta’s plays tell the stories of the struggles and contradictions of the first-generation Indian immigrants. This unique contribution to Indian Theater has inspired several theater scholars to cite Sudipta’s plays in their scholarly work about diasporic theater. Sudipta's plays are part of the curriculum at multiple US and Indian universities including Loyala Marymont Univ in Californa, and Drew University in New Jersey. His plays have been produced and staged in USA, UK, Bangladesh, India, and have been translated and produced in several Indian languages like Hindi, Marathi, Tamil, and English. In India, Sudipta's plays has been staged by major theatre companies. His plays have won several awards at different festivals in India as well as in USA and Canada. Major theater journals in India publish his plays and has
four drama anthologies to his credit. Sudipta is the founder of ECTA theater company and has been producing plays since 2003 in New Jersey and all-around USA and India.
Sudipta received training in acting and directing at the “Panchamved Charyashram” a theater school in Calcutta, India, founded by Saoli Mitra and had the privilege of training under the stalwarts of Bengali theater like Sombhu Mitra, Tripti Mitra, Saoli Mitra, Mohit Chattopadhya and others. He also received training from the famous playwright and director Badal Sircar at many of his workshops. Sudipta has also acted in a principal character role in Mira Nair’s film “The Namesake”. Sudipta is also a published cartoonist, a book illustrator, and a podcaster. He is the writer, director, and performer of the popular chart topper podcast “The Stories of Mahabharata.”
Based on the podcast, Harper Collins India published the book, "Dwapar Katha: The Stories of Mahabharata" authored by Sudipta.
The Cultural Association of Bengal (NY) awarded Sudipta with the “Distinguished Service Award” for his contribution. The Bengal Foundation of America bestowed upon Sudipta their annual award for 2014. Sudipta also received the “Bhashanagar Award 2015” from
Bhashanagar a leading magazine from Kolkata India. Sudipta’s plays were twice nominated for the New Jersey Perry Awards in the “Outstanding Original Play” category. In 2020 Sudipta received the first prize at the "Encore Theatre " playwriting competition. In 2022 Sudipta was honored with the Pt. V. G. Jog award in Kolkata for his contribution to drama and drama writing. He received the Gayatri Gamarsh Literary award in 2022. In 2023, Sudipta's alma-mater IIT Kharagpur conferred upon him the "Distinguished Alumni Award".
Sudipta Bhawmik received his B.Tech(Hons), M.Tech, and Ph.D from IIT Kharagpur. He has worked in leading technical positions in Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies, Agere Systems, Conexant Systems and Qualcomm. Currently he is the CTO of a start-up company PDE Technologies. Sudipta has several patents, publications, and awards to his credit.

AMSOA-RDM - Rhythms of dance & music: Ashtanayika, with glimses of Tagore's "Bhanu Singher Padabali", choreographed in pure Manipuri style
Performance by Leena Ghosh and Archana Sengar

Guru Mitra Purkayastha, the founder, CEO and artistic director of "RDM- Rhythms of Dance & Music” , now known as “AMSOA-RDM - Rhythms of Dance & Music",  is the disciple of Guru Nrityacharya Muralidhar Majhi and his parampara Guru Adiguru Pankaj Charan Das in odissi; Guru Khelendra Singh and Bipin Singh in Manipuri  & Aunt Dr. Manjushri Chaki Sircar in classical based creative choreography, is the recipient of innumerable awards from Odissa, Kolkata and us, such as lifetime achievement award, Nrityangana award, Bhagirath Odissi & Manipuri Nritya -NJ,  “whose who is America ( 2023-2024)” to name a few , since its inception four decades ago in the early 1980s.

Rajib Sarkar
 

Rajib's journey in music began with the deep rhythms of Indian classical music under the guidance of Parthasarathi Mukhopadhaya, and today, he's continuing his learning with the insightful teachings of Sangrami Lahiri. Alongside his classical training, he had the privilege of exploring the soulful melodies of Rabindra Sangeet under Zafar Billah. He is an active participant in several musical groups here in New Jersey.

Sudipta Bhanja Choudhury: Kathak Dance

Sudipta started her training in Kathak at the young age from Guru Shantinarayan Gupta and completed Sangeet Prabhakar from Allahabad, India. She continued her training in the US under the guidance of Guru Pandit Satyanarayan Charkha and performed Kathak in different places inthe US. She took training in Odissi and Manipuri dance from Smt. Mitra Purkayastha of NJ. Currently, Sudipta is continuing her learning in Kathak under the tutelage of Sushri Shinjini Kulkarni, from Kalka Bindadin lineage and granddaughter of Pandit Birju Maharaj. During her university days in Visvabharati, Santiniketan, she performed in several of Tagore's dance dramas.
One of Sudipta’s recent performances is in the musical “Veer Meera” the concept of which was developed by Padmashree Smt. Sumitra Guha . It was presented in the World VaishnavaConvention, NJ. In the iconic scene of Mughal E Azam staged by Green Chillies Entertainment, Sudipta choreographed and performed the role of Anarkali.