Dancers warm up at Open Body Night

On Wednesday, Mar. 2, the Dance department held Open Body Night in the Silver Center for the Arts to preview potential pieces for the Contemporary Dance Ensemble concert, which will be held in May.

At Open Body Night, dance students and instructors come together to share works in progress. These pieces may be choreographed by instructors, guest artists, or students themselves, and represent a wide and colorful range of styles from jazz, modern, hip-hop, and more avant-garde approaches such as contemporary Pointe. The pieces solely feature student dancers.

Open Body Night also serves as an adjudication of work for the student-choreographed pieces. Any student is eligible to submit and present a piece to the judges, who consist of faculty members of the Dance program. These faculty members deem what pieces show strong potential for the show in May, thus forming the program for the concert. 

Amanda Whitworth, the director of the Dance program at Plymouth State University, said of the decision making process: "The faculty values student work that demonstrates an escape from the student's comfort zone. This can be exemplified in a piece which utilizes fresh movements and vocabulary, which is choreographed to music that is more sophisticated than pop, or in which two students with different artistic backgrounds collaborate to create something unique." 

The volume of works submitted this semester was of a particularly impressive caliber, according to Amanda. Students who submitted strong pieces were Jessica White, Brandee Peglow, Mackenzie Perra, Erin McDonough, Brittany Hill, Brooke Ross, Katie Lenhart, Nicole Baroni and Marissa McNutt, and the PSU Dance Team. Thus, the panel of judges had a difficult time this semester making final decisions about which pieces were to premiere in May's Ensemble. 

The show will also consist of faculty works by Aaron Tolson, Lenore Sousa, Lisa Travis, Lois Hanks, and a contemporary piece by Amanda. Guest Artist Pamela Pietro, from New York City, will also be privileging the concert with her own piece titled Lécher. 

One of the Contemporary Dance Ensemble concert's most unique and exciting features is the array of other types of student work present beyond the medium of dance. "We have art majors who come and make huge murals for the backdrops, we have pieces of literature read between dance pieces, and we often have live music to accompany pieces. Sometimes the musicians will be on stage and the dancers will actually dance around the musicians." 

The overarching principle of the Contemporary Dance Ensemble concert is to exhibit student work and to present it with enthusiasm, to bring attention to the differences between each piece, and to call attention to the talent abundant in the student body. "There isn't really a theme to the show," Amanda said. "Pieces may be set strategically in the program, so as to position two similar pieces together, or two pieces on opposite ends of the dance spectrum next to one another. We aim for harmony, but the whole concert eventually comes together in a beautiful chaos." 

The Contemporary Dance Ensemble concert will be held in the Hanaway Theatre at the Silver Center for the Arts, and is currently scheduled for Friday, May 13, and Saturday, May 14. Tickets will be on sale at a later date at the Silver Center Box Office. For those who have never experienced the concert, it is certainly worth attending. "It's such a feel-good concert," said Amanda, "and it reaches out to all types of students. People who come for the first time, not knowing what to expect, always leave in awe."