Some People You Should Know: Gary, Ind. Dancers
GARY, Ind. (CBS) -- It's only eight years old, but already the South Shore Dance Alliance is producing talented dancers for companies and schools around the country.
CBS 2's Harry Porterfield says the young dancers there and their leader are all someone you should know.
Like poets, like singers, like painters, these young people are expressing their artistry through their bodies as they dance.
The South Shore Dance Alliance, a pre-professional transitional dance company, is headquartered in the old Miller School in Gary's Miller District. Larry brewer is the creator of the company.
"I started it because I recognized that the kids who want to dance needed to have a place to come and work intensely," he says.
Ballet, modern dance, jazz and even hip-hop are the dance techniques the students learn through their participation in the company.
This summer, a number will be studying with the world-famous Alvin Ailey Dance Company in New York. A freshman at the Emerson Performing Arts School, 15-year-old Diamond Harris is one of that select group.
"My first thought was 'Yay,'" she says. "But it made me realize it's not a joke anymore, and this is really real and I can be somebody when I grow up."
Seventeen-year-old Samantha Caudle, who also teaches, will be studying with the Ailey dancers, too.
"It means the world to me, it really does," she says.
And 16-year-old Damarco Kimble will be studying dance in Spain.
"I can actually be somebody and be a great dancer and live my dream to the fullest," he says.
In eight years of operation, the South Shore Dance Alliance has produced students who have gone on to Juilliard, the Debbie Allen Academy, Ballet Chicago, the Dance Theatre of Harlem and others.
"These kinds of opportunities give them the chance to see what New York is like, what L.A. is like," founder Brewer says. "They start to understand what they have to do to get there –- which is hard work."
