This year, Abby Tay-Morrison and I had the privilege of choreographing the dance for the Year 7/8 dance group. They performed on Wednesday and Thursday last week at Somerville Intermediate for the Howick and Pakuranga Dance Festival.
The dancers were selected at the end of term 1 after auditioning in small groups. They gave up their lunchtimes, late starts and class time to prepare for this festival.
This year’s performance had the theme ‘Dancing through the Decades’ which had 5 parts to it. We took the audience on a journey through the times of our grandparents and parents. We had traditional 60’s dance styles including some contemporary and new vogue steps. For the 70s we had a little bit of a disco bop. The 80s was a great dancing decade – we brought some of those traditional 80’s moves such as the shimmy and many more. The 90s was the time all those girl bands came around like TLC and Destiny’s Child, but we had a bit of Spice Girls. And of course, the amazing 21st Century where they danced along to some music from the one and only Queen Bee, Beyonce, who topped the charts in 2003.
On the night of both performances everyone did an amazing job dancing their hearts out. They had high energy and were smiling throughout the dance. It was a wonderful opportunity for the dancers to show off their talent and they all had so much fun.
A special thank you to Miss Picot who organised this event and made it all possible.
Sydney Causer
