A bright orange light fills the stage, music begins to play for the dancers. As the song “Bum Bum Tam Tam” by J Balvin plays, the dancers spring into action, getting to show off their talent and passion for dancing. There are many opportunities given at Leyden in many different forms, Orchesis being one of them. Orchesis is for students who want to dance and show off their talents through a performance. This year, they had their performance on Saturday, May 3th at 7pm. Students get to pick their songs, explain their dances to their director, Lindsay Longstreth, who helps them get their visions come true.

Many people don’t know about Orchesis or what it is about, including some staff as well. Orchesis was designed to be a place where students can dance and put on a performance for family, friends, and staff, having a director help them along the way. When asking a few of the dancers if they thought they had improved from the beginning of the year till now, they all agreed as well as Longstreth when asked the same question. Longstreth did say a challenge she did have: “I would be more proactive in publishing my schedule to the other coaches and directors, so that we all knew when we were rehearsing. And I might actually have a third rehearsal.” Many of the kids in Orchesis do have other activities whether it was theatre or choir but they managed to work past their obstacles and make time for Orchesis. 

There were many different things that got these students into dance, some because of cheer, growing up loving the idea of dancing, or joining dance at a young age. One of the seniors, Jessika Alvarez who attends East Leyden, talked about how she had the chance to join dance when younger, saying, “I went with my mom because she went to my brother’s daycare, and she also met with her friends, and her friends has a dad about her and she she wasn’t at school, so we went with with them, with that school, and I fell in love with the dance, so I joined there,” and added how she spent three years there. She enjoyed being able to dance again after years of not doing it. Many of the dancers are doing multiple dances in the showcase, some being collaborative while others are solos. Nat Villalbe Acosta, a freshman at West Leyden, has a couple songs that she’ll be performing with a few others. 

There were a few challenges for tech as well, Isabel Gonzalez and Sebastian Orozco saying a few: “Dancers not having their dances ready or not being able to see the performances live to get an idea.” Doing tech with this but also having to deal with their classes while staying late, working hard on both. Majority of the tech got the opportunity to design lighting pieces for the different songs and dances. 

With that, the lights shut off before showing the dancers bowing to the audience. All the people involved have worked hard, getting to perform and help with the show.