Kathak: History and Key Facts

Kathak is one of the eight major forms of Indian classical dance. Its origin is attributed to the traveling bards in ancient northern India known as Kathakaar ("storyteller"), who communicated stories from the Hindu epics through dance, songs, and music. Its name derives from the Sanskrit word kathaa which means "story", and kathakaar which means "the one who tells a story" or "to do with stories". As time went on the dance-form acquired aspects of technical movement expertise in addition to the story-telling features, so nowadays performers usually give equal emphasis to both.

Kathak evolved during the Bhakti movement, particularly by incorporating the childhood stories of the Hindu deity Krishna, as well as independently in the courts of North India. Especially during the Mughal rule, the emperors were patrons of Kathak dance and actively promoted it in their royal courts. The Nawab of Awadh, Emperor Wajid Ali Shah himself was a practitioner of Kathak. Kathak performances include Urdu ghazal and commonly used instruments brought during the Mughal period. As a result, it is the only Indian classical dance form to feature Persian elements.

Stylistically, the Kathak dance form emphasizes rhythmic foot movements, with the ankles adorned with small bells (Ghungroo) and the movement harmonized to the music and especially its rhythm. The legs and torso are generally straight, and if a story is being told, it is through a developed vocabulary based on the gestures of arms and upper body movement, facial expressions, neck movements, eyes and eyebrow movement, stage movements, bends, and turns. The main focus of the dance becomes the eyes and the foot movements. The eyes work as a medium of communication of the story the dancer is trying to communicate. With the eyebrows the dancer gives various facial expressions.

Kathak is mainly found in four styles or schools, called "gharana", named after the cities where the Kathak dance tradition evolved – Jaipur, Banares, and Lucknow and Raigarh. These forms used to be quite distinct in their style and presentation but in recent years have converged to an extent, although they still retain their specialities. The Jaipur gharana focuses on technical expertise, with long pure dance compositions and fast spins and footwork; the Banaras gharana focuses on footwork and story-telling about Krishna, and Lucknow gharana focus more on grace and elegance. There is a fourth gharana which evolved in the court of the King of Raigarh, where the king invited representatives of all three gharanas to his court to serve as court dancers and teachers. The result produced some unique compositions, known as the Raigarh gharana.

Source and attribution

Text excerpted from Kathak by Wikipedia contributors, available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0. The extract is abridged and formatting has been adjusted; the adapted text on this page is shared under the same licence. Revision history.