Dance extravaganza

Apama dance company performing

BY FLORENCE UTOR
GONGBEAT Productions recently staged a dance festival to recognise, celebrate and also bring to people’s awareness, the beauty of dance.
Tagged ‘APDC Fest’ 09, the festival, which has as theme, Our Heritage: A Divine to our Destination, ran from March 18 to 20.
Dede Kelvin Alozie, the project manager of Gongbeat, said: “It is a celebration of the efforts of dance companies as promoters of the country’s arts and culture.”
While saying that these companies have contributed immensely to nation building by engaging youths through dance, lamented the poor treatment given to private dancers. He said, “we are not appreciated, but if not for us (dancers), our heritage would have been lost.”
He cited the example of the 8th All Africa Games, where the initial contract signed in Lagos was to pay each performer N80, 000, but by the time the artistes got to Abuja the amount was reduced to N15, 000.
“We rejected the offer and held the organisers to ransom until we arrived at a bargain of N50, 000 per artistes. It was also at this forum that we decided to form the dance guild,” he said.
Segun Bankole, an insurance practitioner, who spoke on how to market dance, urged the companies to create a path for others to follow rather than following the existing trend.
He stressed the need for dance companies to package themselves properly to draw attention and investors.
Dele Shonubi, a publisher, called the companies to networking, he said, “it is easier for me to pick up a proposal of someone that I know, and know what he or she can do, than for me to pick up that of the person I don’t know.”
Awards were presented to long-standing supporters of the arts, which include Jahman Anikulapo and Shonubi among others. The audience was thrilled to colourful traditional dances by the various dance companies that participated in the fiesta.