Rogers Performance Celebrates First Year of Class

STAFF PHOTO FLIP PUTTHOFF THEATER DANCE Jenna Leavitt, from left, Ruchika Gorgia, Beatriz Melchor and Mary Chavez practice a theater-dance routine March 20 at Heritage High School in Rogers. The students are preparing for a dance performance April 6.
STAFF PHOTO FLIP PUTTHOFF THEATER DANCE Jenna Leavitt, from left, Ruchika Gorgia, Beatriz Melchor and Mary Chavez practice a theater-dance routine March 20 at Heritage High School in Rogers. The students are preparing for a dance performance April 6.

— The hip-hop number that will open the April 6 "Raising the Barre" dance recital at Rogers High School is one of several numbers choreographed by a student.

The class was added to both Rogers high schools in the fall, and the recital is a first.

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Raising The Barre

Tickets are $5 for Raising the Barre, a recital of theatre dance students from Rogers and Heritage high schools. Doors open at 1:30 p.m. April 6 at the Rogers High School auditorium. The performance begins at 2 p.m. Tickets sales will help students purchase shoes and dance attire for the class.

Students walked through a series of robotic hand motions to the music of Daft Punk at a recent rehearsal, led by Esther Atkinson, a senior at Rogers High School.

Hip-hop, with its unpredictable and sometimes choppy movements, is her favorite form of dance, Atkinson said.

"The way it moves with the music is really cool," she said.

She always imagined choreographing a number, but her few dance lessons were mostly at a community center, she said.

"Don't be afraid to sweat," she told her classmates who laughed at the comment.

"A lot of people think dancing is only for the ballerina or the professional dancer," said Amelia Barton, executive director of DeltaArts in West Memphis. "Movement is part of everything we do."

The learning process is more important than a perfect final performance, Barton said. Something as simple as brushing one's teeth can be a dance, she said.

DeltaArts teaches workshops in many art forms. Dance, with its combination of movement and problem solving, is one of the most successful in inspiring students to learn, Barton said.

Students who have trouble with writing or with presentations may excel in dance because it's more physical and more abstract, she said. The process of stringing movements together to dance lets them try ideas and refine them.

The artistic process requires higher-level thinking, Barton said. Artists create, analyze and revisit their work -- skills teachers want students to have, she said.

The class is the first formal dance experience for most of her students, said Liz Davis, theatre dance director.

Theatre Dance I was added last year to offerings at Rogers and Heritage high schools as an elective. A second level class will start this fall. The class teaches a survey of dance styles, Davis said. She started the year with ballet, lyrical, musical theatre and modern styles, but added cultural dances to the mix.

Davis said she tried to include dance numbers that played to the different strengths, interests and body types of her classes. Standing before an audience is key to the class, she said.

"The performance of the dance is so important. It's something you can't teach in a class. It's something you have to experience," Davis said.

Tribal dance, with its loose moves, is a favorite with the students.

Ballet, however, is hard, said Brad Pena, a senior at Rogers High School.

"It's like a sport," he said.

Students in the class said they probably wouldn't take dance if they didn't have it at school.

Mikayla McCoy, a junior at Rogers High School, said she doesn't have the free time to take a class outside the school day.

McCoy has danced jazz and hip-hop and wants a career in musical theater, so the class plays into her college plans.

Ariadna Valencia, a freshman at Rogers High School, said she's always loved to perform. Dancing is a stress reliever, she said, and the class has been a reason to come to school. It's like family, and she can hang out with seniors, she said.

"You don't see that a lot," she said.

Davis said she sees students learning discipline and patience through dance. Student choreographers for the show had to teach moves to their classmates, after first winning them over in a classroom audition. Teaching others taught them leadership, she said.

Companies want employees who can work well with others, and who can create imaginative solutions to problems in the workplace, Barton said. Dance students learn those ideas through movement, she said.

Art gives context to history and culture, and teaches collaborative thinking and vocabulary, Barton said.

"Education without art is just incomplete," she said.

NW News on 03/27/2014

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