Dance Theatre of Greenville

Set to popular hip-hop music, this form evolved from funk, street, and breakdancing styles. It focuses on skills like popping and locking, freezes, floorwork and fast footwork. This style also hinges on individual expression and confidence.

Codified now as its own technique, modern dance stems from pioneers like Martha Graham, Isadora Duncan, and Katherine Dunham, to name a few. The form requires dancers to train barefooted and involves floor work, off center balances and falls, breathwork, and a keen understanding of efforts in the body.

A character version of jazz seen best in contemporary Broadway style plays and performances. This technique weaves theater and storytelling into dance.

Set to popular music, jazz dance is a fun, energetic form that snaps, pops, and flicks its way on the stage and in the classroom. The form originated with social dance and received influence from classical ballet, African techniques, and modern dance. Today It utilizes some ballet and contemporary terms and is typically performed in parallel positions.

A continuation of flat shoe ballet utilizing shoes with wooden blocks in the toe for dancers to balance on. Must have a solid form in ballet in order to take pointe as well as foot and ankle strength. Students interested in this style safely begin pointe classes at 13 or 14.

A rigorous, classical style of dance in which dancers use turned out positions to perform steps that glide, jump, and turn. Ballet requires flat shoes made of canvas or leather that guides the line of the dancers’ foot and leg. This style utilizes poise and graceful movements and gestures.

A percussive dance technique utilizing shoes with metal pieces on the bottom to create new sounds. Tap skills include syncopation, subtle weight shifts, foot and ankle control, full body rhythm, and pattern recognition.

Building on basic movement skills, kindergarteners focus on learning tap and ballet steps to build the foundation of their technique. We play games that teach locomotor skills including learning left from right, how to move across the floor, and weave in creative movement.

Focusing on fun and creative movement, preschool classes use ballet and tap as conduits to learn basic dance steps. Our tiniest dancers learn spacial awareness, interact with other movers their age, and show off their personalities from the classroom to the stage!