Dancing Through Decades

Tara is on the far right.

This Sunday, I had the opportunity to attend the Grand Rapids Ballet Company's production of Company B, a WWII era-inspired ballet choreographed by Paul Taylor and featuring the music of The Andrews Sisters. My good friend Tara is a real, live ballerina, and she's an amazing one, at that. She's been dancing ever since I can remember, and she's the only one out of us that stuck with it all these years. I quit somewhere around age 5.

Erica, Tara, and I have been friends since
we were just little tykes.

I am by no means an expert in the art of ballet, but I thought the performance was fantastic. Granted, I've always been fascinated by WWII, and I have a thing for big band music, but I thoroughly enjoyed Company B and I think I would have even if I wasn't able to sing along with the music. The dancers were perfectly in sync and they made the twists and turns look effortless. Tara had a flirtatious solo for the song "Rum and Coca-Cola," in which she uses her feminine wiles to transfix the men far from home in Trinidad.  

The ballet was a far cry from our days of prancing around onstage with the Dancin' Fun program from the Flint Institute of Music when we were kids, but those of us who have been lucky enough to know Tara since those early days are so proud of how far she's come (she's even danced in China!). 


Congratulations, Tara, on a beautiful ballet!

Next on my list of things to see is the Nutcracker, my all-time favorite ballet and one that I try to see every year just before Christmas. We've got under 100 days to go, and I'm prepared to start celebrating Christmas now! Is anyone else a fan of ballet? What have you seen or what do you want to see??