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Local dance academy prepares to compete for national title

Posted: Feb 11, 2013 9:11 PM by Shannon Davis
Updated: Feb 12, 2013 10:13 AM

The dancers at the Dynamic Dance and Tumbling Academy in Butte have a long road ahead of them. They recently took home the overall regional title at a competition in Las Vegas, which qualified them for nationals. Now they must master 20 more routines.

"I pretty much do all of the choreography for the routines, which is unique because most of the people we compete against have professional choreographers," said Krista Harrington, artistic director and co-owner of the Dynamic Dance & Tumbling Academy.

The dancers compete throughout the year, and coming from small town Butte, Montana they are always the underdogs.

"Dance isn't really known from Butte, Montana, or Montana generally," said Coby Cashell, a dancer at DD&TA. "They don't really expect dancers from Butte, Montana to be this good."

In 2007 they won the overall national title competing at an intermediate level. Harrington entered her dancers into the advanced competition the following year.

"I think me being from Butte, Montana I wanted to shoot a little higher," Harrington said.

The last two years they have placed fourth overall.

"We just keep pushing for it and that's the rewarding experience, the constant climb," Harrington said.

Harrington requires her dancers to run two miles, stretch and test their strength daily.

"If they love it enough and if they are pushed to doing it at their fullest capacity, they are going to compete well," Harrington said.

At their most recent competition all of their routines were awarded five out of five stars.

"On top of that they gave our studio the Sportsmanship Award because they thought our kids were the nicest kids backstage, which to me was one of the best award we could have gotten," Harrington said.

In July they will compete with the best of the best.

"Nationals is a whole different story," Harrington said. "You just have to keep yourself grounded and realize that there's still a lot of work to be done."

The dancers will rehearse five days a week until nationals.

This year marks 30 years of dancing for DD&TA in Butte.