This year’s dance concert concluded successfully, with around 200 total participants. Read below to learn more. Photo courtesy of Rachel Norum. 

by Clara Guthrie

The Menlo community knows the dance concert to be an annual celebration of school spirit and the arts, but few Menlo students understand the time commitment and dedication required to put together such a show.

At its start, the dance concert was a one-night production with not enough Menlo dancers to even fill the program. “The first two years that I was in it, […] it was still pretty small, so we invited Crystal to perform and a few other outside groups,” Menlo alum (‘00) Courtney Chandler, now middle school dance teacher and co-director of dance concert said. “Shifting to just our school was fun because then everyone watching knows everyone on stage.”

Almost two decades later, roughly 200 students, from the 6th to 12th grade, perform in pieces from dance classes, PE rotations, and organized dance groups, with a few exceptions. “What I love is so many kids want to be in the show and that’s the reason we open it up to […] senior men and the senior number and Bollywood,” Jan Chandler, upper school dance teacher and co-director of dance concert said. 

Starting after winter break, both teachers focus their energy on developing concepts and choreographing for the mass of students they each work with. “I really base everything I do on the class that I have. […] I might come up with an idea ahead of time, but I really wait to see which class is that idea going to fit,” said Courtney Chandler, stressing the importance of working collaboratively with each individual group of dancers.

Additionally, both teachers have to push their students, specifically those who are less advanced, to embrace the experience of performing for a crowd. “Everybody needs the experience of being on stage […] even if you’re scared to death and you do it, you get over a fear that you need to get over,” said Jan Chandler. 

The dance concert extends beyond choreography and performance, relying on a small crew to perfect the light and sound cues in a time crunch. “With the dance concert specifically, there’s just so little time to do tech; […] we’re setting cues while they’re doing one of their two rehearsals and that’s the only time we see the dance before dress rehearsal,” senior Akshay Srivatsan, student tech director for the dance concert, said.

Beyond the pressed schedule, the dance concert’s crew must be extremely concentrated since many important cues are hard to spot. “[Tech for the Menlo plays] is more of a time commitment, but otherwise I think [the plays are] easier [than dance concert] because you have a script, […] but with dance concert you need to look for things or listen for things,” student lighting director and sophomore Thomas Woodside said.

Above all, Jan and Courtney Chandler strive for focus and dedication from every single one of their dancers, regardless of grade or previous dance experience. “There has to be a basic discipline that Courtney and I are still boss. I find it interesting […] that some kids […] always think they know more than us,” Jan Chandler said.

And while the dance concert may still just be viewed as an annual celebration of school spirit and the arts for the Menlo community, Jan Chandler urges that the lessons learned from partaking in such an experience cannot be undermined. “It’s just helping [the] growth of the teenager. The more experience you can get out [on stage] and the more you can realize [that] it’s not […] all about you, [but] that it’s about everybody. […] That’s why the arts exist.”