BY THE DANCE SCHOOL OF SCOTLAND

Welcome to our first monthly newsletter for The Dance School of Scotland and its Residency.

NEW WEBSITE 

If you are reading this then you will have found your way to our new website!

Across our updated website you will find a range of information about the school, its courses, the facilities, our residency, beautiful photo galleries and more. Excitingly, we have developed our ‘NEWS’ section, which will be the home for a vast array of information, articles and interviews. Free for anyone to access and read, this will be compiled and published here under ‘NEWS’, and written by industry professionals and experts.

We currently have two excellent articles published:

Audition Advice Part 1 by Stephen Whitson (Associate Director of Hamilton the musical)

and

Wellbeing in Ballet by Roseanna Leney (Principal Dancer of Scottish Ballet)

We hope you enjoy reading them and we’ve plenty of exciting ones to come.

NEW STAFF

This year we have welcomed Christina Modestou to the school, who is teaching drama on the Musical Theatre Course. Miss Modestou joins us with an incredible array of credits in theatre, television and film.

YOUNG PEOPLE

January is a month in which our examination preparation increases across both courses, which the young people do alongside their day to day learning/training and academic studies.

 The Dance Course is currently focusing on the Royal Academy of Dance (RAD) Classical Ballet Examinations and the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancers (ISTD) Modern and Tap Examinations. The Musical Theatre Course is currently focusing on the Associate Trinity College London Diploma (ATCL) and Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancers (ISTD) Modern Examinations.

Additionally, members of our graduate year groups are preparing and attending auditions for the next stage in their learning journeys.

Our Dance Course seniors presented their Jazz solos in front of a cheering crowd of S3’s and S4’s. Our Jazz faculty said:

“We are immensely proud of the seniors for their dedication, creativity, and perseverance in crafting solos that reflect their individuality. The commitment to refining their artistry resulted in a series of strong performances, that highlighted their growth and unique strengths. It was inspiring to watch each dancer step into the spotlight and deliver their own work.”

Meanwhile, the S1 and S2 year groups have started their Dance Studies with Mrs. Peasgood. This is an integral element to the understanding of their art form and its history, as well as helping them prepare for the National 5 and Higher Dance examinations later in their learning journey. 

Finally, our Musical Theatre young people had their assessments, and this was for year groups S3, S4 and S5.

VISITORS

We welcomed Jacquie Crago this month where she worked with our S6 Musical Theatre young people on Shakespeare.

Norther Ballet School joined us from Manchester and their fantastic team delivered workshops in Classical Ballet and Jazz for our S3, S4, S5 and S6 Dance Course year groups and we played host to London Studio Centre, who held their Scotland auditions at our studios.

RESIDENCE

Our residency team work incredibly hard and passionately to ensure that the young people who reside at our facility have a home-from-home experience. With this, they organise many fun activities for the young people to take part in.

This month we had:

Calendar Making

Leavers ‘Come Dine with me’ – (our leavers create a meal from budget to dishing up!)

Big Life Journal – Discussion groups for our junior young people, discussing a variety of topics

Burns Night Ceilidh

Shopping Trip

Crafts with Clay

Bingo

Snug room redesign (the young people have taken on the exciting task of redesigning the snug room)

That is it for January, it was a busy month where the young people have been working hard to achieve their ambitions and dreams!

We hope you enjoyed reading this and we wish you all the very best for the rest of February.