About

Inès Ouedraogo is a French-Tunisian-Burkinabè dancer who specializes in Brazilian samba. Since the beginning of her career in 2015, Inès has participated in hundreds of performances, from festivals such as Dance for the World Community, Wake Up The Earth, Cambridge Carnival, East Boston Latin Festival, to shows at the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, to private shows for corporate events, weddings, birthday celebrations, quinceañeras, to cultural events in universities such as Harvard, MIT, Boston University, Emmanuel College, Tufts University, etc. Inès also teaches samba classes with SambaViva from absolute beginner to advanced. Recently, she started teaching online classes in an effort to address the growing demand from the online dance community, especially after the pandemic forced everyone to work and exercise from home. Since 2019, Inès participates in Rio’s Carnival. She was a muse for Vigário Geral Samba School in 2020, and Império da Tijuca in 2022. She will continue as a muse with Império da Tijuca in 2023.

Samba, a dance originating in Afro-Brazilian culture, has historically gone through a variety of transformations until the present day. From its inception in the state of Bahia as a dance practiced in a communal circle (samba de roda) where enslaved folks gathered to sing, play music and dance, away from the punitive eyes of the overseer and the slave owner, to its urban modern form known today as samba no pé (literally, “samba in the foot”), samba is an art that is deeply connected to spirituality, joie de vivre and freedom, in particular for its Afro-Brazilian practitioners. The international success of samba culminates in the hundreds of samba aficionados around the world who travel to Brazil to visit the samba schools and parade in the yearly carnival celebrations that take place in Brazil, mainly in Salvador da Bahia, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. The feathers and vibrant colors of the costumes make the samba dance performance a magical and memorable celebration.