BY CAMILA RYDER

In print | Published November 12, 2009

With a talented group of original members and 15 “newbies,” Rhythm N’ Motion’s upcoming concert on Saturday, Nov. 14 will be a high-energy mixture of African-influenced dance styles and fresh perspectives on modern dance.
Rhythm N’ Motion, or RnM, is a Swarthmore dance company that hopes to, as said in their online statement, “increase campus awareness of contemporary genres of dance within the African Diaspora such as hip-hop, jazz and dancehall.” With a concert each semester, student dancers have the opportunity to showcase both their choreographing skills and dance moves. While most of the concerts do not have a theme, in 2005 there was a charity show for Hurricane Katrina and this year’s show will be a tribute to Michael Jackson.

“He was a great dancer and choreographer and he has all these relations to what our theme is,” Tanya Rosenblut ’12, co-director of RnM’s executive committee, said, “We definitely want to give some respect to him and tribute it [to him].”
Taleah Kennedy ’10, who has been in RnM since her freshman year, choreographed one of the three Michael Jackson pieces in the show. “As dancers, we really felt his influence in our everyday lives,” Kennedy said. “We want to make sure this concert is really focused on Michael Jackson and his influence on the dancing world.”

Along with the three Michael Jackson dances, the show will also feature flamenco, hip-hop, African dance, a “newbie” dance (a mix of hip-hop, African and Latin), and hip-hop and swing fusion. While some of the other dances’ styles are not specific to a genre, the hip-hop and swing combination is an interesting mix.

“We’re trying to show more than just the styles that we usually have as a representation of the African Diaspora by having swing,” Rosenblut said, mentioning that while swing has a lot of influence from the African Diaspora dances, it is not often seen on stage or in an RnM concert.

Rhythm N’ Motion held auditions at the beginning of the semester and once the new members were chosen, practice for the concert began fairly soon after. The first step was to choreograph the different pieces, and each dancer had a different approach.

“Some people start the semester with a concept, so they need to choreograph as the year goes by,” Rosenblut said, “Some people come to [school] with a piece entirely choreographed; they just have to teach it.”

Kennedy likes to choreograph before classes start, usually in the summer, and over winter break for the spring semester concert. “I was working on a piece over the summer, and then I completely changed my vision because I wanted to do something for Michael Jackson [after his death],” Kennedy said. She choreographed her piece while going to classes where she would scribble down ideas, making her choreographing process for this concert a bit different from those in the past. Along with her MJ piece, Kennedy will also be performing in a few other dances.

Practices started two weeks into the semester and everyone worked more diligently since this year’s show is earlier than in previous years. “People have come together really well actually,” Margot Adams ’10, co-director of the RnM executive committee said. “We had to really enforce deadlines and enforce how much time people spent working on each piece, but people have really dedicated themselves to RnM this semester in order to make sure that we’re ready for next weekend.”

With all the work each dancer has put into the choreography and into perfecting the moves, Adams and others were “really impressed with the group” and she hopes the audience will appreciate “how much work goes into it and how much we actually care about pleasing our audience and making sure that we get certain messages out to them and that they have a good time.”

The fall semester Rhythm N’ Motion concert will be this Saturday, Nov. 14, at 8:30 p.m. in the Lang Performing Arts Center and will be followed by an RnM after-party at Olde Club from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m.

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