LOCAL DANCERS READY TO SHOW THEIR SKILLS

A rehearsing young dancer ran off the stage of Academic Auditorium Wednesday looking for a Band-Aid. Dr. Marc Strauss smiled and said, "Their blisters are coming through."

Ruby Streate, artistic director of the Katherine Dunham Dance Company, has had just five rehearsals to prepare the members of Southeast Missouri State University's DanceXpresssions Dance Club for tonight's climatic performance of the dance company's residency at Southeast. Some of the 10 young women and two men only recently joined the club, so part of Streate's challenge is to turn dancers of varying abilities and experience into a cohesive unit.

Tonight's performance at 7 will feature the Katherine Dunham Museum Children's Workshop Dancers, the DanceXpressions Dance Club and Ahrai, a black dance club at the university.

The groups will perform again at 6 p.m. Friday at Franklin School. Both performances are open to the community.

Dunham, who is in ill health, has not been able to attend during the two-week residency. She is known for choreographing the movie "Stormy Weather" and is considered an important choreographer in the history of American modern dance.

Although she has danced since she was 3 years old, Memphis native Joanna Maybry has been amazed by the amount of strength required of the Katherine Dunham dancers. The DanceXpressions president has been through many rehearsals in her life but says: "It's nothing like this. It's amazing that the 12-to-16-year-olds can do it."

The Dunham company's primary performing group is the Children's Workshop Dancers.

Jon Gilgenbach, a sophomore from Racine, Wis., is new to dance, though he performed in some musicals in high school.

Gilgenbach has been practicing the movements at home and has been excited to see them all come together.

For Maybry and Gilgenbac, dance won't be a career but they value the experiences it offers. "I just came here to learn something different," he said.

Watching the rehearsal Wednesday was Courtney Beers, a program coordinator for the Missouri Alliance for Arts Education, which provided a grant to help pay for the residency. The organization performs a site visit to make sure everyone is happy.

And everyone is happy here, she surmised.

Strauss certainly is. More than 1,400 people have been exposed to the Dunham dance technique this far into the residency. That includes 150 people who attended a workshop Saturday at Kennett.

He says his dance students have learned enormous amounts about "the complete dedication, the sacrifice of time, the sacrifice of blisters and feet. You are committed to the vision of the choreographer," he said.

Much of this learning is occurring through osmosis, he said.

"Dance is so powerful and visceral that the body responds more than the mind."

Being exposed to Katherine Dunham's 60-year dance legacy is another important part of the residency, Strauss said.

"You have a sense of things much bigger than your own world. It's a lesson that can never be learned enough."