Gasper’s School ofDance and Performing Arts

Photos and text by Melissa Stephan

Before class the girls are free to converse and warm up. The get in a group and talk about boys and school before they have to focus on dance. The girls teach each other fun moves like cart wheels. Some stretch to get warm and others take this time to relax before the workout.

The class starts and the dancers go to the ballet bar to do some stretching exercises. They bend with ease into painful positions.

Dancers will push themselves to the limit each day to get even just a little more flexible. Enduring the muscle pain is just part of the dance experience.

The girls then do bar warm-ups. This consists of one hand being on the bar and working on muscle control in the legs and feet. Their instructer, Matt Gasper, will do a combination and the girls will watch. Then they will do the combination using both their right and left legs. In ballet it is very important to stay ballenced. Whatever you practice on your left you should also practice on your right so you do not end up lopsided.

Parents and other children are allowed to watch during the classes as long as they do not cause a disruption. Many of the younger girls stay to watch the older girls class. When learning choreography the girls are told to try different moves in different places until it looks how the choreographer wants. Many times a dancer will change one part three or four times a practice. The challenge is remembering which part the choreographer really wants.

Dancers perform “tricks” such as jumps, turns, or different flexibility moves. In the top photo the class is holding the 6 o’clock stretch. The goal is to have your legs in a compeletly straight line. On the bottom a dancer is practicing a firebird or capezio. As a dancer tricks are a very good thing to be versatile in, especially when attending auditions.

Dancers start learning the basics of tricks when they are just learning to dance. One they get the basic movement down they start applying technique and flexibility to them.

When in a dance class you sometimes follow the movements of the instructor in an exersise or warm up. When younger you can get away with not following them exactly or being late on a step. When you are older and a more experienced dancer you are expected to pick up on the steps very fast and be able to keep up with that theinstructor is doing.

Dancers devote their lives to improvement. Dancing is not only about technique and skills but also about having fun. Gaspers provides both fun and dedication, the key ingredients for a successful studio.

Kathy Gasper has an impressive classical background complimenting her appearances on the Broadway stage, television, cabarets, regional theaters, and summer stock productions. Kathy has been a soloist and principal dancer with the Milwaukee Ballet, Weisbaden Ballet, Illinois and Chicago Ballets, the Florentine Opera, and the Chicago Opera Ballet. She has been an instructor/guest artist at several universities and has produced creative “in-school” programs that are applied today in Michigan, Florida, Minnesota, and North Dakota.

Kathy’s professional musical comedy roles include Lola in Damn Yankees, Gladys in Pajama Game, Rose in Bye Bye Birdie, Gypsy and Dainty June in Gypsy, Ado Annie in Oklahoma, and Miss Hannigan in Annie. She has been privileged to have studied and performed under outstanding choreographers Lupe Surrano, Luigi, Jamie Rogers, Madame Clistove, Ellis DuBoulay, Peter Genaro, and Ron Fields. She was assistant choreographer for the Doc Severinson & Brothers and Sisters nigh club act at the Plaza Hotel in New York and Hawaii.

She has choreographed summer stock productions, industrials, commercials, and major dance works for several performing groups, including the Merion Cole Ballet. Kathy was the former artistic director of the Red River Dance and Performing Company in Fargo, ND, and choreographed and was the director of the dance department at Trollwood Performing Arts School from 1981-1993. After 1993 it became Gasper’s School of Dance and Performing Arts.

Zumba classes at Gasper’s are fun and high energy. By the end of the class the participants have had a hard work out. The dances are done to popular and latin music. The steps are repeated throughout the routine so even beginers can catch on and get a good work out.

Sometimes the classes use weights to make the routines more difficult. The classes are taught by Jill Lawrence. Most participants come back week after week so they know the dances and they have fun with them. Sometimes theparticipants wear jingle skirts for fun.

The younger girls do bar exercises just like the old-er class. Easier moves are used but even now the precision and the steps are being repeated so they can remember them and progress in the technique of them as they become more experienced dancers. The bottom photo shows a memory arm exercise that is used with every younger class. Mrs. Gasper will show a few arms in an arm routine then put on music and the children will have to remember them and put them with the beat of the music.

During the class Mrs. Gasper will ask the kids terminology of steps so they will be able to “speak proper dance” when they get older. Parents are encouraged to watch their children at the dance classes although not all our thrilled to do so. At the end of each class the students will take a bow to the mirror signaling the end of a productive day of dance.