2023-02-092023-02-09Arts News, Newsletter

Featured Arts News of the Week

January 20, 2023
Mr. Brian Nieh, Arts not-Teacher

Before we start, I’d like to give an editor’s/arts coordinator note regarding our upcoming CNY Celebration and performance:

At the start of each semester, our choreographers are very eager to start their new programs. However, at the same time, we have two major celebrations in the Mid-Autumn Festival and Chinese New Year. Both of these typically include a performance, so this is where things get tricky: what programs do we do?

For the CNY celebration next week, we can certainly run back some of the Winter Wonders programs, many of which our students are performing for other community CNY celebrations (including at Commodore Sloat ES UCSF, and the Sunset Farmers’ Market). But as the artists we (students and teachers) are, despite the time frame, we’re hard at work choreographing and preparing a few new pieces for you all to enjoy.

Now pivoting back to the original planned topic: Chinese Dance as a Celebratory Tool

Chinese dance has been around for centuries in different forms and used for different purposes. More often than not, Chinese dance is used for celebrations. It can take the form of court dances for imperial officials to celebrate holidays or birthdays or a great piece of legislation. More widespread, it surfaces in all different ethnic groups, doing ethnic dances to celebrate a harvest or whenever they just want to have some fun. Several of our dances from Winter Wonders fall into this category, including Snow-Capped Celebrations (celebrating their reverence to the heavens) and Flower Hats (celebrating their beautiful hats).

So next Friday, we hope to celebrate with a few Chinese Dance pieces during the CNY Celebration performance, including a special piece to send off the year of the tiger.

2023-02-092023-02-09Young Artists News, Arts News, Newsletter

Young Artists News of the Week

January 13, 2023
Ms. Hanna Zhang, Young Artists Director and Dance Teacher

Just like the plum blossom enduring the harsh winter snow to bloom in the spring, our dancers have endured through rigorous training and rehearsals to arrive in competition season. The majority of dance competitions take place during the springtime, as early as January. For our dancers, both in the full-time and Young Artists program, we are aiming to join a number of competitions starting early February.

We are very excited for our dancers and wish them the best of luck. Let’s continue working hard and win those awards!

2023-01-312023-01-31Arts News, Newsletter

Featured Arts News of the Week

October 20, 2022
Mr. Brian Nieh, Dance Teacher

There’s still a bit of time before our Winter Wonders showcase at Herbst Theatre on December 16. However, our performers have been hard at work to prepare their dances, both in our full-time and Young Artists after school programs. Ms. Hanna already introduced the Flowery Hat dance, which some of our families got to see our students perform at the Cole Valley Fair last month.

As for the boys, they’ve been hard at work learning and practicing the Tibetan dance, Snow-Capped Celebrations in their Chinese ethnic dance class. Originating from the ancient Tibetans’ entertainment of singing and dancing around bonfires, this folk dance style features energetic and festive movements in celebration. In this piece, the short sleeves represent the khata, a traditional ceremonial scarf in Tibetan Buddhism. Being so high up in elevation and close to the skies, dancers use their khatas to express their praise to the heavens.

These dances, along with many others, will be ready with full costumes, props, and backdrops for you to enjoy come December. See you then!

2023-01-312023-01-31Arts News, Newsletter

Repertoire Spotlight: Flowery Hats

By Ms. Hanna Zhang, Dance Choreographer
September 8, 2022

During the Tang Dynasty, tea tasting was prevalent in the country. Every Spring, when new tea was picked, the palace would hold celebrations with tea art performances. The tea-picking dance was a special dance in the Tang Dynasty. Cheerful and gorgeous in costumes, this dance expresses the joy of singing and dancing when picking new tea in the royal tea garden. In the 14th year of the Republic of China (1925), the tea-picking dance was introduced to Jiangxi Province. Locals formed a folk tea-picking dance team, performing three common tea-picking movements: swinging a fan, picking tea, and presenting a basket.

Flowery Hats is one of the dances for our high school dance students and they are already almost finished learning this dance. With lively pace and light movements, girls hold tea-picking hats and wear embroidered shoes, reflecting the graceful and lively beauty of young girls. This dance is full of creativity and storyline. The sun hats in the hands run through the entire dance. The girls sometimes laugh and play in the fields, and sometimes dance with hats. Please look for this dance at our Winter Wonders showcase in December!