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Falguni Phatak reaches the venue at 5.30 pm every day for a performance which begins at 8 pm.

Casually dressed in a shirt, jeans and sneakers, she rehearses and does a sound check with her troupe for almost two hours.

"The best thing about her is that she keeps improvising," says musician Jatin Parsaniya. "She has great music sense and is a good performer."

Parsaniya has been performing with her for a decade. Although he performs for other singers through the year, he is devoted to Falguni's shows during Navratri.

Her troupe has 19 musicians and three additional singers.

Rehearsals begin one-and-a-half months before Navratri and Falguni travels to centres of folk music in Gujarat to get a feel of the trends.

"She buys those cassettes so that she knows what's popular on the ground," adds longtime friend Sheetal.

Falguni once got a dhol player from outside a temple in Gujarat to play for her because she wanted the instrument to sound just right for a particular folk song.

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Also see: Timeless Ganesha

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