About Bay Area Dance Week
Dancers’ Group is pleased to announce 2012 Bay Area Dance Week (BADW), running April 20-29, 2012 throughout the entire Bay Area. With dance more popular than ever around the nation, BADW is expecting its biggest festival to date, with an anticipated 600+ free events including classes, performances, open rehearsals, lecture demonstrations, and the return of the wildly popular One Dance which will kick off the festivities on Friday, April 20 in Union Square Park.
One Dance was a huge hit in 2011 with nearly 700 people joining together, in dance, to celebrate the beginning of BADW. A perfect event to kick off this 10-day celebration of dance, One Dance features dance groups and schools from a wide array of dance styles – all performing in their own style to the same piece of music and then coming together, in unison for a final dance performance.
Downtown visitors, shoppers, office workers, dancers and non-dancers are invited to participate in the final dance. An instructional video will be available on our home page, in March 2012, for anyone interested in learning the moves.
The Bay Area has one of the largest, most active and thriving dance communities in the country. Over a ten-day period each year BADW invites participants and volunteers to reaffirm the region’s commitment to dance, offering hundreds of free events representing the diversity of dance forms practiced in the region. From established company programs to one-time events, BADW provides an opportunity for dance-lovers of all ages and experience-levels to take a grand tour of the many movement styles, including Argentine tango, classical Indian, jazz, hip hop, ballet, traditional hula, fire dance, Samba, modern, Chinese classical, belly dance, aerial dance, West African, contact improvisation, and more.
The annual event is presented by Dancers’ Group.
Dancers’ Group promotes the visibility and viability of dance. Founded in 1982, we serve San Francisco Bay Area artists, the dance community and audiences through programs and services that are as collaborative and innovative as the creative process. As the primary dance service organization in the Bay Area, we support the second largest dance community in the nation by providing many programs and resources that help artists produce work, build audiences, and connect with their peers and community: Dancers’ Group facilitates artist dialogue, presents site-specific work, and promotes free public performance through our core programming (which includes 2nd Sundays, Dance Discourse Project, Rotunda Dance Series at SF City Hall and ONSITE); offers fiscal sponsorship as well as mentorship and other services to over 100 local choreographers, companies, and community projects; provides funding opportunities, which include the CA$H Grant, Lighting Artists in Dance Award, Parachute Fund (assistance with disabilities and life-threatening disease) and New Stage for Dance Grant (a theatre rental subsidy program); produces In Dance, a monthly print magazine, with online components, distributed locally and nationally; and utilizes multiple media platforms to connect our steadily increasing membership of dedicated dance artists, administrators, audiences, enthusiasts and more. www.dancersgroup.org
Funders
Bay Area Dance Week is a project of Dancers' Group and is supported by: California Arts Council, Delta Dental of California, Fleishhacker Foundation, Grants for the Arts, James Irvine Foundation, J.B. Berland Foundation, Kenneth Rainin Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco Foundation, Walter & Elise Haas Fund, William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation and individual donors.
The History of Bay Area Dance Week
Dance Week was founded in 1981 to increase awareness of dance and its contributions to our national culture. The first Bay Area Dance Week (BADW) festival grew out of a public dialogue in 1998, when dance artists, administrators, and organizations came together to explore how best to spotlight Bay Area dance during Dance Week. The festival that emerged took a national initiative and imbued it with the innovative and inclusive spirit of the Bay Area. As the largest per capita center for dance in the US, the Bay Area's festivities have been the most extensive and best attended celebrations in the country since BADW's inception. Each year, over 100 dance organizations and artists present events during Bay Area Dance Week, involving more than 2,500 artists and 20,000 attendees. The annual event is presented by Dancers’ Group.
For general information contact: shae (at) dancersgroup.org or call 415.920.9181.