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Dance festival continues kicking up a storm after 60 years

The Moose Jaw Festival of Dance was formed in 1959 and has taken place every year since at A.E. Peacock Collegiate.

The Moose Jaw Festival of Dance has been kicking up a storm for 60 years, and in that time, Eloise Sitter has never missed any of the competitions.

Sitter began attending the festival in 1959 at age four while accompanying her mother, Doris, who was one of the event founders. Her older sister was one of the first students to dance at the festival. 

A year later, at age five, Sitter began dancing in the competition herself. That participation continued for the next six decades, as Sitter transitioned from dancing to teaching.

“It’s great. This is part of life for me,” chuckled Sitter. “Come May, you come to Moose Jaw.”

Sitter was in Moose Jaw from May 1 to 5 with her Saskatoon-based dance school to attend the festival, held at A.E. Peacock Collegiate. The Sitter School of Dance was one of 11 groups from across Saskatchewan and Alberta that participated in the competition, which featured 566 dancers.

Students from ages six to 18 performed individually and in groups for enthusiastic family and friends.

All the results can be found at www.danceinspirations.ca., or on its Facebook page. 

“It’s gone great,” Jennifer Nant, president of Moose Jaw Festival of Dance, said on May 5 before the start of the Dance Challenge, where every studio with the week’s top marks performed. “Had lots of dancers cross the stage and perform their talent. (There has been) lots of good dancing.”

All three judges were on hand to adjudicate the Dance Challenge. Awards were handed out in the junior and senior categories, including $5,500 in cash prizes. 

To honour the 60th anniversary, organizers installed a new dance floor for the performers, while an adjudicator who danced at the festival as a youth — Sheri Drewitz-Kanten — was brought in to help judge. 

Organizing the festival is a big undertaking that involves many volunteers, Nant continued. Planning for the next event starts the night after the previous festival is finished. 

“We reach out to our community to help us get the scholarship money that we give back to the dancers,” Nant said. “It takes a lot of planning to reach out and walk the pavement and see who can help us out for the year.”

Programming the festival is one of the biggest challenges volunteers face, she stated. Organizers need to ensure all the dancers fit into the program and have enough time to change into new costumes. 

Nant thought it was amazing that Sitter had participated in the festival for 59 years. Sitter now leads one of the bigger dance studios in Saskatoon.   

One of Sitter’s first festival memories is performing a nursery rhyme dance; this year’s nursery rhyme dance featured the great-great-granddaughter of Doris Sitter portraying Little Miss Muffet. Another favourite memory was being able to spend time with her mother during the week-long festival, along with meeting the other dancers. 

“As a child, it was a magical week here,” Sitter said. “We couldn’t wait. It was as big as Christmas, I think.”

What captured Sitter’s attention as a seven-year-old dancer was meeting Arnold Spohr, the head of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. He came to adjudicate one competition and she “fell in love with the man and thought he was everything — and he was.”

“I didn’t know his importance at that time,” she said. “But a friendship kindled between the two of us.”

Sitter enjoys teaching and being with kids. She appreciates seeing them use their full potential and the joy they experience while dancing. She believes performing at the festival will be great moment for them.

“I think Moose Jaw should be proud of this organization, that it has lasted for 60 years,” she added. “Not many non-profits … can boast that they have survived for 60 years. It’s quite an accomplishment.”

Winners

The following groups won awards during Sunday's Dance Challenge:

 

Junior category

First place: Sitter School of Dance (Saskatoon) for "Replay;" $1,000 prize

Second place: Joy's Dance Factory (Lethbridge) for "Maple Leaf Rag;" $750 prize

Third place: Joy's Dance Factory (Lethbridge) for "Viva Le Swing;" $250 prize

Honourable mention: VanDance Studio (Lethbridge) for "Comin' in Hot;" $200 prize

 

Senior category

First place: Doris School of Dance (Moose Jaw) for "Let The Games Begin;" $1,500 prize

Second place: Joy's Dance Factory (Lethbridge) for "Something Bad;" $1,000 prize

Third place: Joy's Dance Factory (Lethbridge) for "I, A Child;" $500 prize

Honourable mention: Joy's Dance Factory (Lethbridge) for "Mess Around;" $300 prize

                                     

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