Saturday, 31 March 2012

Curtain Call

Have you ever stood on a dance stage? Have you felt that rush that flows through your body as you perform in front of all those people? It's something so powerful it pulls you into a whole different world.

The stage to me has always been something very intoxicating. No matter what experience you've had, at the beginning of every show, it's always intimidating and scary. While you're waiting in the wings, your stomach is tied in a huge knot and you forget all the steps you've memorized in rehearsals for the past 6 months. But once you step onto that stage, something changes. I don't know what it is, the bright lights, the audience in front of you, the music pumping through your veins, everything suddenly feels different. You forget your surroundings and all that's left is you and the magnificence of the stage. It's like a drug. You experience pure bliss while you're dancing and once the performance is over, you drop back down to reality and everything just seems plain and hollow. You need to feel the rush only the stage can provide you with.

Personally, I feel powerful on stage, like I can do anything. I may be an amateur dancer, but when I'm out there, I'm more powerful than any professional. I really believe the stage has this strange force I can't explain. Just walking out on it, even when it's empty sends chills through my spine.


That's one of the reasons I love dance. It is a performing art. Your role is to entertain your audience by becoming someone else through yourself. You become the character you are portraying, and the magnificence of it is that, in reality you might not resemble that character in any way, but you have the oppurtunity to become that person and give a part of yourself to your role.


Someone once said, "On one side there is Drama, on the other there is Music; In the middle there is Dance." This quote could not describe my feelings towards dance any better. Although the art of Music and Drama are fascinating on their own, in my opinion they lack the greatness of Dance. This art form has the ability of combining acting and music with movements of the human body and simultaneously tells a story, without uttering a single word. It is something that cannot be compared with any other performing art. Either it is an all-time classical ballet, such as Giselle, or a new creation of contemporary dance, the message is always passed on to the audience. And each spectator might understand something different about the choreography before him. But in the end, the feeling that is delivered is the same.


That for me is the power of Dance.

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