By Sabrina Michael ’13

This year was a dream year for us as the 2011-2012 dance team, and it defied all of our expectations. From the beginning of summer during camp and practices, there was something special about our interactions with each other.  We supported each other through everything that went on in our lives inside and outside the dance room. This aspect of the team changed everything, especially our dancing. We drove each other, we breathed together, we sensed each other’s presence through our dance movements in a sort of out of body experience, and we lived each dance as if it was a real moment in our lives.

One of the dances we brought to U.S. Finals was a Haunted Mansion-themed hip hop routine to Deadmau5’s Ghosts n Stuff.  Our routine earned us a score of 92.7 out of 100, which beat out 25 All-Star hip hop crews from around the U.S. and ranked us #1 in the country.

I remember sitting in the old dance room at the Fine Arts Building before the Tutor Center was completed, closing my eyes and just listening to the song for the first time. I could feel the anticipation and excitement as all of us grooved and looked at each other with smiles from ear to ear. We heard the Haunted Mansion sound effects like screams and verses from the Disneyland ride and practically lost it (all of us are obsessed with Disney by the way). We knew right then and there that this routine was going to be fantastic.   After a competition held at Disneyland, we went to the park and went on the Haunted Mansion ride together. As soon as the ghostly voice said, “Welcome foolish mortals to the Haunted Mansion,” our whole team recited it for everyone on the ride. Despite our obvious love of this routine and concept, we brought something distinct to the table; with our white-painted faces, black eyes, crazy hair, and unique choreography, we were the exact opposite of the regular cookie cutter dance ensembles.

Our ability to work as a team and be a family is what made this year’s dance team one to remember and one not to forget. We skyrocketed to a national level in two out of three categories, and we defended our National Hip Hop title from last year. We ranked #1 in two All-Star divisions, a first in Chaminade history. This team has been a major stepping stone has set the standard high for years to come.

By Brittni Webb ’12

A senior at Chaminade, Brittni, dances with the High School’s Dance Company and wrote her reflections after the first performance weekend of this year’s dance concert, “The Attic.”  This is the company’s first time taking the stage in Chaminade’s brand new, Tutor Family Center for the Performing Arts.

As I hang in the rafters in the hammock, I watch the sheets get ripped away.

The Irish Princess stretches from years of spending time in the attic, while the dancer inside of her stretches in excitement to once again performing in the annual dance concert after a year off. She takes a deep breath, a flood of memories rush back to her.

“What’s it like?”

“What’s it like what?” I respond, a bit confused and mostly just over-tired.

“Dance Company….” After a few moments I pause and in a hushed reply I say “I don’t know how to explain it to you.”

What’s it like? What’s it like to perform?  What’s it like to be exposed to such inspiring dancers and choreographers?  What’s it like to make history?  What’s it like throwing your old life to the side and creating a whole new one, only knowing that it will be over in less than three weeks?  It’s worth it.

Whether it be varsity soccer or Future Doctors of America, there are plenty of programs on campus at Chaminade that offer students the chance for self-improvement, but the Dance Company is the only program where one not only learns more about themselves, striving for both physical and mental self-improvement; but one is given the chance to create themselves.  Many of us dancers claim that long practices and little sleep are the reason for our different behavior around the time of the performance; however, the truth is that reality is simply going through the motions; we are living in a total different state of mind. We call this state, the “In-between”. In the “In-between” we not only develop empathy for our characters, we become them.  The outside world is a myth, for our mind is not focused to getting through the piece, but living the piece.  For the hour or so performance, we are real, alert, alive, breathing loudly to feel out the other dancers.

Dance Company is not the long hours of preparation, the lack of sleep, and sore feet, but the feeling of unity that cannot be found anywhere else.  We are living in the realm to which we normally escape.  The real world is boring in comparison.  The pieces we perform are so close to our hearts and honest because they are created by students, reflecting human issues, and conflicts we deal with everyday as high school students.  Dancing these pieces allows us to escape from the pettiness of high school, confront our issues and realize that they are universal.  The connections and friendships that are formed in company are not credited to the long practice hours and lack of cell service in the dance cave, but the honest, encouraging environment to which Dance Company provides us.

So as the sheets are pulled off and I descend from the aerial equipment, know that as you, the audience, watches us, we are breathing with you, letting your applause cue our beating hearts.  You are joining our world of the In-between and changing the way we dance, changing the way we live in both worlds.