Big APE’s Everyone Can Dance Comes to Middlebury 3/18-19

Movement is part of everyone's life. It can be forceful or delicate, fast or slow. Limbs move. Heads tilt. Life is a body moving through space.

But somewhere along the line "dance" became something only trained dancers were allowed to do. Dance companies, generally made up of young, trim people, are something we go to a theater to see. It never occurs to us that we could be right up there on the stage, dancing with them.

The title of Big A.P.E.'s newest project indicates how they feel about this. "Anyone Can Dance" strives to do exactly that, as it merges professional dancers with people from the Middlebury community, many with little or no "dance" experience. The goal, says choreographer Tiffany Rhynard, is to make dance more accessible to everyone, to get everyone to fall under "the infectious spell of movement."

Rhynard and company have already presented the program in Burlington and Montpelier, each time using community participants of all ages, sizes, shapes and abilities. "Anyone Can Dance" debuts at Middlebury's Town Hall Theater on March 18 and 19 at 8 pm. Tickets are $24 general, $18 Middlebury College staff, and $6 Middlebury College students. Tickets for this event may be purchased at www.middlebury.edu/arts/tickets or by calling 443-6433.