You are cordially invited to a Joint Meeting of the Twin City Rotary clubs of Dist 3150 Host Club – Rotary Club of Hyderabad for the presentation of the Pt Jasraj – Rotary Club of Hyderabad Award for Cross Cultural Understanding to Ms Saskia Rao de Haas (Dutch born cellist and now exponent of Hindustani Classical music on modified Cello)
Padma Vibhushan, Sangeet Marthand Pandit Jasraj will be the Chief Guest At Hotel Moksh, Necklace Road on Rotary Formation and World Understanding Day Wednesday, 23rd February, 2011 at 6.15 pm (Tea 6.15 pm to 6.45 pm; Awards ceremony & Performance commences thereafter) The Awardee will perform after the Awards Ceremony
P. Venkatram Vijay Petkar President Secretary
THE AWARD – The Award for Cross Cultural Understanding was instituted by the Rotary Club of Hyderabad in 2007-08 to be awarded to an individual or group of individuals who, coming from one cultural milieu have made the effort to understand & master an art form from a different cultural ethos. This Award has been instituted in furtherance of the ROTARY Objective of advancement of national & international understanding, goodwill, and peace. The Award is inspired by Padma Vibhushan, Sangeet Martand Pt. Jasraj, living legend & doyen of North Indian Classical Music, whose spiritual rendition of music and his effortless ability to mesh homage to different religions, transports the listener into a plane of pure positive emotion & bliss precluding any hatred. The 07-08 Awardee was Mrs. REHANA KHAN for her proficiency in BharataNatyam. The 08-09 Awardee was Padmashree DR. ILEANA CITARISTI, an Italian by birth, for her proficiency in Odissi. The 09-10 Awardee was Mr JUSTIN McCARTHY, an American born, BhrataNatyam dancer proficient in Sanskrit, Tamil & Hindi and on that occasion the then Consul general of the American Consul at Hyderabad,
Mr Cornelius Keur was the Special Guest of Honor.
THE AWARDEE - Saskia Rao - de Haas is a brilliant cellist from the Netherlands. She is a pioneer in the world of music for introducing her Indian cello to North Indian classical music. Saskia started to learn the cello at the age of eight by the late cello virtuoso Tibor de Machula. She studied cello at the conservatory of Rotterdam specializing in Indian classical music under Koustav Ray and Pt Hariprasad Chaurasia, while finishing her Master’s in Ethnomusicology from the University of Amsterdam. During her subsequent visits to India she also studied under eminent artistes such as Dr Sumati Mutatkar, Pt DK Datar, Pt Deepak Chowdhury and Shubhendra Rao. With no precedent to follow, Saskia has worked with singular dedication to adapt the cello to Indian classical music. She has performed all over India in prestigious festivals for Indian classical music and is an accomplished composer. She created music for various ensembles, dance, film and theatre. She is the founder of the Raga Mala String Quartet. She is currently doing a PhD at the University
of Amsterdam on Innovation in Indian Music and has published in musicological magazines.