Youth Moves Series

A series of exciting and eclectic works performed by dancers under the age of nineteen.

Saturday May 31st and Sunday June 1st | 2pm
Co-operators Hall, River Run Centre, Guelph, Ontario

Adults: $18 | Youth: $15 | Children under 5: free
| $5

KINESIS DANCE COMPANY [Kitchener]
Jivey Mad (2005)

Choreographer: Janis Price

A wild ride on the train of craziness, this piece uses random bursts of movement to suggest the insane pace of daily life.

Photo by James Croker

Janis Price founded Kinesis Dance Company in 1993 to provide a vehicle for dancers to train in modern dance and ballet choreography. The dancers chosen from Eastwood’s high school population are students of the Waterloo Region Integrated Arts Program. They perform choreography that promotes collaborative creation, showcasing their work at Eastwood events, local schools and festivals in the provincial community. Kinesis received strong accolades at Sur la Pointe Ballet Festival in Toronto and Stratford Kiwanis Festival. Eastwood hosts Kinetic Cohesion, a biannual provincial Dance Festival that brings together Ontario high school dancers for a non-competitive event.

SALEM PUBLIC SCHOOL [Salem]
The twenty-three-sided shape (Premiere)

Choreographer: Jessica Runge

In The twenty-three-sided shape, Toronto choreographer Jessica Runge joins forces with twenty-three students from the Salem Public School in Elora to create five minutes of non-stop exuberant dance. From the moment it begins, this carefully orchestrated geometrical gambol is constantly in motion. Patterns break apart and re-assemble with increasing complexity and speed to culminate in a burst of kinetic energy. Drawing her palette from shapes and movements invented entirely by the cast, Runge has created a kaleidoscopic framework through which we glimpse both the unique personalities of each of her performers and the irrepressible, charismatic energy of youth.

Jessica Runge is an award-winning dancer, choreographer and dance educator based in Toronto. She has performed to critical acclaim across Canada and internationally in the works of many choreographers, including Peggy Baker, Sarah Chase, Peter Chin, Maxine Heppner, and Christopher House. From 1998-2006 she was a company member with the Toronto Dance Theatre, and was featured in several original solo and duet roles. Her own choreography is frequently commissioned, and has been presented at many venues in Toronto, as well as in major festivals in Canada. She is delighted to have had the opportunity to work with the grade three and four students at Salem Public School in Elora, and has been inspired by the creativity, energy, and commitment each student brought to the project. Visit www.jessicarunge.com for more about Jessica Runge Dance Projects, and www.ugdsb.on.ca/salem/ for more about Salem Public School.

YMI DANCING [Toronto]
P(s)alm (2007)

Choreographer: Savannah K. Hoag

“I wanted the dancers to have a strong emotional connection to the movement and I thought of no better way to do this than to have the vocabulary and theme come directly from them. I asked the dancers to write about what they hold in their palm--what keeps them going and what is most important to them. That is the place from which this piece came. This is their own celebration of life, their own P(s)alm.” ~Savannah K. Hoag

Born in 1987 in Toronto, Ontario, Savannah K. Hoag began ballet classes at age four at Pia Bouman School for Ballet and Creative Movement, where she completed her Royal Academy of Dance exams from primary to advanced one. At age eight, she started modern dance classes as well. Her love of this art form eventually led her to Etobicoke School of the Arts, where she spent her four years of high school majoring in dance. At ESA, Hoag had the opportunity to dance at Roy Thompson Hall with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. She also danced the role of Juliet in a contemporary dance version of the Shakespearean play, and she received several dance awards upon graduation. Hoag is currently in her third year at The School of Toronto Dance Theatre. This is her first piece of choreography to be presented at The Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival.

ROYAL RHYTHM DANCE COMPANY [Guelph]
Roxanne (2007)

Choreographer: Jenn Enchin, Jaclyn Enchin & Gillian Ashton

Set to the song, “El Tango de Roxanne” from the film Moulin Rouge, this piece explores vulnerability, forced movement and the anxiety occasioned by pursuit. The distress of the dancers is heightened by their Victorian Gothic costumes as well as the contrast between the restrictions of tango and the freedom of modern dance.

The Royal Rhythm Dance Company has just finished its fourth season. Every year, it gives John F. Ross C.V.I. students the opportunity to choreograph and perform their own dance piece.

CONTEMPORARY SCHOOL OF DANCE - DANCEWORKS [Waterloo]
Refraction (Premiere)

Choreographer: Heather Roy-Kleihauer

An exploration of the process of turning and bending movement in space and time as it is passed from one dancer to another.

DanceWorks is one of the contemporary performance companies associated with the Contemporary School of Dance. Students work with professional choreographers and are encouraged to create works for the company’s repertoire. Dancers perform throughout the season at several venues both locally and out-of-town, including the Muskoka Ballet Gala, the Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival, and For the Cause (a Contemporary School of Dance performance raising funds for local charities). Each individual develops a sense of creative confidence and a commanding stage presence.

SWANSEA SCHOOL OF DANCE [Toronto]
Rabbit of Seville (1997)

Choreographer: Sunny Horvath

A romp through the familiar music widely known as the “Barber of Seville” (by Rossini) but with a special twist that only the Looney Tunes can provide. With gunshots and cannons exploding, the performers make their way through an adventure that is exhausting and wildly silly.

The Swansea School of Dance offers the highest quality ballet, creative movement, and modern dance training for boys and girls in a non-competitive, nurturing and fun environment. Limited class sizes allow our teachers to provide personal guidance and the attention needed to enhance the individual development of each student. Our students explore and expand their creativity, develop self-confidence and perform in a winter demonstration as well as a spring performance designed to delight both students and audience.

MOTUS DANCE SCHOOL OF ST. MARY’S [St. Mary’s]
Wind moves Water (2007)

Choreographer: Rory Scofield

Wind Moves Water is a modern dance inspired by wind moving across water. Wind becomes spirit dancing gently across the pleasant lives of several ladies. One woman in black personifies an antagonistic emotion cleverly hiding within the two or three girls dressed in colourful costume with fans. The action develops into that of a tropical storm as the struggle between the gentle calm of spirit and the fierce pull of emotion ensues.

Rory Scofield began working with children 15 years ago after leaving Toronto to raise her own three children in rural St. Mary’s, Ontario. The Motus Dance School of St. Mary’s has given over 1500 children a place to dance. They enjoy a non-competitive environment that nurtures their self-esteem and teaches them how to present their physical selves to the world in a simple, upright way. All of the dance studies at Motus embrace the principles of the Mitzvah Technique.

JANET JOHNSON [Guelph]
Chrysalis Project (Premiere) (youth excerpt)

Choreographer: Janet Johnson

The Chyrsalis Project is a performing art piece that uses multi-generational artists to tell the tale of this earth/life cycle. The flight of the monarch suggests the fascinating longevity of a lifespan and the wondrous commitment to life that prevails in a species. Strong images of the earth, of ritual, and of physical and spiritual flight smatter this canvas. The Chrysalis Project joins hands with the Guelph Youth Dance training programme as well as with Temple Studios in this citywide, community-focussed event that draws on Guelph’s unique trove of talent. This piece is co-produced by the Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival and featured as part of their 10th-year anniversary celebrations.

After graduating from York University’s Dance Program, Janet Johnson spent six years in Toronto. While there she co-founded the eclectic company, PEDESTRIAN WALTZ DANCE PROJECT whose work was performed on rooftops, art galleries, sidewalks as well as at the Canada Dance Festival, “Dancing on the Edge” Festival and in DanceWorks’ Mainstage series. Since 1994, Janet has been choreographing independently of PWDP through various commissions and with the financial assistance from the Laidlaw Foundation. More recently Janet has had the pleasure of presenting her choreography at such forums as the Guelph Contemporary Dacne Festival (1998, 2007), Peterborough New Dance Series and Danceworks Mainstage Series (1999). Janet has danced for a diverse number of choreographers such as Denise Duric, Darcy Callison, Conrad Alexandrowicz, Julia Sasso, Kim Frank and more recently Dancetheatre David Earle. Since 1995 Janet has been living in the Guelph area where she actively pursues outreach dance efforts through teaching: she has been a resident modern dance teacher in Guelph, at McMaster University’s Centre for Dance, at the University of Waterloo, a frequent recipient of the Ontario Arts Council’s Arts in Education Grant, an artist for the Edward Johnson Music Foundation as well as a guest teacher throughout the region. Since 1998 Janet has been co-founder and co-director of the successful Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival and in 2005 co-founded the Guelph Youth Dance Training Program. In 2007 Janet was nominated for the YWCA-YMCA Woman of Distinction Award in the category of Arts and Culture in Guelph, Ontario.

FIRSTTHINGSFIRST PRODUCTIONS [Toronto]
Double Life (2007)

Choreographer: Kate Alton

Choreographed by Kate Alton, performed by Kate Franklin and Kate Holden with composition/sound design by Lyon Smith, this relentless, intricately tangled duet is an intensely-physical exploration of the idea of double identity and the battle between the image of ourselves that we project and the one that we carry inside.

Photo by David Hou
Photo of Kate Franklin and Kate Holden.

Kate Alton is an award-winning Canadian dancer and choreographer who has performed on stages around the globe. She is a former member of Toronto Dance Theatre and is Artistic Director of her own company, Crooked Figure Dances. Her work has been presented across Canada and in Europe. Recent projects include James Kudelka's 15 Heterosexual Duets at the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival for Coleman/Lemieux & Compagnie, firstthingsfirst production's sold-out show Namesake, for which she was featured on the cover of NOW magazine, the Exchange Rate Collective's Appetite for Summerworks and the Volcano/Crooked Figure Dances’ co-production of The Four Horsemen Project, which garnered four Dora Awards, including Best Direction by Kate Alton and Ross Manson.

SUNDAY ONLY!! IF YOU MISSED THE MAINSTAGE SERIES YOU WILL NOT WANT TO MISS DOUBLE LIFE IN THE YOUTH SERIES. THIS IS A GREAT OPPORTUNITY FOR YOUTH TO SEE PROFESSIONAL ARTISTS IN THE YOUTH SERIES.