Redwood Rangers get ready to assemble their entertaining performances that are open to families and the community to watch and enjoy.
By: Brisa Magana
The Redwood Dance Showcase brings out all the dedication and skills the rangers know or have recently learned. It includes students from 9-12 from intro to dance, intermediate, advanced, hip hop, international, and Dance Force. The Dance show starts on Thursday, April 30th, through Saturday, May 2nd.
Redwood High School dance teacher, Elisa Bardonnex, says, “The dance show theme of this 25-26 school year was chosen by Mrs. Lapp and me.”
The collaboration between Michelle Lapp, another Redwood High School dance teacher, and Ms.Bardonnex has come to the conclusion of making this year’s theme from Vinyl to Digital. While some dance classes get older music to dance to, others get digital trending songs from now.
Bardonnex says, “Cutting music can be an extensive process. First, you have to gather all the songs, then decide the order, and then begin cutting each song. It can take 20 minutes, or it can take several hours to prepare the music.”
As soon as the dance show music is ready, dance classes start to learn their dances at different timings due to being in different dance levels.
Aliyah Perez, ’28, says, “Currently in my intermediate class, we are more than halfway through our second dance; we started learning our first dance in November.”
While Intro to dance is barely midway through their first and only dance, the preparation is still getting through while the dance show creeps up on all Rangers dancers.
Bardonnex says, “Rehearsals happen the week of the dance show on Monday, April 27th, and Tuesday, April 28th, after school and can take several hours. We begin with the finale and then start the order of the show. We do it this way so when each class has completed their dance, they can leave the rehearsal and head home.”
The rehearsals happen in the LJ Williams Theater. Usually, practicing and running the dances happen in the dance room, but during rehearsals, the dancers need to get used to the stage layout and test their performance.
Perez says, “On rehearsals, the first day can get a little chaotic since it’s the first time practicing on stage, which leads us to so many mix-ups, making us rehearse it over and over again to become comfortable for our show and so we can fix any little mistakes”.
The LJ Williams Theaters doors open at 6:30 on Thursday, April 30, and Friday, May 1st to start the show at 7. On Saturday, May 2nd. Doors open up at 1:30, and the show starts at 2:00.
Come join the Redwood Dancers to see the amazing show. Hope to see you there!
Brisa Magana
Brisa Magana, '28 has been in Journalism for 2 years now and loves to work in the Arts & Entertainment Section, loves to write about dance and is really dedicated to creating stories. The point is to let others voices be heard while having the most fun.
Tags: arts & entertainment, rangers, Redwood, redwood gigantea, redwood high school, redwood journalism, redwood rangers, rhs, rhsdance, visalia ca
