About 1,100 dancers competed in VIEW Dance Challenge’s first-ever Red Deer event.
VIEW Dance Challenge, which operates in nine provinces across Canada, is currently in its 11th season and made its Red Deer debut this past week at Westerner Park’s Prairie Pavilion.
“Our goal is to create a platform for dancers to showcase their ability in a safe and exciting environment,” said VIEW Dance Challenge owner Kristen Maurice.
“In our first season we had four events and we’ve grown to 34 this year. We’ve been able to see dancers year after year, going from tiny dancers on stage to now being senior dancers. It’s been amazing to see the growth in the dance community.”
The event in Red Deer, which began Thursday and wrapped up on Sunday, was held at the same time as events in Calgary and Edmonton. Maurice said it’s exciting to expand into Red Deer this season.
“We have great loyal clients in Alberta. We had the demand in Red Deer, so we decided to go for it (and host an event), and it was a success,” said Maurice.
“There are a lot of dancers and dance studios in Alberta. There’s so much incredible talent out here – we love coming to Alberta. We try to host as many events out here as we can.”
The Red Deer event featured dancers from a number of local dance studios, including Red Deer studios Catalyst Dance Experience, Pound It Hip Hop Studio and Strive Dance Academy. Additionally, Jitterbug Dance Academy from Carstairs, Pound It Sylvan Lake and five other studios from across Alberta were represented.
The event featured four different classifications for dancers: novice (first time competitors), pre-competitive (dancers with less than six hours of training per week), competitive (dancers with at least six hours of training per week), and high school dance teams. Dancers as young as young as four were able to compete – overall there were nine age divisions throughout the four-day event.
There were a number of performance styles attendees saw throughout the challenge, including ballet, jazz, hip hop, contemporary and tap.
VIEW Dance Challenge will return to Red Deer April 10-13, 2025. For more information, visit www.viewdancechallenge.com.
sean.mcintosh@reddeeradvocate.com
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