Turtle Dance
Turtle Dance Music, a New Jerseybased six-member troupe, will be in Connecticut for several performances this summer, starting on June 21. Admission is free to all the shows for ages up to 6th grade.
Matt Mazur and his friends want to “help kids come out of their shells.” So they formed a performing troupe called Turtle Dance Music and travel to where the children are to perform entertaining, educational shows that use music, dance and comedy to teach about about science, technology, engineering and math.
“A lot of kids start out at our shows saying ‘This will be so lame,’ but by the end of the performance, they’re so excited about the topic,” says Mazur.
The New Jersey-based six-member troupe will be in Connecticut for several public performances this summer, starting on June 21. Admission is free to all the 45-minute shows for ages up to 6th grade.
“Even if you can’t follow the lyrics, you still can enjoy the show,” says Mazur, who has degrees in both early childhood development and performing arts.
The lyrics are easy to follow; here’s an example from the song “Big Bang”:
“So all life living on the planet
Has atoms that were born inside a star
We’re all sisters and brothers of the cosmos
We’re all a part of one heart.”
The dance group usually chooses libraries as their venue.
“We tell kids that if they want to learn more about the subject we sing about, they have to read a lot of books. We want them to think that a library is a magical place, a place to get out of the house and to learn about a lot of things,” Mazur says.
“Kids today were raised on YouTube and social media. Parents don’t know what to do with them They
can bring them to one of our shows. Bring them to the library, where they’ll be safe.”
Some of the shows are sensory-friendly shows for kids on the autism spectrum, with sound and spectacle levels adjusted for sensitivity, and with less abstract language.
“In our space shows, we use words like ‘black holes,’ but that’s not a really concrete way to explain it,” he says.
Rie Poirier-Campbell, executive director of Hartford Performs, has brought Turtle Dance Music into Hartford schools since 2013. She called the performances magic.
“Teachers love how [Mazur] works with the students, how he gets them engaged. He’s such a hit,” Poirier Campbell says. “The performers we bring in go through a thorough vetting process, that they conform to state standards, national standards. His evaluations come out glowing every time.”
Turtle Dance Music also has short YouTube musical videos about astronomy and inventions, but Mazur says the troupe prefers live performances.
“We want kids to get outside interacting and collaborating with real people. We want those feelings to be associated with the library,” he says. “We take things written by Carl Sagan, Steven Hawking and other people, this incredible body of knowledge, and turn it into a dance party.”
Schedule
Turtle Dance Music will perform four different shows numerous times in the state this summer. Admission is free to all shows. turtledancemusic.com.
Space: A Universe of Stories will be on the New Haven green on June 21 at 1:15 p.m.
Autism Friendly Music, Bubble and Comedy Show will be at East Haven library, 227 Main St., on July 17 at 2 p.m.; and at New London library, 63 Huntington St., on Aug. 21 at 1 p.m.
Songs That Count will be at New Canaan library, 151 Main St., on Aug. 21 at 10 a.m.
Space: The Cosmos for Kids will be performed eight times: Cos Cob library, 5 Sinawoy Road, on June 22 at 2 p.m.; Burlington library, 34 Library Lane, on July 16 at 6:30 p.m.; Berlin library, 234 Kensington Road, on July 17 at 6:30 p.m.; Milford library, 57 New Haven Ave., on July 25 at 6:30 p.m.; Cheshire library, 104 Main St., on Aug. 2 at 10 a.m.; Meriden library, 105 Miller St., on Aug. 2 at 11:30 a.m.; Weston library, 56 Norfield Road, on Aug. 14 at 3:30 p.m.; and Harwinton library, 80 Bentley Road, on Aug. 14 at 6:30 p.m.