By Shauna Steele
In reflecting on what my directors note would be this year, I realized something important and amazing. The seniors you will see onstage tonight started their college journey on a sea of shifting sands, in the middle of a hurricane and stepped into the unknown to play a game where the rules were forever shifting.
They began their college career not just with the normal unknowns of moving away from home, how could they become a dancer...or a dancing double major but how will I dance? How will I learn? Will there be any jobs out there once Covid ends? When will Covid end? They arrived on campus in masks, had to stay 6-10 feet away from each other at all times, dance in defined squares in the studios, take classes online that would normally not be engaged in that way. I believe they have thrived in part not in spite of this unknown that shut down the entire world but because of it. They are all strong dancers, with clearly defined purpose and goals both inside and outside of dance. They are exactly what we hoped would develop when we frantically started making our plans for the future when the world shut down.
They have become leaders amongst their peers.
We can’t seem to get away from mentions of Covid and even here I really did try...but I can’t really and truly honor not just the seniors but all of the other students, faculty, staff, parents, and family that have continued to trust, persevere, find joy, and create magic without mentioning it. This concert is a reflection of that spirit of looking forward into a terrifying and horrifying unknown and finding not just a ‘pivot’ but an entirely new language, road...in essence creating a new recipe of ingredients but using a ‘starter.’ We engaged in collaborations, new choreographic ideas, new ways to interact, new ways to create.
The result is onstage in the strength of technique, artistry, and aesthetic...of the dancers, choreogsraphers and student and faculty design collaborators and I absolutely look forward to seeing what we will all do in the future as we find new moments that ‘take our breath away!’
