Mid-Pacific Institute and UH team up for benefit dance concert

MPI Senior Kristen Lau is featured in "Swarm," choreographed by Amy Lynn Schiffner, a member of the UH Manoa dance faculty.
Courtesy Photo


The Honolulu Advertiser

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Reader Submitted

The Mid-Pacific Institute School of the Arts (MPSA) and UH Manoa present a Benefit Dance Concert Sunday April 26, 2 p.m., Kennedy Theatre UH Manoa. Proceeds will benefit the UH Friends of Dance and the Future Light Orphanage in Cambodia.

MPSA dancers selected the orphanage to be the beneficiary of the funds following a visit by the Cambodian orphans to the MPI campus in September 2008. The Cambodian students performed traditional Cambodian dances in an all-school assembly, followed by participation in a dance class with the MPSA dancers.

The benefit program opens with the Pas de Trois from the classical ballet Paquita, featuring MPSA dancers Brittany Hill and Gregory Lau who will be attending the Juilliard School this summer for a three-week dance intensive. Songs of the Spirit with choreography by MPSA faculty Paul Maley and Sylvia Yamada follows Paquita.

This highly spirited work received critical acclaim at the 9th National High School Dance Festival in Philadelphia, PA in March of 2008. UH Professor Amy Shiffner has two works on the program; Swarm performed by Mid-Pacific and A Woman's Song, a new trio for three UH Manoa dance majors. The final piece on the program Sojourn...Shifting Paths, by Paul Win of the Liverpool (England) Institute of the Arts, highlights male dancers from MPSA.

$10.00 general admission tickets are available by contacting Lisa Reed in the MPI Advancement Office, 973-5017 or lisareed@midpac.edu. Doors for the 2 p.m. April 26th event will open at 1:30. For information, please visit www.midpac.edu.