/ Sexy & Successful 2011 - Bageshree Vaze

by Anokhi Admin

Sexy & Successful 2011 – Bageshree Vaze

Jul 16, 2013

Dancer, choreographer, musician

When you watch Bageshree Vaze execute a kathak twirl, you are left breathless. Then you watch her latest pop-classical fusion music video and blink twice . . . is it really the same person?! Vaze's infinite grace and success lies in her passion for Indian dance and adaptability to North American sensibilities. She was initially trained in the South Indian dance style of bharata natyam in the eastern Canadian city of St. John's, Newfoundland. She then added to her reportoire Hindustani (North Indian) classical vocal music, by studying music with her father Dr. Damodar Vaze. Upon completing her arangetram, or dance graduation, Vaze packed her bags and headed to the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute in Mumbai to complete a dance fellowship under the late Guru T.K. Mahalingam Pillai. She switched directions in 1998 and began learning the North Indian classical dance style of kathak with the living legend Pandit Birju Maharaj. (Incidentally, Maharaj also choreographed Bollywood actress Madhuri Dixit's dance for the mujra "Kahe Ched Mohe" in Devdas). Vaze went on to complete a master's degree in dance from York University in 2000.

Casting her nets wider, Vaze released a debut album, Bageshree, in 2001, combining Indian classical aesthetics with modern pop and electronica. The music video for her single “Deewana” won the 2004 Annecy International Animated Film Festival Award and the 2006 ReelWorld Film Festival award for Outstanding Canadian Music video. Three years later, she released a follow-up CD called Tarana. In 2010, she opened her very own dance company, Raagini Dance.

This year, you can catch Vaze as she premiers "Avatar (9)" in the Toronto Harbourfront Centre's NextSteps Dance Season in May. Not one to slow down, she is already working on her third CD.

Q&A

Zodiac sign: Aries.

Relationship status: Married.

Best way to unwind: Watching Law and Order and Sex and the City. Glass of wine optional.

Fave Bollywood movie: Dil Chahta Hai.

Favourite Hollywood movie: Don't have just one, but my faves are Brit comedies like Bridget Jones's Diary.

Favourite book: The Alchemist, The Solitude of Emperors, River Thieves and About a Boy.

Guilty pleasure: Strawberry Mentos and Shiraz.

If you could choose a superpower, what would it be and why? To be in more than one place at one time. You'd never miss anything.

What is on your iPod? The Police, Indian classical music, me, Coldplay, Vineet Vyas, Fleetwood Mac, Queen and Duran Duran.

Something quirky about you no one would know: I love dancing to ABBA.

Best personal feature and why: To not take yourself too seriously when it comes to mundane matters, and take yourself seriously when it comes to your professional life.

Best feature on the opposite sex: Eyes/shoulders.

Celebrity crush: Russell Crowe (last decade). Haven't decided for the next one, but I've learned it's more fruitful to have crushes on people in your own life.

If you had to choose, would it be romance or hot sex? Romance.

Three things you can't live without: Only three? My daughter Kalashree, husband Vineet and music.

Most memorable professional moment: Dancing in Pt. Birju Maharaj's kathak festival at Kamani Auditorium in New Delhi and having all the legends of kathak dance watching and applauding me.

Most valuable life lesson: Patience is not always the best virtue. Making things happen is.

Motto you live by: Never give up.

_{BY: TAMARA BALUJA / PUBLISHED: JANUARY 2011 / 8TH ANNIVERSARY SEXY & SUCCESSFUL ISSUE}