Introduction
Dance is my LIFE. Unofficially, I have been dancing forever. As the story goes, I was once slumbering when my favorite song started playing on a music show on the TV. I wake up, groggy, and start dancing to the song in my stupor. When the song ends, I go back to sleep. I was 2. Dancing has had an appeal to me since I saw the ethereal movements of a ballet dancer followed by the cool, defined steps of a break dancer on a local dance show in India. I would dance in my own time, copying moves I saw on TV or moving to the music as I deemed fit. Naturally, break dancing and popping-and-locking appealed to me more than other forms, and I was pleasantly surprised to discover that dancing came naturally to me. The artist had found his art :)
Arya Classes
My official dancing experience began with Arya Dance Academy, an institute based in New Jersey with branches in many states around the nation. Arya is the primary Bollywood company in the nation, providing background dancers for a majority of the Bollywood shows that tour the nation. When Arya opened a branch in California, I joined. I started attending the classes in Dublin, and was part of a crew of about 12 teens. I was the only boy though, so naturally, I had to take the lead in all of our dances and stay in the center of the performance. To the delight of our choreographer, who we later on developed a close relationship with, I managed the position well. Slowly and steadily, I developed a fundamental foundation to go along with my passion.
Troupe Introduction
Our choreographer, Ravish Ranjan, invited me to join the newly formed California troupe, composed of the best Arya dancers in the state. The troupe consisted of approximately 20 dancers, 18 girls and 2 boys. The purpose of the troupe was to perform at the biggest competitions of the year and accept invitations to perform at special events. To get accustomed to our new dance partners, we started off with a hip-hop piece, which we performed at Arya shows. However, our masterpiece was choreographed by our new choreographer, Karan Riar. Ravish had to leave for India for some personal reasons, and Karan replaced him as the primary choreographer in the state. The religious piece he choreographed for us was genius, as shown when we won CCF and ICC, the most prestigious dance competitions of the year. Soon we were invited to perform at a range of shows, culminating in our performance at the SF Giants game on the Indian Independence Day on August 15 when the Giants were playing the Padres.
Troupe Career
Karan became our official choreographer, and our troupe underwent a revolution. Because of the overwhelming demand to join the Arya Troupe, we held special tryouts for the troupe and ended up with a solid group of 20 girls and 1 boy: me. The other boy stopped dancing for Arya because of family concerns. We started expanding beyond Bollywood, trying different forms of cultural Indian dances and receiving some training in jazz and ballet forms. We won CCF and ICC yet again this year, but the rigorous workload of the older troupe members refrained us from accepting most invitations to perform our pieces. The troupe was stronger than ever.
