The past three decades have witnessed a series of experimentation in Mohiniyattam, especially with regard to its repertoire, theme and music. Significantly, these have been aimed primarily at attributing to the dance form an individuality of its own.

As for music, meaningful attempts were made to employ Sopana Sangeetam, a singing style esoteric to Kerala. But the all-pervading influence of Carnatic music could not be warded off as this branch of music lacks a rigid structure. The latest in this connection was Rituranga, a group choreography by noted danseuse Pallavi Krishnan that was performed to Rabindra Sangeetam.

For the first time in Kerala, it was staged in Thrissur recently at the theatre of the Kerala Sangeet Natak Academy.

Incidentally, Rabindranath Tagore was an ardent devotee of traditional Hindustani music. But he championed a new stream by drawing deeply from the folk air thereby according it a semi-classical pattern. At the same time, he took extreme care to adhere to the structures of the ragas and their timings. The melody that this synthesis produced was marvellous.

The native of Bengal - now, she is settled in Thrissur after completing her course from the Kerala Kalamandalam - Pallavi seems to be overtaken by the sweet, flowing style of the Rabindra Sangeetha tro which she was exposed during her student days at Shantiniketan.

And she has been successful in providing how this branch of music dovetails into the swinging, lasya-rich movements of Mohiniyattam. The attempt was further laudable since it also demonstrated the potentiality of the dance form to embrace themes different from the conventional one of bhakthi and sringara.

Tagore's Rituranga gives an enthralling description of the six seasons, bringing out the peculiarities of each. As for the choreography, Pallavi banked on slokas excerpted from Kalidasa's Ritusamhara for introducing each season and thereafter on the sahitya of Rituranga set to music for performance.

Interestingly, Kalidasa is more observant of the changes in nature that occur with the seasons while Tagore attempts to correlate the same to human emotions that too romantically. For instance, the poetic genius of Kalidasa provides a vivid description of the Varsha where the rains have been compared to the shower of arrows sped from Indra dhanus whose cord is the lightening in the skies.

But Tagore seizes the occasion to tell us how, during the season when the nature is all in its fury, the sakhi (maid-companion) warns Radha against her move to meet her lover as the strains from his flute are irresistible to her. While the total freshness of Sarath captures Kalidasa's imagination, the falling of leaves and flowers inspires Tagore to conclude that the message of the vanishing season as "To whom shall I leave my bansuri (flute)".

Hemantham, Sisiram and Vasantham also receive similar illustrations and the choreographer has exploited all of them to the hilt thereby according a new dimension to the dance form.

The group of seven dancers, including a couple of novices, impressively delineated the variegated shades of the seasons - Rituiranga -for that appropriate ragas had been employed.