Photo Courtesy of David Schamis P’26
Filling three rows of chairs lined up against the back wall of the Colony Hall dance studio, audience members at the annual Student Choreographers’ Showcase (SCS) watched up close as dancers leapt and spun across the floor. SCS, which occurred on December 3–4 under the direction of Dance Program Director Ms. Pamela Newell, grants students the opportunity to participate in the choreographic process by creating solo or group pieces. After a few months of experimentation and preparation, these pieces are performed by students in the dance program.
The choice to host SCS in the dance studio instead of the Paul Mellon Arts Center stage — where the annual spring showcase takes place — was intentional: the studio emphasized the personal and intimate aspect of experimental dance and fostered the idea of dance without perfection.
This year, there were a variety of dance genres, ranging from ballet-based choreography to Latin dance. SCS showcased performances by the Dance Composition class from the fall term as well as dances by students who worked independently.
Zooey Schamis ’26 and Lucy LaPlaca ’26 danced the opening number entitled “With You All the Time.” SCS was both students’ debut dance performance at Choate. One of LaPlaca’s most memorable moments while performing was when the music began to stutter because of a technical difficulty; she and Schamis had to restart the piece from the beginning. These small bumps in the road are inevitable, but the beauty of SCS is the opportunity to learn and grow from experiences like this one.
Alluding to the iconic classical ballet Swan Lake, Schamis described their choreography as an “eerie black-swan, white-swan kind of piece.” Inspired by the movie Don’t Worry Darling, the black and white costumes added “more texture to the piece since the music had mostly no words,” Schamis said.
While Schamis and LaPlaca had known that they wanted to perform a lyrical-contemporary piece, their final choreography was based on an eerie poem, “Ten Little Soldiers,” which Lucy received from a fellow classmate in a Secret Santa gift exchange activity during a Dance Composition class.
Ernie Mok ’25, who began his formal dance training after coming to Choate, performed both a solo and a duet. Taking Dance Composition made him consider dance in “a different limelight, for example adding more levels, tempo changes, contrast, and those elements we usually subconsciously see in dance anyways.”
His duet with Vicky Dzodan ’23 focused on the idea of contrast between them. He also incorporated a cloth as a prop to “act as a bond between the two dancers.” While the piece was initially choreographed for three dancers, Mok had to adapt it for two dancers instead, which was a challenging but rewarding experience.
Mok’s solo was a “freeform contemporary-style dance that involved fast and sharp movement” to the track of K-pop band BTS’s “Black Swan.” Mok took inspiration from BTS’s original choreography and chose the orchestral version of the song to match a more contemporary dance style. “I’m a person who is inspired by the music and then I create the dance,” Mok said.
Reflecting on the students’ journey through her Dance Composition class and to SCS, Ms. Newell said that it is “always exciting to see students discover their own personal voice,” as the class focuses on the student and “creating their own movement language.”
After attending one of the performances, Tashi Bista ’26, said, “All the performances were very creative. They were put together well, and I was impressed with all the pieces … Overall the experience was unfamiliar to me, but I would like to experience it again.”
