Sonia Sabri awarded MBE in King’s Birthday Honours
We are delighted to announce that Sonia Sabri has been appointed an MBE for her Services to Dance in the King's Birthday Honours.
This award recognises her tireless commitment to South Asian dance shown throughout her entire career. Her trailblazing contributions can be seen in her work as a performing artist, movement director and choreographer, in her productions and artistic collaborations, as a teacher and mentor as well as her participatory and wellbeing work.
Sonia’s impact spans the micro and macro scale, e.g. collaborating with both world-renowned artists like Sir Trevor Nunn and Dame Arelene Philips and marginalised local communities. Her large-scale choreography for the 2022 Commonwealth Games reached millions of viewers in-person and online, whilst she personally teaches weekly small-group classes, schools’ and SEND workshops and community wellbeing sessions.
Sonia was born in the Black Country into a working-class, immigrant family. Bullied at school, Sonia’s parents introduced her to Kathak to help build her confidence. Sonia fell in love with dance and never looked back, making her debut as a solo artist at just 14 years old.
She has grown to become one of the world’s leading Kathak dancers, acclaimed for her enchanting stage presence, musicality and incredible technical skill that enthral audiences at top venues worldwide. The first British born female Kathak dancer to be fully trained in the UK, Sonia is a torchbearer for British Arts internationally.
Sonia went on to co-found Sonia Sabri Company, with internationally acclaimed Tabla Maestro, Sarvar Sabri, in 2002, which was awarded Arts Council England NPO status in 2018: the first British Asian female-led organisation to receive this. As a British Asian woman working in a competitive industry, Sonia’s journey has been a challenging one but one which has created a multi-award-winning South Asian dance artist, teacher, choreographer, Artistic Director and industry leader.
Sonia has an international reputation for collaboration across dance styles and art forms including work with pioneers like: Sarvar Sabri, Sir Richard Alston, Lea Anderson, Shobana Jeyasingh CBE, Nitin Sawhney OBE, Rose English, Jonzi D and Jatinder Verma. She was the first British Kathak Artist to work as a movement director for theatre productions and pop videos including Sir Trevor Nunn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Phizzical Productions’ Cymbeline and with UB40.
Always ahead of her time, Sonia’s ambitious and pioneering approach has resulted in exciting innovations within Kathak including digital, audience interaction, outdoor touring, large-scale productions, mask-work and puppetry – which have influenced dance makers both in and outside the South Asian dance sector and opened-up the world of South Asian dance to hundreds of thousands of people.
She has created many innovative and relevant productions for theatres and non-traditional venues, including Drishti (2002) the first South Asian dance company to incorporate digital, and Virago (2017) which explored female foeticide. Red (2005) and Kathakbox (2011) pushed boundaries by combining live musicians as part of ensemble choreography for the first time, and Nisbat (2007) presented Qawwali alongside Kathak – another first for the artform.
Her first show for young audiences: Same Same…But Different (2019) was created collaboratively with schools and libraries, and most recently Mughal Miniatures (2022-25) a hit series of outdoor touring productions for families inspired by the forgotten Persian artistry of miniature painting.
She is a visionary artist whose productions challenge pre-conceptions, reflect under-represented cultures and tackle contemporary issues in British society, actively listening to and involving participants in her creative process. Both her performance and participatory work is relevant, accessible and designed to transform the lives of all who experience it.
Her site-specific work includes Associate Choreographer for the 2022 Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony and Wondrous Stories, a large-scale outdoor production produced by Motionhouse, and Director and Choreographer for Sharing the Light (2022), a mass outdoor production commissioned by Birmingham Hippodrome, Bullring and Grand Central.
Sonia is a role model for thousands of women and girls in the UK and abroad. She is a nurturing, passionate and generous individual who has trained and mentored over 3,000 young talents enabling them to pursue their aspirations.
She extends the healing power of her craft far and wide through her outreach work working with the elderly, early years and SEN children, young offenders, young carers, women suffering physical and mental abuse, asylum seekers and people with medical conditions.
Sonia is an advocate for health and wellbeing in dance, for example she designed CLASP (2016) the only national training programme for library workers using the tools of Kathak to support literacy development. During Covid lockdowns, Sonia voluntarily delivered hundreds of online dance therapy sessions for participants around the world.
An accredited ISTD teacher, Sonia teaches widely in dance organisations, community and educational settings. Sonia was a key contributor to the creation of the syllabus for the, now internationally recognised, ISTD Kathak examination. Sonia has also created an engaging and accessible participatory programme for Sonia Sabri Company, which brings learning opportunities to education and community settings.
Always a supportive and nurturing mentor, Sonia runs Kathakaars, a platform for advanced students and early-career dancers to gain vocational training, performance and choreographic opportunities, creating the next generation South Asian dance artists.
The testimonies of her audiences, pupils and participants speak volumes about the life-changing impact and legacy of Sonia’s work, demonstrating that she couldn’t be more deserving of this honour.