Friday, April 7, 7:30 p.m. and Saturday, April 8, 1 p.m. and 5 p.m.
Sanders Theatre. Tickets available through the Harvard Box Office,
(617)-496-2222. $6 students, $8 general.
Dancing to the spoken word sounds more like a cryptic metaphor
than an actual event. But the twenty-third annual CityStep show,
entitled “Louder than Words,” intends to do just that: depict the
memorable words of great leaders through the art of dance.
“We are going to be dancing to quotes from figures around the
world,” says CityStep Executive Director Russell L. Graney ’07. “The
implication is that dance is louder than words, and we’re bringing back
these influential words.”
CityStep has been serving schoolchildren and audiences of the
Cambridge community for over two decades. The club teaches dance, along
with self-expression and self-confidence, to fifth-, sixth-, and
seventh-graders at six schools in the Cambridge area. Each year of
instruction culminates in the annual performance of original works,
choreographed and performed by the children and their instructors.
This year, however, CityStep has made an effort to get the
students to “think outside of the box” and consider “dance as original
movement,” Graney says. The organization has set academic and personal
goals for the students to better focus class time—some of these goals
correlate even with the Massachusetts Arts Standards.
“We’ve really refreshed our curriculum...to challenge our
students to the utmost,” Graney says. “This year our show will be the
culmination of our new focus and our renewed dedication to introducing
our students to movement and dance.”
To achieve this dynamic new focus, the members of CityStep
have chosen seven inspirational quotes from political, artistic, and
social leaders and have constructed an innovative dance number to each
of the quotations.
According to Graney, in six of the seven pieces, the audience
should “Look forward to seeing Cambridge youth performing their
versions of inspirational quotes, interpreting the words sounds and
rhythms of quotes, and transforming them into dance.”
The CityStep instructors will perform the final dance, which was choreographed by the six classroom directors.
In its fusion of words and movement, CityStep hopes to create a
communicative whole that somewhat resembles the sentiments of one of
their performance quotes, by author Chinua Achebe: “People create
stories create people; or rather stories create people create stories.”
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