Dance
ROOTS- 5-Day Dance Intensive Programme
ROOTS 2026: On Ancestry and Re-Rooting
Step into a transformative 5-day dance intensive curated by internationally acclaimed choreographer Aakash Odedra-designed to uplift, challenge, and inspire early and mid-career dancers.
Artists for this year:
Aakash Odedra and company artist Subhash Viman Gorania, Laura Vanhulle, Melissa Ugolini, and Kesha Raithatha.
Guest Speakers:
Skinder Hundal OBE, Anita Bhalla OBE, Farooq Chaudhry, Piali Ray OBE, Steve Maddock, Rushil Ranjan and MAC Director Deborah Kermode.
ROOTS offers an exciting blend of world-class training, creative exploration, industry insight, and performance opportunity. Across five dynamic days, participants will dive into masterclasses, discussions, and movement sessions with leading voices in dance and culture, expanding their practice while building a powerful network of fellow artists.
This year, we trace the pathways that brought us here. Together, we explore how our histories-cultural, artistic, personal-shape the dancers we are becoming.
We will ask:
✨ Where do our lineages converge and diverge?
✨ What practices, memories, and echoes live within us?
✨ How do we find steady ground and re-root ourselves in fast-changing, urban spaces?
ROOTS considers the self as a mosaic of experiences, carried through generations. Through embodied exploration, we tune into our dance DNA-the vitality, rhythm, and wisdom inherited from those who came before us.
It is said that all of humanity traces back to just three ancestral lineages.
ROOTS invites us to remember that what connects us is far greater than what divides us.
📅 2nd-6th March 2026
📍 Birmingham Hippodrome
💷 £275 for the full 5-day intensive (Early Bird Valid until 15/02/2026)
(Payment plan option: Paythen)
For any questions, please contact info@aakashodedra.com
Join us for a week that roots you deeper, lifts you higher, and connects you to the global dance community.
Re-Code. Re-Root. Re-Cord
