Thursday, October 28, 2010






Brian McGinnis was the highlighted guest artist at the Greenville Dance Festival held October 9th, where he taught the FAC dancers in the advanced modern /contemporary dance class. The photos were taken during his master class at the Greenville Dance Festival.






Twenty-five (25) FAC dancers as well as other dancers in the Upstate participated in the 5th Greenville Dance Festival on October 9th, which was held in the FAC and Wade Hampton High School. FAC dance students took classes with Brian McGinnis in modern dance/contemporary, Japanese with Toshiko Joerger, Classical Indian dance with Krishna Kumar Venkataraman and Sivakami Bhavnandnan, dance improvisation with Dr. Stephanie Milling, African dance taught by Melina Palumbo, ballet with Andrew Kuharsky, and yoga with Janice Batson and Brian Delaney. Other classes at the Festival were English Country dance with Eve King, improvisation with Jennifer Becker and Cathy Maschek, and jazz with Michelle Bays. A lecture/demonstration was held at the end of the day with dancers performing Classical Indian, Japanese and African dance.

Monday, October 11, 2010






Brian McGinnis was choreographer and artist in residence at the Fine Arts Center from October 4-8. He set a new choreographic work on the PM dancers, titled “Terminus”, which is very fast-paced to music by Frederic Chopin. “Terminus” is the last section in the dance 3 Shorts of 8, which he choreographed during the week of his Greenville residency for three different groups of dancers. The first section is “Orsa” which he choreographed for the ARMES dancers, the second section is “Medius” which he choreographed for the FAC AM dancers, and “Terminus” which is the last section, for the PM dancers. The photos were taken during the PM rehearsal with Brian.

Sunday, October 10, 2010






Brian McGinnis was choreographer/artist in residence at the Fine Arts Center from October 4-8. He set a new choreographic work on the AM dancers and also taught them master classes. Brian’s piece is a very sculptural adagio. The photos were taken in class rehearsing the new dance piece.

Thursday, October 07, 2010






The evening performance with Joan Wadopian and Free Planet Radio in the black box theatre at the Fine Arts Center, was packed! The solo dancer and the 3 musicians improvised together so that they truly became 4 instruments. It was a rare opportunity for Joan and her father, Eliot, to perform together.

Strings students performed with Free Planet Radio as did FAC faculty Dr. Jon Grier and Steve Watson. The four-day residency and performance with Free Planet Radio was made possible by a grant from The Braitmayer Foundation.

The two-week choreographic residency with Joan Wadopian was made possible in part by a grant from the Metropolitan Arts Council.











September 23rd the FAC PM Dancers performed a dance choreographed by Joan Wadopian during an open rehearsal in the dance studio of the FAC. The dancers performed their dance to the song "Radio Toure" by Free Planet Radio on their album The Unraveling. The choreographic work was performed "live" with the three musicians from Free Planet Radio so that the dancers and musicians were listening and feeding off of each other's energy and performance. The musicians in Free Planet Radio, from Asheville, are River Guerguerian, Chris Roser and Eliot Wadopian. Their four-day residency was made possible by a grant by The Braitmayer Foundation.