Best dancers
PH wins top prize, as well as three golds and a silver, at Hong Kong Challenge Cup dance competition
PH wins top prize, as well as three golds and a silver, at Hong Kong Challenge Cup dance competition
At the recent Hong Kong Challenge Cup Dance 2017 competition, a three-day event held at the Y Theater, Youth Square in Chai Wan, Hong Kong, young Filipino dancers stood out among a total of 1,200 dance contestants or 600 teams of them, from many parts of the world, including 10 participating cities in Mainland China, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, South Korea, and, of course, the Philippines. The annual competition, which advocates dance education and creation, was organized by Inspired Dance Competition, a non-profit dance society founded in 1988.
If you were in the audience, though the contestants were called onto stage, ranging in age from toddlers to young college dance students dancing in teams, as a couple, or solo, without mention of the country or city they represented, you could tell the Filipino dancers from the others. You might guess wrong one time or another, but when the results came, you would know you guessed right most of the time.
Judged to have given “Overall Best Dance Performance” was the Saint Benilde Romançon Dance Company,
composed of Lois Laylo, Ghian Red Arboleda, Jaydee Jasa,
and Mark Juelar, whose entry they aptly called “Little Swans,” with Christine
Crame as their trainer and choreographer.
But more dance teams from De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde picked up the highest distinctions, including three golds, such as solo dancer Michael
Patrick Dela Torre from the AB-Dance Program (choreographer: Cir Garing), the duo Nicole Gutierrez and Ralph Nuguid, also from the AB-Dance Program, and also the duo Jaydee Jasa and Mark Juelar (choreographer: Christine Crame) from the Saint Benilde Romançon Dance Company. With her solo performance, Martha Lelis (choreographer: Tonjie Mangao) from the Saint Benilde Romançon Dance Company picked up a silver medal. Among the judges was Corinne Yee, principal teacher and director at Victoria Phillips Academy in Auckland, New Zealand. She is director of the Asia Pacific Dance Association that she founded as the governing body of La Beauté Ballet, Urban Ignition, and Jazz Addict Australia.
Also tasked to judge the competition was Ko Chun Kwai, examiner of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council and once the principal dancer and lecturer of the Hong Kong Academy for the Performing Arts. A graduate of Beijing Dance Academy, he joined the Central Ballet of China in the 1960s and then the Hong Kong Ballet in 1980.
These recent wins are a testament to the mission of the Bachelor in Performing Arts in Dance at De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde, which is to gear students for the 21st century world of dance and to introduce them to the broad scope of dance career possibilities in a liberal arts setting and future graduate and/or advanced studies.
The dance program further increases the expertise of and individualizes the creative capabilities of prospective artists by sustaining progressive and innovative course offerings that have never before existed in local dance education. The goal is to produce artists who will meet or exceed the prerequisites of the dance profession.
‘The mission is to gear students for the 21st century world of dance and to introduce them to the broad scope of dance career possibilities in the world.’