Bharatanatyam is a classical dance form that has countless combinations of dances, it’s known for its delicate movements with such purity. I took this opportunity to learn a new dance in Bharatanatyam called ‘Slokam’, this dance is devoted to Lord Ganesha. It’s a dance with combinations of jatis, sahityam, tirmanams, and mudras which makes the dance extraordinary. Before diving into it, I practiced hasta mudras and understood the meaning of the dance.

It took me approximately 3 weeks to learn this dance with rigorous practice. I learned under the guidance of my Bharatanatyam teacher; Ulupi Patel, she taught me throughout and helped me improve on my stances and hand movements.

LO1-
I witnessed my personal strengths and weaknesses along with my teacher correcting my mistakes.
Strengths: Due to my flexibility I was able to get all my movements properly. Since I studied the whole dance with its meaning and who it devotes to, I could emote to the words of the singer. I practiced the hand gestures and mudras to make them fluent.

Weaknesses: Previously I had extremely strong stamina, but due to inconsistent dance practice during the lockdown, I couldn’t keep up my stamina like it was better. This is where I faced difficulty while dancing, sometimes I couldn’t keep up with the flow of the dance and hence, I had to practice more.

LO2-
It wasn’t a huge challenge for me since I had the experience in different dances like Jatiswaram, Tillana, Kirtanam. Using the skills and knowledge of the dances that I was already familiar with I could catch up with the dance that I learned. The only challenge I faced was time-management due to my school work and being physically drained out from practices.

Final Takeaway-

This experience gave me the opportunity to invest my time in learning a new dance form and helped me improve in different areas which might help me in many future occurrences. Overall, my performance improved during the practice weeks and helped me