History
Kiran Seth, a young graduate from IIT Kharagpur, was studying for his doctorate at the Columbia University, New York, when he chanced to attend a Dhrupad concert by Ustad Nasir Aminuddin Dagar and Ustad Zia Fariddudin Dagar at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York.
On his return to India in 1976, he started teaching and doing research work at IIT Delhi, where he got together with students and started SPIC MACAY in 1977, and its first concert was held at IIT Delhi in the same year.
The first Lecture-Demonstration series was held in 1979, with six artistes, including Sonal Mansingh, Birju Maharaj, Asad Ali Khan, the Dagar brothers and Munawar Ali Khan who performed in a few colleges in Delhi.
Today, SPIC MACAY has some 500 chapters across the world and holds around 5,000 events annually, mostly in educational institutions, but occasionally in "public" venues like town halls or community parks.
Some of its major activities include: FEST series, VIRASAT series, National Conventions for students and teachers, National School Intensives, Music in the Park, the SPIC MACAY Scholarship Programme, heritage walks, talks by eminent thinkers, yoga and meditation camps, screening of classic cinema etc. Lately it has also started getting international artistes from other equally rich cultures to perform in India.
Read more about this topic: SPIC MACAY
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