I co-lead the School of HONK Dance Troupe, and one of the things I love most about SoH is that there is space for you here, even if (or maybe especially if) you’ve ever felt that dance or music “isn’t for me”. As for me, I always I loved to sing, but I didn’t know how to play an instrument or read music, so I thought I wasn’t allowed to think of myself as musical. Similarly, I always liked to move, but I “didn’t dance” (and thought I couldn’t dance) until I was about 20.
Up until then, I thought that dancing was one of those “you have it or you don’t” kind of things, and that I didn’t have it. In retrospect, all my peers who I thought “had it” took dance lessons after school or practiced on their own. Isn’t it amazing to discover that just about everything in life is actually a learnable skill rather than an innate gift?
I went to school for theater and I got to take a lot of movement classes, which made me more aware of my body, how it moves, and how to “play” it. This led me to discover that I LOVED dancing—which I think is really just a mildly intimidating word for “moving your body in relationship to a rhythm”. I spent a semester studying classical Indian dance-theater in southern India, and when I got back, I discovered international and American folk dances, and later got into things like swing/blues, tango, etc. I also work in professional theater, especially movement-based styles like puppetry, dance-theater, clowning, etc., and my idea of what counts as “dance” is pretty broad.
At this point in my life, I’m pretty darn passionate about the belief that dancing and music are for EVERYONE, and I love facilitating dance experiences at School of HONK. I love that we have a mixture of kids and adults, at all ability levels, and yet we can all come together and dance joyously, in unity with each other and with the music!