Dance Break 231 welcomes dancers age 5-18 to participate in a four-day dance experience, this year hosted in beautiful Manistee, Michigan! Read on to learn what we have in store and check out the amazing teachers/choreographers lined up to be there!
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Classes
Registered Junior and Senior dancers will get four days of dance instruction and choreography in the styles of contemporary, hip hop, jazz, musical theatre and production. Classes are 8am-4pm, Tuesday-Friday.
Mini's will get four, half-days of dance fun in the style of Pop Jazz and will also get to perform in the production piece!
See the detailed schedule HERE.
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Finale Performance
Dancers will learn choreography in each of their classes to perform at the end of the week! The performance is free and open to the public!
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Scholarships
At the Finale Performance, we will be offering partial/full scholarships for DanceBreak 231 in the summer of 2024! These scholarships will be awarded to dancers who exhibited good work ethic and positive attitudes throughout the week.
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Extra Performance Pieces
We are offering studios a chance to bring competition/recital pieces that they would like to perform in our Finale Performance! Each studio may audition six total dances and our faculty will choose up to three to be added to the performance line up. Studio Owners must register the pieces by sending an email to hello@dancebreak231.com. Auditions date and time TBA.
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Meet the Faculty
Debora Knight
Co-Director
Debora Knight is the former owner/director of The Conservatory of Dance in Manistee and the Great Lakes Dance Academy in Petoskey, as well as current Dance Director at Concord Academy Boyne. Ms. Deb has enjoyed sharing her passion for dance for 40 years! Coming home to Manistee and reuniting with former students to bring a fantastic summer dance program is fulfilling a long time dream!
Tarah Hodges
Co-Director
Tarah is co-owner, teacher and alumni of the Conservatory Dance in Manistee. She has worked for the Walt Disney World Company as a character performer and character dancer. Now, she focuses her time as a competition choreographer where she has earned many choreography awards for her routines. Tarah is certified in ballet and jazz through Dance Masters of America.
Shelli Golembiewski
Co-Director
Shelli was born and raised in Manistee and loves this area! She is an alumni of the Conservatory of Dance in Manistee and is now Co-Owner and Instructor there. She is a past member of the Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp International Ballet Ensemble and a graduate of Dance Masters of America with certifications in Ballet, Jazz and Tap.
Hailey Bruce
Musical Theatre Instructor
Hailey has a BA in Dance and Creative Writing and an MA in Elementary Education. She has performed in numerous musicals as well as performed many dance works. She has also choreographed a number of musicals and has a passion for musical theatre! She is currently an instructor at Great Lakes Dance Academy as well as a fifth grade teacher.
Justin Bobbs
Hip Hop Instructor
Justin's passion for hip hop movement started at age 16. After high school, he went on to major in dance at The Young Americans College of Performing Arts, dancing across the US and internationally throughout Europe and Japan. Soon after, he started working with major artists such as The Weeknd and Miguel. Currently, Justin is living his dreams producing music for artists while simultaneously teaching and choreographing hip hop numbers for a variety of performance companies across the country.
Lauren Judkins
Contemporary Instructor
Lauren Judkins (LJ) is a 2023 alum of Conservatory of Dance and is a current student of the American Musical and Dramatic Academy. She started dancing at 3 and grew up training in a variety of styles, competing regionally, and participating in many performance opportunities. She currently lives in New York City while attending AMDA as a Dance Theater Major to pursue a professional dance/theater career where she trains in ballet, modern, jazz, commercial jazz/heels, tap, lyrical, and takes singing and acting technique classes.
Bethany Socher
Mini Instructor
Beth is a Conservatory of Dance alumni and current teacher there. She also teaches at the Landing Dance Academy in Cadillac and is director of the Dream Team competition team. Bethany has completed three years of training at the Dance Masters of America Teachers Training School and is certified through Alixa Flexibility’s modules one and two. She loves being able to expand her love of dance to her students!
Whitney Soule
Jazz Instructor
Whitney is a Northern Michigan native and currently lives in the Cadillac area. Whitney studied dance in Traverse City at The Dance Center and went on to earn a BA In Dance from WMU. She danced professionally with America's original jazz dance company, Giordano Jazz Chicago and was also a part of a contemporary dance company called Contempo. She has taught and choreographed for many years throughout Madison, Wisconsin and western lower Michigan before returning north. Whitney has taught at The Landing Dance Academy for the past 6 years where she can share of love of dance with her students as well as her two daughters.
