Dancing to fulfil her dreams: Shivani Patel’s Journey of becoming a Sensational Choreographer

Dreams can take you anywhere until and unless you are ready to go there. The journey of Shivani Patel is also nothing less than a beautiful story of fulfilling her dreams. In this exclusive interview with The Celeb Lyf, Shivani Patel told us about how a girl from Ahmedabad became a dancing sensation. 

Beginning 

Born on 17 April 1993 in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Shivani started dancing from her childhood. Her mother decided to train her in classical dance form and Shivani started her training in Bharatnatyam when she was in the 3rd standard. She learned Bharatanatyam for 7 years but at that time she was not thinking of choosing dance as a profession. However, her interest grew in dance more with time. This is the reason she was a star in school. She used to perform for the school and choreograph for annual function. 

She used to participate in summer camps and other dance competitions. During her college days, she participated and represented her college in inter-college dance competitions and won many trophies for the college. That was the time she realised that she can pursue dance as a serious profession, though doing it was not that easy for her.

Stepping in the world of Dance and struggling period

Since her school days, Shivani was fond of watching Dance India Dance and she was a huge fan of Terence Lewis. She had a dream to get trained under the guidance of Terence Lewis. In Ahmedabad, she took part in a dance camp which was organised by Terence Lewis Dance Company. She did so well that they offered her a scholarship to do a diploma in dance from Terence Lewis Dance Company in Mumbai. 

As said before, Taking up dance as a profession was not easy for her. Coming from a typical Gujarati family, it was really difficult for her to convince her family to go Mumbai and pursue her career in dance. They didn’t have any issue with her dancing career but sending their daughter to an unknown city was a big thing for her family. Shivani’s mother is her strong supporting pillar throughout her dance career.

Shivani eventually started her training in Terence Lewis Dance Company and it was all new for her. However, she was still not living a perfect life in Mumbai while doing her diploma. Being brought up in an upper-middle-class family, Shivani lived a pretty nice life in Ahmedabad. Surviving in Mumbai on her own was not that easy. She knew that she would be getting monetary help from home, but she didn’t want to ask for more. A girl who never travelled by bus was now travelling through it and was trying to save money.

Moreover, her father sent her to Mumbai on one condition that she would come back after completing the course. They wanted her to pursue her dance career in Ahmedabad only. Shivani knew that she wanted to do something in life and Mumbai could only give her that exposure. After going back to Ahmedabad, she did some shows in Mumbai. For this, she used to do up & down from Ahmedabad to Mumbai for 2 years.

Reality Shows, assistant choreographer, and a beginning of another struggling period

Shivani gave an audition in Ahmedabad for So You Think You Can Dance and she got selected from Ahmedabad. She was really happy but life had planned something else for her. Shivani was unable to clear the Top 18 round in Mumbai of So You Think You Can Dance. At that point she thought, she needs to practice more. 

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Meanwhile, a choreographer called her from Mumbai and asked her to assist him in Jhalak Dikhla Jaa. She assisted him and was training Nora Fatehi at that time. From Jhalak Dikhla Jaa, her journey as an assistant choreographer started. Later on, she got an offer from Tushar Kalia and she assisted him as well. By that time, she also got an opportunity to choreograph for Stardust Awards, Indian Telly Awards, Mirchi Awards, Femina Miss India and worked with many actors like Sushant Singh Rajput, Ranbir Kapoor, Diljit Dosanjh, Kareena Kapoor, Jacqueline Fernandes and Madhuri Dixit.

Shivani was happy with her life. She was choreographing for reality shows, movies and award shows. What else a dancer could want?

But life was going to take more turns. This was not the end for her.

Dance+ and meeting Tarun Nihalani: A new journey in making

Shivani got a call from Tarun, someone she knew was in Terence Lewis Dance Company. They were not close friends but they knew each other since then. Tarun wanted a partner for Dance+ audition and he wanted Shivani to dance with him.

Earlier also, she was unable to clear Dance+ audition so she wasn’t ready to go for it again. However, Tarun convinced her to join him. 

Soon they became a sensational jodi and everyone was loving them. During that period, they became good friends and got comfortable with each other.

They cleared the last audition and they got the Green Trophy and entered the top 12 of Dance+. He proposed to her that night in a romantic way while driving back to the home near the Imperial Palace. It was a total romantic and filmy proposal. He went on his knees and his mom earlier gave him a ring to give it to Shivani. He proposed to her and she said yes.

Though they didn’t win, they were proud of their journey. Shivani found a partner for life and too much love from her fans. 

After Dance+, Tarun and Shivani conducted many dance workshops where they travelled to different cities around the globe and trained thousand of dance lovers who are passionate about dance.

Apart from workshops, the duo also performed in many stage shows and events, they were also invited to judge various dance competitions.

In 2018, Tarun and Shivani shined as choreographers in Super Dancer – 3 followed by Nach Baliye – 9 in 2019.

On 8th December 2019, they married each other in Ahmedabad. Now they are living in Mumbai. 

Rapid Fire

Your Dream

To represent India on Internation platform in dance.

Inspiration

Terence Lewis, Remo D’souza and Dharmesh Sir

If you were a bar of chocolate or candy, which one you would be

DairyMilk Crackle

Which food product you can eat continuously for a week

Pani Puri and Ice Cream

Pani Puri with meetha pani or teekha paani

Teekha Pani

Favourite nickname

Everybody calls me Shiv or Shivu

How would you react if you wake up one day on some other planet

I think I would be happy. I’d see new things and start exploring things

Celebrity Crush

Shah Rukh Khan

A person who can instantly make you smile

Tarun

If you get your one wish fulfilled by God, what would it be

To represent India on an international platform. More than this, I think I want everyone’s wishes should be fulfilled. Because when wishes don’t fulfil, it hurts

The theme song of your life

Kal Ho Na Ho

Addicted to

Phone and Instagram

If not a choreographer, what would you be now

Lawyer

We at theceleblyf.com, wish Shivani all the luck for her future endeavours and plans.

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