East Tennessee State University’s popular Spring Dance Concert this weekend offers a wide variety of dance forms performed by both student and professional dancers.
Show times are 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, March 25-27, and 2 p.m. Sunday, March 28, at the VA Memorial Theatre, Building 35, on the campus of the James H. Quillen Veterans Affairs Medical Center at Mountain Home.
This third annual concert, directed by Cara Harker, assistant professor of dance in the Department of Communication’s Division of Theatre and Dance, consists of three suites of dances.
The first suite features the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and includes ballet and modern dance.
A highlight of this segment is a low-flying trapeze aerial dance, with a live performance of the music by Dr. Alison Deadman, associate professor of clarinet in the ETSU Department of Music.
“There is some music out there that seems too sacred or untouchable to elicit dance choreography that could do it justice,” says choreographer Molly Baker Crofts. “However, when considering Bach, I feel his ghost welcomes and beckons the listener to partake. There is absolutely nothing snooty, standoffish or obscure about Bach, despite his inarguable genius for creating music of haunting depth and beauty.”
The choreography of guest artist Danah Bella of Radford (Va.) University will be presented in the second suite by ETSU student dancers and members of Mountain Movers, ETSU’s dance company in residence.
The suite also includes a performance by members of Bella’s professional dance company, danah bella DanceWorks. The dances will be set to the music of Salvador Barajas.
The third suite, entitled “Balloon,” features ballet, ballroom and aerial dance – including low-flying trapeze and silk – choreographed by Harker, along with original music composed by Dr. Joseph Borden of University School.
Harker says the inspiration for this suite comes from her memory of the day when all 500-plus students at the elementary school she attended released balloons into the air with tags attached giving the students’ names and addresses.
“(We) let go of our balloons together with the hopes that they would travel far and wide and land in some interesting place, and whoever found it would contact us and tell us where the balloon had traveled,” she said. The dance, she added, “is an exploration into the feelings of first love, the sense of inadequacy and alienation often associated with adolescence, our perception of duty and responsibility often at the risk of our own happiness, and the desire to break out of the protective bubble, or ‘balloon,’ that we enclose ourselves within.”
Admission is $15 for adults and $7 for students.
For reservations, more information, or special assistance for those with disabilities, call the ETSU Division of Theatre and Dance at 423-439-7576 or 439-6511.

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