Accolades

Metro DC Dance Awards DanceMetro/DC
Sunday, October 3, 2010, Kennedy Center Millennium Stage and
Wednesday, October 6, 2010, Harman Center for the Arts
Washington, D.C.
By Lisa Traiger
Copyright 2010 by Lisa Traiger

Accolades, applause and air kisses all around made the two evenings of awards to Washington, D.C., area dancers, choreographers and their allied artists a Sally Fields love fest. Dancers, choreographers, and audiences realized they all really, really liked one another. Wednesday at the Harman Center for the Arts, a fashionably dressed Liz Lerman sagely declared Peter DiMuro, awards producer and Dance/MetroDC director, the “Mayor of Dance.” I’m not sure if that’s like Mayor McCheese of HappyLand, but both evenings everyone left smiling. So while Chicago may have a former dancer and possible future mayor in Rahm Emmanuel -- if the election goes his way -- DiMuro is, for the moment, D.C.’s unofficial dance politico. In this capacity, DiMuro declared another dance first: denoting NBC4 weather guru Chuck Bell the region’s only “Dance Meteorologist,” for serving as one of three celeb judges of the first (annual?) “Quit Your Day Job” dance-off.

All in good-natured fun, five amateur teams competed for a performance slot on the Harman stage. The winner, Team Joy from Joy of Motion Dance Center, assisted by choreographer Nikki Gambhir, rocked the concept in Bollywood-fusion style. But the real joy was exhibited throughout the two nights of accolades recognizing the just-anointed best and brightest in the D.C. region’s dance community.

Founded ten years ago by technical director/producer Cheles Rhynes and his Mason/Rhynes Productions, the Metro DC Dance Awards were intended to recognize dancers, choreographers, teachers and companies for what Rhynes felt was often unheralded work. A decade later, now under the sole direction of Dance/MetroDC, a service affiliate of Dance/USA, the event has become both a season kick-off and a veritable love fest for the non-profit dance community. Stalwarts like The Washington Ballet and newcomers get to rub shoulders, share the green room, stage and after party. And Wednesday at the Harman everyone got to dance, from the five amateur teams who entered the “Quit Your Day Job” contest, to the audience, welcomed by fabulous bboys, flygirls and hip hoppers of Urban Artistry, joined by scantily clad women of Next Reflex Dance Collective. They danced up, down and through the aisles to the pulsating sounds of dj Baronhawk Poitier.