The powerful songs are still popular as folksongs. Another opera, Nyikyi ti bedyi or 'Good and Evil' was meant for children and first performed at the Hindu High School in 1956. Based on painstakingly composed songs, Nadim's most important opera, Vitasta, was universally admired for its melopoetic treatment of the flow of the river Vitasta or Vyath through the Valley. The metaphoric imagery and musical contrivances make it a sublime artwork. In collaboration with Noor Mohammad Roshan, Nadim wrote Hyimal ti Negymy i.e. 'Hyimal and Negyray'. This was a modern version of the immortal Kashmiri love story of a Brahman girl and the Serpent Prince of the netherworld. Some other operas written by him in the 1950s and 1960s were Safar ti shahjar or 'Journey and Shades', Madanvar ti Zuval Mai or 'Madanvar and Zuval Mai', and Shihily kul or 'Shady Tree'. Dina Nath Nadim died in 1988. |