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Channel i for the first time on Saturday launched a programme to find out hidden music talent.
   The event, Channel i Sera Kantha 08 (best singer of Channel i 08) will soon begin with the slogan Gaane… awaz tolo prane, said the organisers at a briefing at the Sheraton Hotel in Dhaka.
   Registration for the competition will begin on March 13 and will continue till April 15, said the organisers, adding any Bangladeshis from home and abroad would be able to register their names through SMS or logging onto a web site, to be announced a few days later.
   The organisers have divided the country into seven zones –– Dhaka Metro, Dhaka, Barisal, Rajshahi, Chittagong, Khulna and Sylhet for primary selection rounds scheduled to begin in the last week of April.
   ‘We are going to organise the competition to find out the best singer of Channel i 2008,’ said the Impress Telefilm Limited managing director, Faridur Reza Sagar.
   Interested contestants, aged between 15 and 27, can participate in the competition, he said.
   The two living legends of Bangla music, Sabina Yasmin and Runa Laila, will be on the judge’s panel.
   ‘I thank the organisers for taking such an endeavour,’ said Sabina, one of the competition judges. ‘We will try to present some new faces in music.’
   ‘This is not only a competition, we will also nurture gifted singers until they get a good platform,’ said Runa.
   People with basic training in music will be selected to participate in the competition, the judges said.
   The best singer will be given special awards and will get a chance to perform in concerts at home and abroad.
   ‘Bangla music means Bangla heritage. Many lyrics and compositions were lost in the course of time… and many compositions are coming up,’ said the Prothom Alo editor, Matiur Rahman. ‘I hope the competition will bring in some new faces.’
   Actor Afzal Hossin, also the project director of the competition, addressed the briefing.

The premiere of Centre for Asian Theatre’s 17th production Amputation was held at the National Theatre Hall of the Bangladesh Shilpakala academy on Friday.
   The play has been scripted and directed by Norwegian poet and playwright Jens Bjorneboe and Kamaluddin Nilu respectively.
   Young translator and theatre director Raihan Akhter has translated the play into Bangla.
   The playwright himself described the text Amputation as ‘a wild, almost surrealistic play – partly sinister, partly comic…directed against those forms of society that do not allow room for people who think differently from those in power.’
   Eminent Norwegian light designer Kurt Harmansen has done the light design of the production.
   Different roles are played by Abul Kalam Azad Shetu, Mithu Barman, Sabina Sultana, Shipra Das, Mesbaul Karim, Rahmatullah Basu, Ratna Akter Keya, Mohammad Rafi, Raihan Akhter, Arfan Mridha Shiblu, Jannatul Ferdous, Farhadul Amin Bappy, Morzina Muna, Syeda Tania Sultana, Nizami Azad Ashok, Shadat Hossain, SM Ismail Hossain, Safiqur Rahman and M Mashud.
   CAT has produced the play with financial cooperation of Royal Norwegian Embassy in Dhaka and GrameenPhone.