TC Dance wins
national honors
BY DENNIS NARTKER
dennisn@kpcnews.net
KENDALLVILLE — TC Dance Academy for the Performing Arts returned to Kendallville Saturday as Dance America national dance champions.
The TC Dance competition team of 31 dancers ages 11-19 from Indiana and Michigan won several individual and group first place awards at the Dance America National Finals held July 4-7 at the Schaumberg Renaissance Convention Center in Chicago. Forty-three dance schools from throughout the U.S., Mexico and Canada participated in the competition with 825 dancing entries.
TC Dance had 53 entries that had qualified earlier in the year at preliminary competitions in Chicago and Detroit, according to Christine Rash, TC Dance director.
Entries were categorized by youngest (primary/junior) to older dancers (intermediate/senior, adults); divisions of size, solos, duet/trios, small groups, large groups,
lines and productions; and by dance disciplines, jazz, tap, ballet, hip hop, lyrical, musical theater and open.
TC Dance earned 24 first-place awards, nine second-place awards, five third-place honors, five fourth-place awards and four fifth-place honors.
Several TC dancers earned special awards: Best Presentation by a Group, Shoeless Joe; High Score Small Group, Unwritten;
Best Precision by a Group, 42nd Street; Best Precision Duet/Trio, Devil Went Down to Georgia; First Runner-up High Score Large Group, I Want to Be a Rockette; First Runner-up High Score Duet/Trio, Take Me Out to the Ballgame; First Runner-up High Score Production, 42nd Street; second runner-up High Score Production, Shoeless Joe; Second Runner-up High Score Line, Jelly Jam; and Second Runner-up High Score Duet/Trio, Rockafeller Skank.
Several TC Dance soloists received additional honors, according to Rash. Clara Borg and Claire Brown qualified in the Top 10 out of 112 competitors. Caitlin Gieseking, Brooke Campbell and Paige Romer qualified in the Top 10 out of 83 competitors in their category, Romer earned second runner up for Dancer of the Year.
Auditions were held later for participation in the faculty show presented during the followup dance ;workshops. Caitlin Dashield, Gieseking, Campbell and Borg qualified in the Top 20, and Campbell and Borg eventually qualified for the show. They received scholarships for the DanceAmerica Summer 2012 workshops, said Rash. \
TC Dance teachers and > choreographers include Kirn Berkley, Molly Miller, Amanda Snyder, Katrina Romer and Christine Rash.
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