By: Hannah Moore
My name is Hannah Moore and I’m a senior at The Academic Conservatory at Project Ballet. This is my fifth and final year in the pre-professional, advanced training program since I’ll graduate in the spring. My formal dance training began at the Fort Wayne Dance Collective in 2010 where I studied under Liz Monnier, Alison Gerardot, and Brittney Coughlin in modern, contemporary, and jazz techniques. I made the transition to Project Ballet in the fall of 2013 through a joint program – I took modern classes at the Collective with Kate Majorins and Ashley Benninghoff weekly while also strengthening my technical proficiency at Project Ballet in a neoclassical, Balanchine aesthetic under Beth McLeish and the esteemed faculty. Both organizations continue to cultivate my appreciation for dance through their encouragement, support, and new opportunities they present.
In the past, my involvement with the Collective has been exclusively dancing for seasonal performances and different outreach programs, including the dance troupes at both Weisser Park and Memorial Park, and South Side Dance Program. The Dance Collective’s curriculum is inventive, collaborative, and experimental—all qualities necessary in the growth of a budding artist—and was vital to my interest in choreographing. I’ve choreographed for local show-choirs and theatres for musical productions in the past, but up until my junior year, I hadn’t choreographed anything relative to contemporary or ballet. In February of 2017, Project Ballet held its annual Student Choreography Showcase, where I presented my first co-choreographed piece with live accompaniment to an audience. I further strengthened my choreographic understanding when spending five weeks at Alonzo King LINES Ballet Summer Program this year in San Francisco, CA. After so much exposure locally and nationally over my formative high-school years, I have gained a greater knowledge of my own abilities and weaknesses.
After dancing in six of FWDC’s Halloween shows, I am so excited to be on the opposite side choreographing this year for “Hotel Hysteria.” My piece, “Kōma,” has eight female dancers ranging from 12 to 17-years-old, all of which who train at Project Ballet with me. Our school is known solely for the high caliber of our ballet technique, so there are is no other on-site instruction in other forms of dance except for master classes. Luckily, even with some inexperience in alternate styles, the dancers in my piece are hard-working and willing to try anything. I selected a four-minute instrumental piece by Clint Mansell for my contemporary work and am looking forward to the costuming and lighting design process. I am fascinated with intentional, purposeful gaze and eye contact and have emphasized the importance of its nature in the piece; by focusing on this aspect, I hope the motivation of the movement and the general theme will be clearly interpreted.
I enjoy participating in the Halloween show because it’s so unlike any other performance I partake in during the year. Winter is reserved for The Nutcracker and spring is reserved for Project Ballet’s annual Variations Showcase and Spring Concert, so the Halloween show is perfect at the beginning of each schoolyear and leading into autumn. It’s a great outlet for new dancers to try something outside of their comfort zone and for returning, more experienced dancers to play with different characters and stories. From an audience perspective, it’s an alternative for going to haunted castles or houses and it really adds a unique, intimate side to Fright Night. I’m so grateful to return to the FWDC family for “Hotel Hysteria” and can’t wait to see the outcome of the show in less than a month!
Don’t miss Hotel Hysteria
Friday, October 20th & Saturday, October 21st
8pm
Parkview Physicians Group ArtsLab
Tickets HERE!