Work it on Out, a Northwest Vista dance theatre production, debuts Friday at 7 p.m. at the Watson Center for the Performing Arts. Courtesy photo

Special to the Northwest Weekly

A unique multi-generational dance production of Northwest Vista College students will be showcased Friday at the Watson Center for the Performing Arts at St. Philip’s College. The performance, titled Work it on Out: Dance Narratives and Fantasies, is a community dance project that pairs college students in a dance composition course with citizens in the Academy of Lifelong Learning (ALL), a weekly program for seniors, to provide stimulation, enrichment, and socializing.

Jayne King, assistant professor and coordinator of the dance program at Northwest Vista College, created this opportunity for mothers, daughters, grandmothers and sisters to share and celebrate their love for dance.

“I thought it would be interesting to explore the role of dance in a woman’s life across generations and cultures with the women here at Northwest Vista,” King said. “So I asked the women in the ALL seniors and the students in my dance composition course if they would spend some time together in the dance studio on a regular basis to share memories, stories, and dreams which relate to dance-from toe shoes to tap shoes, American Bandstand, Tina Turner and women’s lib.”

The project emphasizes reciprocity as both generations of women become teachers and students.

“The seniors’ stories also create a meaningful context for the students. … They learn that choreography is not just putting together counts. It can be a means of expressing thought and feeling,” King said.

Live dancers will be accompanied by a large-scale video montage of interviews with the women in the project, images from their family photo albums, and footage from rehearsals. Work it on Out premieres at 7pm. The event is free and open to the public.

For more information, contact Jayne King at Northwest Vista College at 348-2225 or This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .