Sahasra Sambamoorthi is currently co-president at Navatman. She learned Bharatanatyam under Guru Smt Kalaimamani Ramya Ramnarayan and is the recipient of various awards including the NJSCA Folk Arts Apprenticeship. Following her graduation from Columbia University and learning much from the semi-classical troupe there Taal, she created Navatman Dance in an attempt to explore the boundaries of Bharatanatyam. Currently, she is learning Kathak from Ramya Agrawal and has taken continues to work in odissi with Bijayini Satpathy, Surupa Sen, and Pavitra Bhatt (Nrityagram) and Kuchipudi with Kishore Mosalikanti.
samyukta ranganathan has been actively performing with her band Ariya.
For Samyukta Ranganathan, a junior vocalist and daughter of singer Aruna Ranganathan, Carnatic music has an inherent tendency to be extremely cerebral, with alapana, calculations, niraval and other technicalities. I feel that emotion and devotion, which were perhaps the original purpose of the compositions, may get muddled in the changing style of concert singing today, she says. For her, the main emotion is devotion. It is hard to sing a song that doesnt appeal to your soul , she says. Emotion should be overlaid with intellectualism (or vidwat).
