“As dancers we live, eat, sleep and breathe [dance] every day. And even when we think we hate it, we love it because it is completely part of who we are, who we’ve been and who we are working so hard every day to become,” Eastern Michigan University senior dance major Elizabeth Hynes said.
Hynes, along with her peers Caitlin Brown, Annie Jones, Joy Morris and Rebecca Zahm will be preforming in “Crossroads: Senior Projects Concert” at 4 p.m. on April 14 in Pease Auditorium.
Crossroads is the final project for Dance Performance majors. According to Morris, “[It’s an] afternoon showing of five solos performed and choreographed by each senior and six group works choreographed by the seniors and performed by dancers in the EMU dance department.”
Additionally, Hynes said, “Our solo and group piece has to total 15 minutes.”
Morris said, “‘Coming to Terms,’ choreographed by Hynes, explores the reaction process that we as human beings experience when faced with tragedy. The athletic and technical choreographic choices contrast the somberly ethereal musical accompaniment of ‘On the Nature of Daylight’ by Max Richter to provide a gut-wrenching abstraction of such a universal human process.”
Hynes commented about her choreographed piece, “A lot of us, where we are in our careers, aren’t thinking about choreographing yet, but to pick a piece and polish it takes about three months of choreographing. My
dancers started in January. We had auditions and everyone I chose is a
dance major and everyone is an upperclassman with the exception of one freshmen.”
While looking for dancers, Hynes kept in mind the requirements of a contemporary jazz piece stating, “You need a certain level of athleticism as well as stylistics attention to detail. Everything is so cut throat, so you have to have confidence in yourself.”
While Hynes is practicing her choreographing skills, she said, “I already teach competitive dance in Canton, but I want to branch out to Chicago or New York and audition and perform there.”
In contrast, Morris is already professionally performing in Ann Arbor, as well as teaching yoga, dance and pilates.
“When I graduate, I want to teach and preform where I am. I’m getting paid to do what I love,” she said.
While Morris is keeping the idea of possibly moving to a bigger city for her dance, she has a much greater priority in mind: the fact that she is six months pregnant.
According to Morris’ doctor, dancing is actually helping with the pregnancy to help her avoid hurting her back during it and the birthing process.
Morris said, “I will take a couple months off after the birth, but then I can go right back to what I love. I’ve been told I can bring the baby to rehearsals and there’s daycare within the studio.”
While the prospect of being a young mother and trying to work with her passion can be daunting, Morris’ dedication to dance started at a much younger age.
“I started dancing when I was five years old and I danced in high school. I started doing more in college because when I was in high school I had
to pay for classes myself. I think before college [my parents] didn’t really know how dedicated I was. The work definitely paid off. Now I’m getting paid to dance. It wasn’t handed to me and [working] helped me appreciate it.”
Similarly, Hynes’ passion and dedication is what has brought her to where she is today, “I started dancing when I was two and a half, I’m twenty-two now. I did ballet, but at first I didn’t enjoy it so I begged my mom to switch me to something else. I started competing when I was 14 along with being on my school’s dance team. I went to University of Michigan Dearborn as [a] journalism major and put dancing in the back of my mind. My strength in school was always writing, but I love [to dance] so much I can’t imagine doing anything else.”
Both women strongly encourage everyone to come to their show. Hynes said, “A lot of the time we’re at school and people don’t even know there’s a dance program. There’s a lot of variety and talent and we keep raising the bar each year.” Morris also says, “There’s a lack of getting the information out there. I think you can get a learning beyond the classroom credit for it, and it’s free.”
