The heartfelt response echoing through an audience as the principal ballerina and danseur (or if you’re the Ailey Company post Revelations, the entire company) appear downstage signifying the end of a show is a great honor. A large applause erupts. When the performance is exceptional you know! There are no staggered claps— just a sea of overwhelming love for the production and its presentation.
“Bravo!”. “Brava!”
The audience is both excited and impressed. The evening has come to a flourishing end.
Webster’s Dictionary defines “bravo” as an exclamation. It is used to express approval when a performer has done something well. To their “well” I’d like to add “awe-inspiring”. While that expresses a form of gratitude after a performance, my recent discovery takes me back a bit. Let’s consider what happens before a performer gets to their “Bravo Moment”.
Although adopted by English, French and Spanish speaking people, “Bravo” originated in the Italian language. One reason I found this interesting is because of King Louis XIV. You mean to tell me no one thought to hand out a few bravos while contending for a spot in the court dance choreography? However, my actual moment of interest raised when I discovered that one of the definitions for the Italian word “bravo” is “brave”. BRAVE!.
If you are like me and your soul contains a fiery passion for dance— its intricacies, processing, processes, phases, steps, literal choreographic steps, and history being things that you can feast on forever, I want you, from now on to think of yourself as brave. Your pursuit of a delicate and beautiful art form is needed and the time you put into learning, cultivating, rehearsing, executing, executing with mistakes and then executing with finality are needed and appreciated. They are craved by art lovers and inspiring both to directors and choreographers. To engage in a process of vulnerability day after day with sights set on propelling society with YOUR contribution is BRAVE. When you continue to delve into your artistic process of making a work come alive from mere steps to a visible story, you are brave.
The moment you find yourself capturing the nuisances, reflecting on them, becoming inspired by them just to recreate it in some form onstage, you have been brave. And once it is curtain call at the end of the show and your Bravo moment arrives, know that what you left out on the stage amongst lines, sight-lines, epaulment, pirouettes, abandon and enjoyment—
You were brave.
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