The first deaf and hearing West Coast Swing Dance Team, “Nowords”
The first combined west coast swing team of Deaf and Hearing dancers called “NoWords” is raising global awareness of deaf persons in the arts in the west coast swing dance community. The deaf members will be competing as the worlds first deaf team doing a form of partner dancing. It is also the first time the deaf culture will co
mpete with the top hearing dance teams on the world stage, at the The US Open Swing Dance Championships in 2014. The “NoWords” deaf team members are directed by Fred Beam. They are all seasoned dancers with Wild Zappers/NDDT (National Deaf Dance Theatre). https://www.facebook.com/WZ.NDDT
Individually, the dancers are Funmi Thorne, Tara Miles, Diane Hilliard, Renee Glanville, Wade Green, Ronnie Bradley,and Michel Angu. Fred Beam, is the owner and founder of Invisible Hands Inc., a non- profit organization dedicated to promoting cultural awareness through arts and entertainment within deaf and hearing communities, recruiting artists and performers, and establishing partnerships with performing arts, visual arts, and media communities http://invisiblehands.com/about. The individual hearing members are, team lead, Stephanie Courtney; west coast swing professional choreographers, Greg Scott and Lemery Rollins; dancer and ASL interpreter, Kendra Zara; dancer Romero Royster, and documentary videographer and ASL interpreter Timi Gray. The project is an education research dance collaboration. The purpose is to learn from each other about how we each understand dance and develop choreography. The members of Wild Zappers have never done partner dancing as team. This is a first, and they are eager to share their important success with the world. The dates of the US Open Swing Dance Championship 2014 are 11/26-30/2014. The US Open Swing Dance Championships, in Burbank CA, is the flagship international swing convention, where the Best of the Best in swing dance compete for the coveted title “US Open Champion.” More competitors come to The US Open to perform their swing routines than any other event in the world. Dancers consider The US Open to be the most challenging and exciting swing competition on the planet. Spectators get to witness the most amazing dance performances that will be seen in one place, at one time. It has a broad representation of different cultures from around the world. This will be the first time a deaf and hearing team will participate. We are still trying to raise $34,000.00 to cover airfare, hotel, food and miscellaneous expenses for the 12 person team. All donations are managed by our fiscal sponsor, Fusion Partnerships Inc., for disbursement to cover appropriate expenses, and are tax deductible. Please donate today by clicking the paypal link in the "about" section of our page. Stephanie Courtney,
Email: [email protected]
