Dancers battle injury, long hours

By Nicole LaPrade

If Karl Kuehn isn't on his back sleeping, he's on his feet dancing.

"I feel like I live in the dance building," says the junior art history major, who minors in dance. "But dancing is my passion, and if there was something I really didn't like about it, I wouldn't spend so much time doing it."

Dancers at Santa Clara, like Kuehn, endure lengthy rehearsals, strained muscles, broken toes and an impeded social life to perform in the quarterly shows and best utilize the department's resources, all for the love of dancing.

Senior communication major Kimberly Davey has enjoyed 14 years as a professional ballerina, beginning at age 17. She sees the amount of time Santa Clara dancers put into their work and wonders if they are foregoing the typical college life.

"The college experience is something that I missed out on to have my career, but there's always a part of you that's going to miss that. I just wonder if it's something that they'll regret later," Davey said.

Because many of the dance majors are double majors, they have little time to spend with friends.

Senior Melanie Jimenez said that it has been difficult to socialize with students outside the dance department, simply because people from the "outside don't understand."

Despite Jiminez saying she loves her dance department "family," she also wishes that she had branched out and had gotten to know people in her dorm during her freshman year.

Jimenez spends the majority of her day in the dance building or in the costume shop where she works. The rest of her time is spent in the Arts and Sciences building where she is working to complete her degree in political science.

The senior is often so tired from rehearsing all day that she finds herself going to sleep at 10 p.m. and waking up at 5 a.m. to finish her homework.

"My homework just fits in. I cut out time-wasting. I always do my homework early and try to stay ahead because you never know what's going to come up," senior Misha Patel said. "Dancing is something that I have to do. It is my passion, but in doing it I can't let anything else suffer. It is a balancing act."

Taking care of one's body to prevent injury is also part of the balancing act Patel described.

David Popalisky, director of Santa Clara's dance program in the Department of Theater and Dance said that overall the dancers in the department have been relatively lucky when it comes to injury. He credits the students as well as the faculty's training and not pushing the students too far.

But many students still suffer from injuries, often chronic ones. Shin splints, strained ACLs, MCLs, torn meniscuses and knee injuries are just some of the pains dancers endure.

Kuehn broke two of his toes while warming up for a show last year, but still performed.

"Depending on the injury, if you're able to perform, you will," Kuehn said. "You've got adrenaline pumping through you and you've put so much time and effort into rehearsing that you don't want to not see it through."

Jiminez understands that it is difficult to replace injured dancers.

"If you don't perform, that is also a spot the choreographer will have to fill and all the other dancers will have to adjust to," Jimenez said.

"I've been in that position and that is tough for a choreographer to have to do."

Jimenez is on a partial scholarship from the department and according to her, a student's scholarship is in part determined by his or her involvement.

Missing a performance due to an injury could jeopardize that involvement.

Most dancers in the department carry between 20 to 25 units per quarter, depending on the dance classes they're taking. That's combined with the classes for university requirements or their other majors. Since the school is not centered on dance, Jimenez and other dancers find it difficult to add the classes and units they need.

The advisors in the Drahmann Center "don't understand that it's necessary to continue taking technique classes or they ask me why I need to T.A. jazz class if I've already done it three times," Jimenez said. "It's because I want to teach dance in the future and it's good practice for me."

Jimenez didn't come to Santa Clara planning to major in dance. But she took so many classes that she's been involved with the department since her freshman year, that it became her second major.

"I like the dance department here because it's not like a conservatory. It's a lot more laid back," Jimenez said. A conservatory is a dance-focused school primarily for those who intend to perform professionally.

The program is centered on gaining experience in the performances each quarter. There are auditions, but the professors are more lenient, helpful, and sensitive to the students than in real auditions, senior Jacob Mirelez said.

According to David Popalisky, graduates leave this "modest size" program not only with knowledge of how to dance and choreograph, but also with the knowledge of how to conceptualize and see their idea through to the performance in senior recitals, which is a capstone-like project offered by the department.

Because a dancer's degree is a B.A. in theater arts with a dance emphasis, students learn about stage production, lighting, and acting in addition to dance history and technique.

Popalisky also says that Santa Clara's dance department is one of the best among Jesuit schools. Although in comparison to schools like Florida State, Ohio State, or Utah, all of which are well known for their dance departments, it is smaller and less intense. This gives more students the opportunity to learn about dance and pursue it even though they are not all destined to become professional dancers.

Many dance majors also take part in a program offered by the Alvin Ailey Dance Company in New York.

Junior Tara Macken attended the program last summer and noted that because Santa Clara does not teach specific styles of modern dancing, but rather a mixture, she felt unprepared.

Nevertheless, she enjoyed the program.

Most of the eight to 10 graduates of the department each year keep dance in their life, even if it is for recreation, and a smaller number go on to dance professionally.

There are currently three Santa Clara graduates who are on Broadway and one who is a Rockette.

Others have gone into the dance business. Hillary Thomas and fellow graduate dancer Caterina Mercante started their own dance company, Lineage Dance, in Los Angeles, which tours the country.

* Contact Nicole LaPrade at (408) 554-4546 or nlaprade@scu.edu.