Back-to-School Season at PNB
It’s back–to–school season at PNB! This school year, PNB will provide many ways to experience dance, from our new audio-described performances to our Dance for PD classes. We are committed to making dance accessible for all who wish to participate. Keep scrolling to read about our various offerings this year!
The fall session of Dance for All classes begins this October! Dance for All is centered on supporting neurodiverse students and students with disabilities. Designed to support multiple ways of perceiving and expressing, Dance for All sessions build upon movement concepts emphasizing balance, coordination, expressivity, strength, and teamwork. The classes will be taught by PNB School faculty skilled in inclusive and adaptive teaching practices, and a professional musician will accompany all the classes. Learn more here.
PNB’s Community Education team is busy preparing for PNB’s sensory-friendly performance of George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker®. PNB’s sensory-friendly performances provide a welcoming and supportive environment for people with sensory processing challenges to enjoy live ballet with their friends and family. These performances have a relaxed environment featuring lighting and sound modifications and entry/exit privileges. During sensory-friendly performances, the lights in the theater stay on, fidget items are handed out and welcome, and patrons can move, vocalize, and behave in ways that are often unfamiliar in other performance settings. Join us on December 19 at 2:00 pm for the sensory-friendly performance of The Nutcracker and next spring on March 22 at 12:30 pm for the sensory-friendly performance of Beauty and the Beast.
This fall, PNB’s DISCOVER DANCE continues its partnership with Seattle Public Schools and the Bellevue School District to provide equitable, accessible dance education to over 500 students as part of the school day. DISCOVER DANCE’s curriculum blends creative movement, choreographic tools, and integration with classroom topics. Throughout their DISCOVER DANCE residency, these students will collaborate to create an original dance for a culminating performance at McCaw Hall. Join us in celebrating these students’ hard work and creativity at this season’s DISCOVER DANCE performance on November 14th at 6:30 PM!
Audio Description at PNB
We saw the opportunity to grow our accessibility options to include the Blind and Visually Impaired community by introducing Audio Dance Description to our regular season programming starting this fall. This season, we’ll include Audio Dance Description to three Reps (All Balanchine, The Sleeping Beauty, and Roméo et Juliette) and George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker. We’ll also screen Krishna Washburn and Heather Shaw’s Telephone, a film “exploring the creative possibilities of audio description for dance.” Alyson Osborn, a Portland-based disability advocate, theater educator, dancer, and audio describer will provide descriptions for six selected performances throughout the season, including our Sensory Friendly performance of George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker. PNB is proud to offer this new program. For questions, please contact idea@pnb.org
PNB is continuing the Dance for PD® program this fall in collaboration with Seattle Theatre Group. Dance for PD® offers internationally acclaimed dance classes for people with Parkinson’s disease and their care partners. Whether seated or standing, people with Parkinson’s disease can enjoy this creative and welcoming class that is open to all abilities and mobility of movement. Classes are taught by professional teaching artists, accompanied by live music, and explore movement in a creative, joyful, and stimulating manner. Drop ins are welcome, and these classes are always free, no matter the season! Learn more here.
PNB School’s DanceChance is preparing for an exciting school year! DanceChance aims to enrich the lives of each participant through the opportunity to study classical ballet, to cultivate a diverse School and Company, and to train and nurture the next generation of dancers. During the next six weeks, a team of DanceChance staff and instructors will be active throughout the Seattle community, visiting around 60 third-grade classrooms. These staff will provide dance education presentations and movement instruction, and students who demonstrate the unique attributes for classical ballet training will be invited to study at Pacific Northwest Ballet School free of charge.
This school year, PNB’s DANCE TO LEARN program is back at four Highline Public Schools! A customizable, in-school arts integration program, DANCE TO LEARN engages K-12 students to creatively communicate their ideas through movement. This fall, PNB teaching artists are designing dance classes that blend creative movement with concepts from other subject areas like literacy, science, or social emotional learning. This year marks the third year of PNB partnering with Highline Public Schools; special thanks to The City of Burien for their support.
