Carrie Ann Inaba Writes On When She First Became A Judge For Dancing With The Stars And More

Carrie Ann Inaba has written a new blog at Parade about her memories of being on Dancing With The Stars. In this take, she writes of how all came to be for her.

Ten years is a long time. Dancing with the Stars has been on the air for 10 years. A Decade! It’s an amazing time to reflect upon.

I remember when I went in to interview for a new dance show that had originated in England. At the time, I was working on with Nigel Lythgoe on American Idol and as a choreographer on So You Think You Can Dance. At the interview, I was happily surprised to see many fellow choreographers, peers and people I respected who had been in the business for a long time. It was fun and exciting to talk shop and be a part of something so very new and different. I was offered two jobs: judging roles on both Dancing With the Stars and So You Think You Can Dance. It was a very hard decision for me to make. I loved both concepts, and I had worked for so long with Lythgoe. But I had also worked with Conrad Green, the executive producer of Dancing With the Stars. In the end, I chose Dancing With the Stars.

I was so thrilled to be part of this new craze of dance shows that were just becoming popular. And look at us now! Dance is mainstream. Dance has become almost as popular as our sports. It’s become a major part of pop culture and people now talk the language of dance. I can bring up dance at a dinner table and everyone chimes in, all generations and all walks of life. Dancers are now respected as athletes and artists. It has been a beautiful evolution for my dance community, the community I have lived in for most of my adult life. And the best part is that people now know the incredible power of dance. The celebrities who have done our show have all experienced firsthand the joy, the pain, the thrill, the emotional freedom, the physical power and the transformational power of dance. They know now what I have known for most of my life. Dance heals. Dance empowers. Dance expresses what words cannot. And our audience, our beautiful extended family has experienced it all too, and they also have been able to enjoy those incredible artistic creations and performances throughout the past 20 seasons. They’ve witnessed the power, beauty and joy of dancing, and they have embraced it. They have embraced us.

Lots more at Parade. I thought she looked stunning last night on the 10th Anniversary show. I loved these photos…