.:ABOUT:.
From the first time sound reached my eardrums, my body has known how to move. As a child, dressing up, crafting costumes, singing, and most of all dancing, were the magical tools that I used to create a beautiful dream world and birth my fantasies in waking reality.
At the age of three I began to take formal dance classes, and soon after engaged in competitive dance. I quickly learned that in this world there was a major focus to be better than the next girl and that conformity wins. After a decade in this world, I built resentment towards dance and “quit” as a teenager.
My life without dance wasn’t the same and my departure only lasted about a year. During this time I took the opportunity to dive deeper into myself, spirituality, community, electronic music, and the festival scene. After much soul searching I came home to my truth and remembered that my soul is here to dance.
My passion for dance was once again ignited. From solo studio sessions, to fire dancing, to performing at festivals … I remembered how much I love to be on stage and perform. My devotion for dance grew exponentially, and i worked with many different performance companies, while also creating my own interactive projects and stage productions.
This path proved to be extremely fulfilling for many years, and a wonderful alternative to my experience in my younger years. Despite outward successes and a newfound inner satisfaction, I begun to feel I had hit a plateau with my creativity and felt that there was another layer of my being that wanted to be expressed.
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Once again reaching back to my roots, I found my original inspiration - MUSIC. I always felt deep reverence to music, recognizing it as the driving force of dance.
Looking around at the current state of electronic music I noticed a divide between the commercial producers/dj’s and the dancers who brought their work to life through movement. Realizing the art of dance is almost completely reliant on music, I felt a potent passion to unify music and dance once again, and create a deeper experience and unity within the scene. I especially wanted to share my transformational experience of how I had reconditioned my understanding of competition between women into co-creative collaboration.
I wasn’t hearing exactly the sounds my body was craving on the dance floor, so I decided to do something about it. I began to collect music and learned how to mix. I watched many sunrises for months as I practiced DJing in my bedroom. I began to play with music production, carry around a field recorder, and took voice lessons as I realized I needed channel my unique essence thru sound. I felt inspired from the DJ and producer women making waves in the music scene and wanted to be a part of the movement.
The SHELAJIT project was born out of my desire to be the full embodied channel of both music and dance, while unifying and uplifting others.