Thursday morning February 27 – Choreographer and Math paraprofessional Chris Chueng as well as the selected 18 Auroris  dancers in his piece “Elemen o.p” will be going down to the National High School Dance Festival at Point Park University in Pittsburgh, PA  for Nationals.

Auroris Dance Company is 1 of 75 out of 350 accepted into Nationals. Auroris has only been to nationals 3 times according to choreographer Chris Chueng, so this is a huge opportunity for the company. 

The dancers that are going to be attending are Albert Luna, Anjani Padhiar, Ben Lehrer, Britney Le, Danielle Lehrer, Emily Feingold-Fisher, Jade LAjeune, Jadean Warburton, Kalliope Kobotis, Kylle Basillio, Maya Bral, Miranda Estrada, Monica Guerrero, Myka Punzalan, Neiko Gaoiran, Olivia Yoshioka, Olivia Hilby, and Summer Lee. 

State Competition:

On Saturday May 2, Auroris will drive to Arlington Heights to compete in State. Senior Olivia Yoshioka’s dance “Fever Dream” and sophomore Olivia Hilby’s dance “Creeks” both made it to the Illinois dance state competition. Yoshioka’s dance made it to the finals placing 8th 

Choreographer of “Fever Dream”  Olivia Yoshioka says:

“A lot of my inspiration for Fever Dream came after watching the New Works dance show that my dance teacher choreographed for there was another choreographer in the show that made a piece about dreams and it was so mesmerizing that I was inspired to do something similar. I also knew this year I wanted my dance to be a more contemporary piece with a stronger story attached and eventually Fever Dream came out of all that. I’m super excited to take a bunch of really interesting dance workshops from past years that sounds super fun and i’m really excited to see what this year has to offer. I’m kind of hoping for a ballroom class because I’ve always wanted to learn ballroom dancing.”

Choreographer Olivia Hilby says:

“My inspiration for my piece was mostly the music and what the artist intended the listener to feel. To me it’s supposed to be about a person losing them and reliving the pain that you want through with that person about reminiscing about the memories you had. But at the same time I wanted it to be vague enough that people can interpret the piece in their own way and feel however they want to. For nationals i’m definitely most excited to take the master classes that they offer as well as watching the different schools perform their pieces” 

More about state the Choreographers:

Sophomore Olivia Hilby is a 15 year old student at Niles North. She has choreographed for her dance studio Karishma as well as Auroris and YND.

Senior Olivia Yoshioka is a 17 year old student at Niles North. She has also choreographed for YND and Auroris.