Bhangra - a Great Dance to Learn

Navdeep Singh

English 098

Bhangra, A great dance to learn

The curtains arose and there was near dead silence for about 3 seconds. When the lights arose, I heard thousands of people screaming loud and rising to their feet. They were excited about what was coming forth, which was a totally unforgettable dance to be displayed to the entire audience. As the five minute routine started, I danced with enjoyment and displayed my incredible skills. Included with that was a smile that was everlasting and left people in awe. Near the end of the dance, I got on top of the shoulders of my teammate and rose my hands in victory. The result was a first place victory for Khalsa Junction and the start of my professional dancing career. Not only it was a start but it showed me what I have learned over the years. The dance I did was a genre that is growing very popular and has something original to it. The dance is called Bhangra. What is Bhangra? Bhangra is one of the greatest dances in the world today and the best to learn about. Of course the best experience of learning this genre is dancing to it. However, people need to realize what bhangra is all about and how it is being conceived today.

Bhangra is a popular folk dance genre found in Punjab, a region that is located in northwestern India. Punjab, which is a word that may be confusing, means a "land of five rivers." The genre is growing very popular in the world, especially in the United Kingdom and Canada. The reason for this is because most of the population in these countries is Punjabi. However, the USA is not known for this type of dance and most of the people don't know what the genre is all about. The reason for this is that there is no interpretation available and most Punjabis don't live in the United States. Quite possibly the only way to show what bhangra is all about is by telling people or close friends about it. In other words, people that are not familiar with bhangra or have never seen it before live. The rhythm of bhangra is another key concept. Bhangra always has a traditional dance rhythm feel to it, but after seeing genres such as hip hop, the style of bhangra has changed.

After having traditional dance rhythm, bhangra for the last decade has been changed to a very upbeat mix. The genre is being fused. Fused means taking one kind of music and blending it together, also known as mixing. The genre today is being fused with various styles of music such as: hip hop, UK Garage, Techno, and many more sounds. Out of all of these genres, hip hop is the most common that bhangra will be fused with. The collaboration with hip hop started when Jay Z, a popular hip hop artist, decided to blend his music with a Punjabi musical group from England called Punjabi MC. The song was widely played throughout radio stations in the UK, Canada, and even the USA. It became a hip hop anthem and some people started to know what bhangra was all about. Britney Spears, one of the greatest female singers of all time, was being criticized of her music. So she decided to find what kind of music was being used out there in the world. Soon she met Rishi Rich, a popular bhangra producer in the UK, and asked him if he could help her with her new album due out soon. Rishi would then make a bhangra remix of her song "Me Against the Music." The song brought back the respect Britney had long deserved because people were amazed at the genre she used in her music. Generally besides the mixing, Bhangra is usually and always played with an instrument called a dhol. The dhol is powerful drum that has string to put around your neck and is always accompanied by two sticks called chimtes. With the sticks, you would basically make some type of beat or rhythm out of it. The dhol is a necessary ingredient in bhangra music and without it there can be no bhangra music at all. Despite all this, the greatest thing about this genre is to learn how to dance to it.

Bhangra is a great dance to bounce to and it doesn't matter what race, age, and sex you are. This dance can not only be danced to at parties but also on teams. There are hundreds of teams across North America that compete in the greatest bhangra competitions. A usual bhangra team consists of six guys and six girls. However, if you want to get to a university level, it is going to take lots of time and patience. The first thing is learning the moves. The moves are really not that difficult but the only that matters in doing them correctly is timing. Timing is one thing that is really crucial in bhangra. If you don't have it, you simply will not enjoy the genre and not do it correctly. There are hundreds of different moves in bhangra but the basic one is moving your arms and feet. When you move those arms, you are moving them as if you were unscrewing light bulbs. Of course the footwork has to go with the hands and that is where timing can kill you. Some moves require getting low or bending down, which can become quite painful