 |
||||||
| HOME | BUTTON BOARD | DID YOU RECEIVE A BUTTON? |
WANT TO GIVE AWAY A BUTTON? |
AWESOME DANCERS | AWESOME STUDIOS | WANT YOUR STUDIO TO PARTICIPATE? |
|
Young dancer
passes torch
Tuesday April 25, 2006 COLIN HUNTER RECORD STAFF  WATERLOO
-- Tanner Matthews is an awesome dancer. He has a button to prove it. The button, fittingly, reads "Awesome Dancer." A complete stranger gave Tanner the button at a dance competition in Rhode Island when he was seven. Now he's eight -- a little older, a little wiser, and finally ready to pass the torch to another awesome dancer. The Waterloo third-grader has just clickity-clacked his way offstage at Guelph's River Run Centre after performing a tap number to the swing ditty Mr. Pinstripe Suit, as part of the weekend-long Terpsichore dance competition. Tanner, dressed in a tiny pinstripe suit, is clutching his "Awesome Dancer" button, looking for a suitable recipient. "I'm not sure who to give it to," he says. It's not a decision to be made lightly. Boasted on its website as "the most positive movement in dance," the Dance Button Project is a grassroots effort to spread good vibes in the booming world of competitive dance. Just over a year ago, students and instructors at Chris Collins Dance Studio in Alexandria, Va., decided that the competitive dance scene was too, well, competitive. Heated rivalries between dance studios were taking the fun out of dancing and putting undue stress on kids who just wanted to tap, twirl and prance. So the studio printed 100 little "Awesome Dancer" buttons, and students were charged with the task of spreading admiration. "It has definitely changed a lot of people, one button at a time," founder Chris Collins said recently on the phone from Alexandria. "It brings dancers closer together." According to an online tracking system, Awesome Dancer buttons are now held by dancers in every state on the American east coast, as well as parts of Canada. Tomorrow the world, Collins says. Tanner had never heard of The Dance Button Project when a girl from Virginia handed him his button last year. He had just recently started dancing at Davenport Dance Project, after, as he jokingly puts it, "my dad made me." But he caught on quick, and had amassed a respectable collection of medals and ribbons by the time he got the button. It was a different kind of reward. The young dancer who gave it to Tanner also handed over a sheet of paper explaining the meaning of the button: "It's a chain of kindness that . . . goes on and on and on." So now it's Tanner's turn to continue the chain. "You can't keep the button for yourself," he says. "If you give it to other people, it builds up their courage." He scans the backstage area for a dancer whose tap routine he watched on Friday, the first day of the competition. He spots the prospective recipient in a dressing room and clickity-clacks over to him. "I want to give you this," Tanner says, offering the button and a printout explaining its meaning. "Wow," says the surprised recipient, 14-year-old Zach Burke of Bolton, Ont. "Thank you so much." Tanner explains that he enjoyed Zach's solo tap routine to the song Freddie Said, and thought it was worthy of the Awesome Dancer button. There's a tear in Zach's eye, though he insists it's caused by a wayward eyelash or something, not ooey-gooey emotion. Regardless, he says he is moved by the unexpected honour and is looking forward to spreading the joy himself. "I won't keep it for very long," he says. "I'll find someone to give it to." Tanner shakes Zach's hand and clickity-clacks away again, having learned the valuable lesson that it's better to give than to receive. Sort of. "I wanted to keep it. But he's an awesome dancer too." |
|
 |
 |
| © 2005 - 2008 ● The Dance Button Project ● All rights reserved. | ||