The art of sport in Cirque du Soleil Songblazers

Cirque du Soleil Songblazers is in Houston, the beauty of theater, art, innovation, and, yes, a little bit of sport.

Many say that there is a strict line between what is truly a sport and what isn’t. Soccer and baseball are widely considered sports, but golf or javelin throwing aren’t.

However, in the Oxford Languages dictionary the definition of sports is very clear “physical activity, exercised as a game or competition, whose practice involves training and adherence to rules”, so by definition juggling can be considered a sport.

Cirque du Soleil Songblazers juggler Bruno Macaggi is in charge of giving life to the character who juggles with red cups, something that is not easy and takes many hours of training.

For him, the question of whether what he does is a sport is complicated, but he did make it clear that just like traditional athletes, for what he does, you must have discipline, dedication, and passion.

“That is a bit of a complex question because sport is a lifestyle and circus artists have the same lifestyle. We are not professionally dedicated to any sport, but we are always training. Work is our life. The sport that we do, juggling, acrobatics, anything, takes a lot of time,” explained Macaggi.

The Spaniard is a fourth-generation circus artist. He shared that he had a childhood full of happy memories with his family, as they all traveled together and spent a lot of time together playing table games, playing soccer, but also practicing his art.

“I have been practicing this discipline for 19 years since I was seven. It is a long time. It is every day in the morning and afternoon with your teacher. Being there is always a dedication. There are people who will say that it is a sport and people who won’t. That is in the eyes of each person,” explained Macaggi, who thanks to his posts on social networks was recruited by Cirque du Soleil.

You can see Macaggi in action in Songblazers, a new Cirque du Soleil presentation that is different from those that have previously visited our city. This is a musical with “Country” music but without losing the essence of the cirque, which is full of humor, art and emotion.