There was a time when the Swishers Dance Club had to cap its membership at 130 people, but the coronavirus pandemic and other factors have now left the group on its back foot, with 30 people keeping the club alive. Despite the impact, members anticipate a rebound to former glory in the months ahead. Club president Lavonn Peters said COVID-19 played a significant role in hitting the group’s membership. While membership is holding steady, the group attracts non-members to their dances as well. And those numbers give the

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Once a week on Southern California's most famous beach, just before the sun dips into the Pacific Ocean, dozens of people gather and silently dance like no one is watching. Those swaying on the sand wearing wireless headsets with decorative LED lights streaming music from a nearby DJ are practitioners of ecstatic dance. Moving their bodies and losing themselves in the music, participants describe an almost spiritual experience. The gatherings held on Venice Beach and organized by Ecstatic Dance LA are normally held indoors and

In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Orpheus recounts the story of Myrrha, who is cursed by Aphrodite to fall in love with her father. After becoming pregnant she is forced to flee to Arabia, where the gods take pity on her and transform her into a myrrh tree. This is where Junk Ensemble’s The Misunderstanding of Myrrha – staged as part of Dublin Dance Festival Winter Edition – begins, the figure standing on a pedestal with a dramatic head-dress of branches. It is also the point when Ovid’s moralising male authorship is finally

Shannon Dyer brought home the trophy in the ‘under eight’ category after impressing the adjudicators with her talent at the competition held in London last month. This was Shannon’s first win at a major competition since lockdown and saw her competing against dancers from across the globe. Proud mum Lisa said: “For a year she was doing Zoom classes and it was just keeping her fitness up and she had no face to face classes. "She started competing again in July. "She’s had a few local competitions since then and recently there was

Cheickne Sissoko 5Tamans, a cultural troupe of Mali specializing in Mali’s centuries-old traditional music and dance, participated in the 2nd National Tribal Dance Festival 2021. This festival was held at Raipur, capital of Chhattisgarh, from October 28-30, 2021. “It was a unique opportunity not only for the Malian troupe, which was on its first visit to India, to showcase the richness of their Malian culture in India but also for the Indian audience to get glimpses of Mali in India and appreciate their diverse and attractive cultural traditions,”