The Performance

Dance! is a two-person presentation designed for middle school classrooms or small assemblies. It takes students through the world of ballet, exploring a dancer's training and equipment, classical positions, jumps, and turns, and the history of this, one of the world's most stylized and fascinating art forms. The presentation ends with the performance of two classical dances from some of the most beloved ballets of all time, including Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake, Cinderella, and The Nutcracker.

The Performers

Carolyn Currey has been dancing since the age of ten. Her training has taken her to a professional level, and her passion for performing has taken her across Canada. She is a registered teacher with the Royal Academy of Dance and has operated Daybreak Dance Studio in British Columbia and Ontario. With the Oakville Ballet Company, she has performed solo and corps roles in The Nutcracker, Markitenka, and La Fil Mal Gardee. She performs as a principal dancer with Soli Deo Gloria Ballet, a Christian dance company she co-founded.

Rachel Starr Thomson is an author, a writing coach for junior high and high school students, and the co-founder of Soli Deo Gloria Ballet. As a teenager, she traveled across the United States performing in a children's show called Dynamite the Dinosaur and Friends, a family production for which she wrote the script. Rachel has worked as a preschool teacher and put in many volunteer hours working with children of all ages.

Interaction

Most students are familiar with ballet to some extent, even if they've only seen dancers caricatured in cartoons or read about them in books. Dance! brings this worldwide art up close and personal, in a presentation that is equally fun and informative.

Students don't simply watch Dance!. Participation is encouraged as they examine the quirky contents of a dance bag, pass around the pieces of a pointe shoe, ask and answer questions, test their own flexibility and strength, and count off the number of turns Carolyn can pull off without stopping.

Contact

For more information or to book Dance! for your school, contact Carolyn Currey at daybreakdance@hotmail.com or call 905-382-6036.