Dance Troupe Kicks Off State Tour Here Friday

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Created on Thursday, 12 September 2024 15:36

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By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
Performers in the diverse EMERGE125 dance company hope you leave after their show Friday with a sense of joy and – if not joy – emotion.
“We just really want to spread a sense of joy to people who watch us,” said Caitlyn Morgan, one of the eight dancers in the New York-based company in town this week.

Alyssa Manginaro and Travon Williams of EMERGE125 rehearse in one of the Allen Auditorium
dance studios Wednesday. The company will perform Friday at the PAC. (Sentinel Photo)

“Dance and art is pretty interpretive,” she said. “People take away from it what they need to, but I think as long as people can walk away with some sense of joy or some positive emotion, I think we’ve done our job.”
EMERGE125 will go on stage 7 p.m. Friday at the Performing Arts Center. It’s sponsored by the Sitka Fine Art Camp, but tickets are free, a gift from GCI for Sitkans’ patience during the fiberoptic cable break.
The dance troupe, including artistic director and choreographer Tiffany Rea-Fisher and producer Jodi Kaplan, arrived here Sunday, their first stop on their Alaska tour. Since arriving the dancers have performed for elementary classes at the PAC, and put on a master class at Sitka Studio of Dance. Friday, they’ll perform for Sitka High, in addition to the public performance.
The troupe is the latest in a series of professional dance companies coming to Sitka, and the shows are always excellent, said Kenley Jackson, SFAC program director. The most recent ones were Thodos Dance Chicago, Eisenhower Dance Detroit, and Michael Mao Dance from New York City.
“Producer Jodi Kaplan has really good taste, and offers Sitka an opportunity to see professional dance at the highest level,” Jackson said.
Other stops on the tour will be Petersburg, Haines, Skagway, Ketchikan, Anchorage, Homer, Seward, Fairbanks, and Kodiak.
The company describes itself as “a Black female-led hub for dance performance, creation, and education,” with dual homes in  Harlem and the Adirondacks of upstate New York. It performs locally in New York City and Lake Placid, and on tours around the world.
Responding to the Sentinel’s request for an interview, the dancers asked Morgan to speak for the company.
In the interview, Morgan spoke about the path that led her to become a professional dancer. She has been with the company for six years, with Tiffany Rea-Fisher as artistic director.
Morgan started dancing at age 2, but at first it wasn’t a big thing for her. “My mom had to bribe me with candy to go to dance classes,” she said. “When I was eight or nine, I switched dance studios and something clicked and I started taking it more seriously.”
At age 12, she had her eyes on a career as a professional dancer, specifically as a prima ballerina, but soon realized that she didn’t have the typical feet and body type for that role.
“Then it was, how can I segue? And that’s how I was introduced to modern dance, and it worked out because EMERGE125 is a modern dance company.”
She graduated from the University of California, Irvine, in 2018 with degrees in educational sciences and fine arts in dance performance. She attended a summer intensive at Lake Placid, where Rea-Fisher selected her for an apprenticeship before she became a full company member.
Audiences will see Morgan several times throughout the Friday show. Asked to talk about one particular piece, she picked the duet-solo dance “Spirit Celestial.”
“When I first learned it, I was an apprentice, and it was with a different dancer, so I’ve been able to see the evolution of it, both choreographically and with partner work, which I didn’t have too much experience with in college,” she said.
“From an artistic standpoint it was very satisfying to be able to explore that with another dancer that I dance with - Maddy (LaLonde) - is a lovely partner and we’re also friends, so it’s nice to have that sense of camaraderie with her,” Morgan said.
They switched roles for this tour, with Morgan taking on the solo part.
Morgan said she enjoys EMERGE125’s dedication, focus and hard work to create a high-quality and artistic show, and also the caring nature of the company members.
“We care about each other on a human level,” she said. “It’s not just that we are co-workers, and it’s nice to have that family sense. It’s a small company so we all know each other pretty well at this point because we’ve been dancing together for so long.”
Producer Jodi Kaplan has taken dance companies to 14 communities in Alaska, including 10 on this tour, and is proud to note that this is the longest tour of performing artists in recent years in the state. She is pleased to have Sitka be a “soft landing into Alaska.”
“I’ve done four other tours where this was the starting place because of the beautiful gorgeous dance studios (at SFAC), the community, the Performing Arts Center, and the Sitka Fine Arts Camp,” she said.
Kaplan said she’s enjoyed over the years bringing a variety of dance companies for Alaskans to see. EMERGE125 will present a program of contemporary “engaging, beautiful and dynamic” pieces.
    Kaplan enjoys presenting not only a variety of dance companies and styles but seeing how different communities and individuals respond to the dancers and dances.
    “The fact that Tiffany is engaged in inclusiveness and representation in a diverse way, I felt this was really perfect. Because people will fall in love with the dance and then see the diversity on the stage,” Kaplan said. “And that’s enough for people to open up and maybe influence some of the children that haven’t seen themselves represented. ... I’m excited about this company from that point of view as well as the absolutely beautiful dance.”

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