Boo and Charlotte danced in their folklorico school’s “Noche de Carnival” over the weekend. They had 2 performances, one on Friday night and another on Saturday.

Things looked pretty bad when we all got sick with a stomach virus during the week and the children had to miss their dress rehearsal. We were all  sad at the thought of missing the performances, but they recovered enough to dance on Friday.

It was quite an experience. With 2 children in 3 dances, we had 6 costumes, one set of props and 3 hair pieces. We got there early each evening to dress and get ready and settle down. The first night all of the children dancers did a run through of their polka dance (Mexican polka – who knew?) with the live musicians. It went ok.

Here’s a picture of their run-through, taken from the back stage area.

(click on the pictures to see them bigger) Boo is on the left in the red plaid shirt. Charlotte looks like she’s directly across from him, in the green skirt, slightly ahead of the rest of the line. They were not partners.

Everything happens very fast backstage. One minute we’re watching the dancers on stage and the next minute it’s pitch black and the children are being told to line up. It was so dark that nobody could find their places and they entered the stage all unsettled. The dance was a spectacular mess.

We shook it off and got ready for the next dance, “Los Machetes.” It wasn’t until after intermission, so we watched some of the show from the wings. “Los Machetes” went much, much better. Charlotte was beautiful in her dress and braids and Boo was great as the leader of the boys!

That’s Charlotte in the turquoise.

Here’s Boo on the right, you can see Charlotte on the left.

After the machetes, we had to change quickly into merenge costumes. This one went very well, too. Boo was front and center for most of that dance.

No, that’s not Boo, it’s Charlotte in the back!

That’s Boo, all in white with a gold vest.

After the merenge we watched the rest of the show from backstage.

Saturday night, some of the moms and I took charge and had the children practice lining up back stage. We even got the musicians, who were warming up, to play the polka music so they could do another run through. When the show was starting, we lined up the children in the brightly lit hallway, then walked them in to the backstage and made them stay in order. They were calm and confident when they took the stage and they ended up dancing the polka than they ever had before!

The rest of the second night went just was well, not just for the child dancers, but for the others as well. As for me, I felt better knowing what to expect and how to pace ourselves for costume changes and how early to show up backstage for each dance.

Here’s Charlotte during the curtain call. Dancers wore the last costume they danced in. She is highly motivated to continue folklorico so she can get one of the pretty, white Veracruz dresses!

Boo was the boys’ captain, so he led them out for curtain call. They got a huge round of applause.

It was a wonderful experience in the end, despite some obstacles in putting their costumes together and frustrations with the choreography.

{ Comments on this entry are closed }