Verve: Day Three

Sunday morning saw a lot of late risers scramble out of bed early to catch the Street Play. They were well rewarded, for all three competing semesters put up a show that was talked about for the rest of the day. The second semesters kicked off the event with a piece on depression, and how it insidiously creeps into your life, dragging you down further than you realise. They ended, however, on a triumphant note, showing that it can be treated and overcome with the right support. What followed was the fourth semesters’ performance, based on the state of women in this country. Highly indignant, they repeatedly asked why women are forced, time and time again, to compromise on issues that men can take for granted. They finished by reminding us that we are all part of a society that condones the same. The event culminated with the performance of the defending champions, the sixth semester students. Bold and unapologetic, they portrayed the atrocities that take place on the internet on a daily basis, and emphasised the need to put our phones down and live life in the real world.

A group of excited students from each semester gathered at Interact armed with newspapers, flyers and magazines to put in their best efforts and ensure victory in the collage contest. The theme for the event was “Syria”. Although the subject was extremely grave, the participants were infused with an array of ingenious ideas and had a lot of fun in creating a collage suitable to the topic at hand. They showed great enthusiasm and painted a composite picture by cutting and rearranging paper clippings. The delicate political situation and reign of terror in the country was appropriately brought out in the collages by the creativity, originality and aesthetic sense of the young artists.

The Mad ads performances at Greens exceeded all expectations, especially in the light of the fact that the teams were given merely two hours to come up with innovative ideas to sell their respective products to the judges – Dr. Vinay Khanna and Dr. Navin Patil. The products included – the unbreakable Robot Hand, the Magic Mirror, the Hawa Hawai Gas Cylinder (the pressure of which is comparable to what medical students experience during their university exams, apparently) and the Shivaji Flying Filter, to name a few. The narratives were crammed with hilarious puns and rhymes, and the comical histrionics entranced the audience enough for them to pardon the few jokes that fell flat. It certainly was an entertaining event, the laughter and cheers a glowing testament to the boundless creativity of the participants.

KMC Greens was resonating with the sound of beautiful melodies, some of which were accompanied by live acoustics and the others by karaoke music during Western Vocal solo. Each performance was detailed and had a different element of surprise to it. The judges for this event were Dr Chandni Gupta from the Department of Anatomy and Dr Naveen Patil from the Department of Pharmacology. All the songs were in English and each one got the audience to reminisce about a different phase in their lives. 

Thecrowd couldn’t help but sing along to songs such as Stitches and Set fire to the rain. The dusky sky and the fairy-lights which surrounded Greens added to the vibe of the event. Each participant had a marked difference in their choice of songs and their voice. Some were sweet and melodious, some were full of bass and some had a subtle huskiness to their voice which gripped the audience.

The sun had set and the lights that adorned KMC greens shone bright. After captivating performances by the solo artists, it was the groups’ turn to outdo them. The event was judged by Dr. Chandni Gupta and Mr. Tanveer.

The first slot performed a melodic, harmony based medley starting with Zombie by the Cranberries. Slot 2 then provided the event’s first throwback to the 90s with Circle of Life from Disney’s 1994 animated classic, The Lion King. Lest the audience think that only one group shared their love of nostalgia, slot 3 opened with Under the Sea from the movie The Little Mermaid and closed with I’ll be there for you, the title track of Friends. To conclude the event and provide a moment of levity for the judges and audience, the final slot provided an overly dramatic rendition of We are the Champions by Queen.

An amped up crowd, an excited dancing toddler and bright lights set the stage for the Battle of the Bands. The judges for this event were Dr. Bala from KMC and Mr. Tanveer from MIT. The first slot opened with the iconic Game of Thrones theme track and followed it up with Hotel California by The Eagles. The crowd was won over by the effortless rendition of the song’s guitar solo, originally composed and performed by Joe Walsh and Don Felder. Next almost inexplicably came the band’s cover of Kolaveri Di. Slot 2 came out all guns blazing, and opened with their cover of Boulevard of broken dreams by Greenday and followed it up with other crowd favourites such as Wonderwall and Kryptonite. The final performers of the evening, presented an ensemble of goosebump inducers and tear jerkers with hits such as Carnival of Rust and Maa Tujhe Salaam. An amidst standing ovations and rounds of applause, the third day of Verve 2018 drew to a close.

As reported by: Dharini Prasad, Supratim Banerjee, Niharika Dixith, Anushna Sen and Ashutosh