Starting a classical dance career when he was 12, Walson Botelho, director and co-founder of BFB, said he was first introduced to Bahian dancing when he was about 16. For Botelho, it was unlike anything he had seen before.

“It was a surprise for me the first time I saw my own culture, the Bahian culture, dance,” Botelho said. “When I saw that for the first time I said, ‘Woah, this is my soul, this is my culture and I want to do this instead of classical dancing.’”

After traveling the world with the well-known Bahian folk group Viva Bahia for six years, Botelho was faced with the decision to go back to classical after the group broke up, but decided to go in another direction.

“I knew I had to have something more,” Botelho said. “People kept asking me, ‘Why don’t you start your own company?’ I knew it would be too hard and I said, ‘No, I will never start my own my own dance company,’ but I had to do it, destiny gave me this chance and I decided to start the company step by step, very slowly.”

Botelho said the company grew from having only 16 people to having its own dance school, theater and performing six days a week in Bahia, Brazil and traveling the world.

This year’s tour, containing a 34-member troupe, will incorporate dances Botelho said each tell a story.

“I always say it’s a kind of opera,” Botelho said. “It has dance, it has costumes, it has music, live singing, it has drama, but what makes the show is the dancing. We have powerful dancing that I know everyone will enjoy.”

Botelho said he’s looking forward to his time in the U.S. and the appreciation Americans show for dance.

“The audience in the U.S. is fantastic,” Botelho said. “Adulation is very present in the American people, and when we are on the stage we can feel it. All the different movements and things that we do strikes a response, and if you like it, you clap your hands. We don’t see this anywhere else.”