Aspiring Filipino dancers hone skills to innovate performing scene

Beyond the elegant steps and powerful moves, aspiring Filipino dancers refined their skills across multiple disciplines to innovate and navigate the evolving local and global performing scene.

Acclaimed prima ballerina Lisa Macuja-Elizalde, with Ballet Philippines soloist Nina Anonas and professional artistic director Mycs Villoso, together emphasized the younger generation of dancers are well-equipped to handle even technical facets such as videography and musical composition.

Anonas, the Dance Program chairperson of the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde (DLS-CSB), shared the students under the Benilde Major in Dance Program continuously expand their skills and cultivate discipline in their craft.

“We do have a course on dance and video, as we are also trying to develop dance filmmakers,” she shared in the advocacy online program Art-To-Art by Macuja-Elizalde. “Right after the pandemic, there was a niche that suddenly appeared for these dance films and videos.”

“With this development, all of our kids know how to shoot videos. They also learned how to edit,” she added.

Anonas, an accredited examiner of Australian Conservatoire of Ballet, a training school, underscored they mentored the students on grassroots indigenous dances so they may be able to grasp local movement vocabularies. She likewise noted they created specialized modules that focused on street dances to expose the learners to the methodical aspects of other genres.

Villoso also highlighted the innovative offering encourages collaborative works with other fields, namely the Creative Industries Management, Culture-Based Arts, Music Production, Production Design, and Theater Arts Programs of Benilde.

“Napaka-limitless ng (There is limitless of) possibilities to do a lot of artistic creatives,” she stated.

Macuja-Elizalde firmly encouraged the talented hopefuls to join competitions to foster their teamwork, camaraderie, and commitment to their passion.