Janani, Priya and Roopa are the founders of Sanhiti- A Bay Area South India Dance Group.

In this discussion they share a little bit about Sanhiti, the inception, the cause, and about Salangai to Salsa, the groups performance for charity for the year 2007.

In the course of a free-wheeling conversation with BehindWoods, they opened up about their journey so far, what drives them and their commitment to dance and social causes. Read on The three of them have been trained in classical dance and are primarily classical dancers. Their shared passion for dance and choreography and a desire to provide a platform to showcase this south Indian art form to the Indian diaspora in the Bay area led them to found Sanhiti – meaning ‘confluence’ in Sanskrit – in 2004. They are active art aficionados with interests in folk dance, painting and theatre. The ease with which they juggle their roles as mothers to infants, corporate responsibilities and passion is admirable. The main aim behind Sanhiti has been to promote the rich and diverse South Indian dance culture in the Bay Area.

The organization brings together dance enthusiasts and provides them an opportunity and platform to perform. In keeping with the intent to marry passion with social change, they consistently present fund-raisers that benefit non-profit organizations. Sanhiti supports many charities – they are supporting Udavum Karangal, Bay Area Chapter this year and it is the first time the two are working together. Sanhiti’s reasoning is clear: - Different organizations support different good causes and are worthy of our support. - Working with different institutions is a constant learning that helps Sanhiti and its founders grow too, and - This gives Sanhiti a chance to try new ideas and take up new challenges. Salangai to Salsa’ has around 35 dancers. Dancers are chosen by conducting yearly auditions, - usually in spring - for people who are interested and have a flair for dancing’. Then the training starts to fine-tune their skills as they progress. For 2007, instead of picking a theme, they started picking out the songs and dance numbers first. All the dancers sent in their favorite song requests and everyone voted for their top choices online. The top 10 numbers with the highest number of votes were chosen and have been woven together to showcase a mix of different styles of dance such as classical, folk, jazz, hip-hop, salsa and hence the theme - Salangai to Salsa. For more info and online tickets please visit www.salangaitosalsa.com