For Educators
Dancing at the Crossroads: A Celebration of Anglo-Celtic and African America Dance in the New World (http://dancingatthecrossroads.com) is a full-length, original dance/theatrical show. Singers, players, dancers, and storytellers present a fully-staged dance/theater narrative relating the mythic history of the encounter of these two great vernacular performance traditions in the New World, including blues, jazz, hip-hop, New Orleans, Irish, English, Scottish, and Caribbean musics and dance.
About the Program
Dancing at the Crossroads is an impressionistic, evocative, engaging theatrical spectacle of live music and dance, celebrating the meetings and transformations between European and African cultures which are the deep roots of American popular music. Conceived as a show integrating music, solo & group dance, narration, solo song, projections, sets, and costume, it draws upon a corps of energized and charismatic young singers, players, and dancers, to tell the stories, both real and imagined, magical and mythical, dusk-to-dawn, that lie at the heart of the American expressive imagination. Mr Scratch & the Bluesman, the Dance Master and the Freestyler, Elizabeth Bennett & the Creole Girl, Reynardine & Marie Laveau dance their way out of history & legend and onto our stage. Suitable for all ages and accessible to widely-diverse audiences, the show is dramatic, participatory, and expansive, capable of taking any audience in any venue on a journey of adventure, discovery, and transformation.
About the Music
Includes narrative and magical songs from Ireland and England; tales of transformation and crossroads magic; blues and gospel from the Mississippi Delta; sean-nos (“old style”) song from Ireland’s Gaelic West; dances and dance music from Ireland, Scotland, and Cape Breton; ritual dances from the Welsh Borders; country dances from England and Appalachia and sea shanties from the North Atlantic, and an audience sing-along as finale.
A partnership of the TTU Vernacular Music Center (http://vernacularmusiccenter.org), the School of Music (http://www.music.ttu.edu) and the Roots Music Institute (http://rootsmusicinstitute.com).
Social media:
http://dancingatthecrossroads.tumblr.com/
https://twitter.com/CrossroadsDance
https://www.facebook.com/groups/crossroadsdanceshow/
http://on.fb.me/Zt4Y9U
http://dancingatthecrossroads.com/
About the Cast
The cast of Dancing at the Crossroads is comprised of a small and select group of talented and energetic young artists around whose talents the show’s book and music were composed. They include Becca Rhoades (soprano/dancer/fiddler), Abi Rhoades (alto/dancer/fiddler), Emily Furillo (dancer), Candice Holley (dancer), Lamar Peeples (tenor/dancer), Barry La'Craig Horn (dancer), Justin Duncan (bass/dancer), Rachel Boyd (alto/piano/guitar), Zac Barron (percussion), Zoe Carter (flute/sax/whistle), Jakob Reynolds (fiddle) and William Combs (trombone).
Dancing’s creative team includes Chris Smith (musical director/composer), Bill Gelber (stage director/narrator), Genevieve Durham DeCesaro (choreographic consultant), Gerald Dolter (executive producer), Rich Remsberg (photo/film/found-sound designer).
For Educators: K-12
For Educators: college
About the Program
Dancing at the Crossroads is an impressionistic, evocative, engaging theatrical spectacle of live music and dance, celebrating the meetings and transformations between European and African cultures which are the deep roots of American popular music. Conceived as a show integrating music, solo & group dance, narration, solo song, projections, sets, and costume, it draws upon a corps of energized and charismatic young singers, players, and dancers, to tell the stories, both real and imagined, magical and mythical, dusk-to-dawn, that lie at the heart of the American expressive imagination. Mr Scratch & the Bluesman, the Dance Master and the Freestyler, Elizabeth Bennett & the Creole Girl, Reynardine & Marie Laveau dance their way out of history & legend and onto our stage. Suitable for all ages and accessible to widely-diverse audiences, the show is dramatic, participatory, and expansive, capable of taking any audience in any venue on a journey of adventure, discovery, and transformation.
About the Music
Includes narrative and magical songs from Ireland and England; tales of transformation and crossroads magic; blues and gospel from the Mississippi Delta; sean-nos (“old style”) song from Ireland’s Gaelic West; dances and dance music from Ireland, Scotland, and Cape Breton; ritual dances from the Welsh Borders; country dances from England and Appalachia and sea shanties from the North Atlantic, and an audience sing-along as finale.
A partnership of the TTU Vernacular Music Center (http://vernacularmusiccenter.org), the School of Music (http://www.music.ttu.edu) and the Roots Music Institute (http://rootsmusicinstitute.com).
Social media:
http://dancingatthecrossroads.tumblr.com/
https://twitter.com/CrossroadsDance
https://www.facebook.com/groups/crossroadsdanceshow/
http://on.fb.me/Zt4Y9U
http://dancingatthecrossroads.com/
About the Cast
The cast of Dancing at the Crossroads is comprised of a small and select group of talented and energetic young artists around whose talents the show’s book and music were composed. They include Becca Rhoades (soprano/dancer/fiddler), Abi Rhoades (alto/dancer/fiddler), Emily Furillo (dancer), Candice Holley (dancer), Lamar Peeples (tenor/dancer), Barry La'Craig Horn (dancer), Justin Duncan (bass/dancer), Rachel Boyd (alto/piano/guitar), Zac Barron (percussion), Zoe Carter (flute/sax/whistle), Jakob Reynolds (fiddle) and William Combs (trombone).
Dancing’s creative team includes Chris Smith (musical director/composer), Bill Gelber (stage director/narrator), Genevieve Durham DeCesaro (choreographic consultant), Gerald Dolter (executive producer), Rich Remsberg (photo/film/found-sound designer).
For Educators: K-12
For Educators: college
