INNER-CITY KIDS RAISE THE BAR FOR ANNUAL DANCE RECITAL

Everybody Dance! Celebrates its 8th Consecutive Year with Dance Adaptation of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"

Los Angeles, CA (June, 2008) – Everybody dance! has come a long way since first opening its doors eight years ago in a low-income housing project just west of downtown Los Angeles.

Teaching ballet, jazz, tap, hip-hop, creative movement, ballroom and modern dance to LA's most underserved kids, the non-profit has grown from 12 weekly classes and 35 students to 111 weekly classes and over 1,000 students.

“I just witnessed the best gang prevention program in Los Angeles,” remarked Janis Minton of The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation, after watching the program’s spirited ballroom dance competition in March. The Gilbert Foundation provides funding for the program.

Everybody dance! (www.everybodydance.net) is operated by The Gabriella Axelrad Education Foundation, a non-profit organization established in memory of Gabriella Axelrad, a 13-year-old who loved to dance. The Foundation’s mission is to help each child it serves nurture self-confidence, acquire self-discipline and create a positive self-image through the arts—and in so doing, increase each child’s potential for a fulfilled, productive future.

Nancy Gomez, parent, shares, "When this program came into our neighborhood, everybody was ready to write their names down. Because we don't get a lot of opportunities like this."

Operating at full capacity, everybody dance! now has a 4-year waiting list. Parents routinely sign their kids up at birth.

While the program’s primary goal is not to create professional dancers, many of its students have gone on to prestigious schools (Juilliard) and to win prestigious awards in the dance field (Los Angeles Music Center “Spotlight Award,” among others).

Drawn primarily from Rampart’s Pico-Union and Central City neighborhoods, everybody dance! students also come from South Los Angeles, Echo Park and East Los Angeles. For a $5 monthly fee, kids are taught by professional instructors the Los Angeles Times described as “some of the best children’s dance instructors in the world.”

Studying ballet, tap, hip-hop, modern dance and/or creative movement, most students take two dance classes each day, but many students attend four to five times weekly. The year-round curriculum provides consistency and structure to the children’s after-school schedules, and culminates each summer in an annual recital.

This year, in a continued effort to reach higher and broaden the experiences of its dancers, the everybody dance! faculty took on the challenge of creating a dance adaptation of “Charlie and The Chocolate Factory.”

Carol Zee, Artistic Director for everybody dance! shares, “In past years, we have followed a fairly standard ‘dance recital’ procedure in that each individual class would take the stage to perform a dance choreographed by their dance teacher. This year, we wanted to stretch ourselves creatively and produce something brand new for our audience.

“We have dancing squirrels, jumping jellybeans, a motion-filled chocolate river, jazzy baby chocolate bars, tap-dancing oompa loompas, a marvelous candy shoppe, sweets that come to life, and twelve charismatic young dancers who are taking charge of the lead roles … I think it's something they will remember for a long time!”

Looking to the future, the non-profit hopes to develop an academy branch of its dance program dedicated to its most advanced students and to open additional inner-city dance studios to alleviate its four-year waitlist.

Liza Bercovici, the Foundation’s Executive Director says, “These are some kids who've proven they'll do great things, given the opportunity."

Two performances of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" will be conducted for parents, family, and supporters at USC's Bing Theater, on Saturday, June 7 at 6 p.m. and Sunday, July 8 at 2 p.m. For more information, contact Livia Squires at (310) 993-1702 or livia@squirespr.com.

###

Press Contact:

Livia Squires, Publicist
Squires PR
142 N. Clark Dr.
West Hollywood, CA 90048
(310) 993-1702
contact@squirespr.com

About Squires PR - Squires Public Relations is a full-service PR firm specializing in getting killer press for great companies and individuals. Based in Los Angeles, we have direct contacts to key decision-makers at every news and entertainment outlet in the nation. Squires PR represents a wide range of clients including entertainment, fine arts, non-profit, legal, family & parenting, and more. Our expertise isn't a specific category of clientele -- it's our ability to "zero in" on what's newsworthy about your business and create press to further your goals. From Good Morning America to the Los Angeles Times to Daily Variety, our "targeted pitching" approach gets you greater media coverage than other agencies, and is consistently praised by reporters and clients alike. For more information, visit www.squirespr.com.

This release was published on openPR.