When Bhubaneswar-based Odissi exponent Sonali Mohapatra takes stage, her performance unfolds in two distinct worlds. One where she moves flawlessly to the audience’s awe, and another inside the artiste’s mind where a rerun of rigorous learnings and memorised rehearsals dictate each of her moves. Living with hearing impairment since the age of five, it’s one of the ways the artiste continues to kindle her passion for Odissi. Over a video call assisted by an interpreter, Mohapatra walks us through her journey, one step at a time.

“I would accompany my father, a trained vocalist himself, to Odissi shows. I remember being starstruck by the graceful dancers and mimicking them at home later,” the artiste reveals, adding that it took Nirmal Kumar Mohapatra, her father, some convincing to come around to the idea of his daughter taking up a dance form, knowing the inseparable part music and sound play in a dancer’s journey.