Continued success for one of our Favorites!
We have a lot to celebrate!! We are incredibly proud to announce that one of our five commissioned choreographers for the season has received a Princess Grace Award!! Crystal Michelle Perkins (choreographer of Lit-Anies, premiered in 2020 on SCDT) was awarded an honoraria in choreography. This accomplishment is huge and we feel so very lucky to have worked with Crystal. We await her return in 2021 as she intends to expand her work on our company and officially work with us in person!
The Princess Grace Award is an award of high esteem that is given to those in the realm of theatre, dance, and film in order to fund and advance their career with an awarded grant. These artists are emerging in their chosen field and are dedicated to continued education in their craft. More than 800 Princess Grace Awards have been given out since the foundation's inception and can be awarded to performing artists as well as creative generators. Crystal is a bold, dedicated, and passionate choreographer and we are proud to see her name listed next to other prestigious award recipients such as Kyle Abraham and Robert Battle. This is a wonderful accomplishment on the upward path of her career and we are thankful to be a part of her journey in any way we can be!
As a dancer, working with Crystal was such a rewarding experience. We participated in a residency with Crystal in 2020 solely over Zoom. To watch Crystal teach choreography, organize the choreography in a space she wasn't physically in, and attach it to sound after constructing the framework was something else. She is a proven mastermind in beautifully stringing together intentional stillness with powerful and athletic movement. The contrast in her work is clear and creates intrigue as a viewer. Crystal's ability to impact an audience through movement is the reason why she's received this high honor. Crystal - we are proud, we can't wait to work with you more, and we applaud you on your many successes!
Season 5's Whirlwind of a Start
I’m back, y’all!! Kelly Anderson – Season 4 and 5 Company Member here to dish everything your way through our SCDT blog! Welcome to Season 5!!
Our season started a bit earlier this year – we came together in the beginning of August to dive into three rigorous weeks of rehearsal with Kia S. Smith’s choreography and Jessica Miller Tomlinson’s incredible rehearsal directing. Our purpose for starting so early? We were selected to be a part of Chicago Dancer’s United’s Dance For Life annual performance! This is such an amazing honor for Kia as a choreographer, for us as a young company, and for each of us dancers as young members of the Chicago dance community. All in all, it was an experience we did not want to miss out on!
We came back with the six returning members from the previous season and welcomed a full slew of guest artists and new emerging artists to be a part of this performance. We reconstructed a 5-minute excerpt of Kia’s “Architect of a Dream” which was part of our Black History Month show, set to the powerful words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech. Bringing this piece back to life was a privilege and to be quite honest, I forgot how much I loved performing it! I wrote about it last year, but this piece gave me actual CHILLS in rehearsal last season. There’s something so difficult to explain but so special to feel about experiencing dance that provokes thought, means something, and demands change in our world.
One of the most exciting parts about our preparation for Dance for Life was that it would be our first live performance since I joined the company! The state of our world has made it so difficult to truly see dance the way it was meant to be seen – live, in person, and fully and viscerally experienced. To have the opportunity to once again perform for people in a safe way at the beautiful Pritzker Pavilion was nothing short of amazing. It brought true joy to stand at the end of the piece with my fellow dancers, take in the applause, and soak up the dream of performing for so many people that we’ve all desired from the start of our training. This is what we train for!! Obviously we were thankful to still be dancing – even if it was simply for a screen – last year, but there is no comparison to dancing for a live audience.
Dance for Life 2021 was just what we needed to jump-start what is bound to be an incredible season. We have SO much in store, I am already struggling to catch my breath! I’ll be here all year updating you on our adventures, so don’t worry – you’ll get your SCDT behind the scenes fill as always!
For now, I just leave you with a giant THANK YOU for your continued support. We are all ready to make this season the best one yet!
