The Riviera Ridge School is celebrating the talents and vision for the arts with the announcement of Miriam Dance serving in an expanded role as director of visual and performing arts for the school in Santa Barbara.
Dance has been with the school for eight years, directing plays and teaching extension classes and electives. The new post will enable her to design and collaborate with the current visual and performing arts faculty to create more ways for students to hone their artistic talents, connect with the community, and learn life skills.
“I’m all about a hands-on experience for our students,” said Dance, whose productions have provided students with avenues to discover their talents and create a production themselves from the ground up. “I don’t know what it is, but I love creating something out of nothing.”
For students who don’t want to act, Dance offers them other roles integral to the production, such as being a stage manager, creating the sets, or controlling the sound and lighting.
An actor, singer and director herself, Dance is responsible for turning a four-person elective into a full-fledged haunted house; creating a runway production with housemade sets for “The Lion King;” and debuting a partnership with the New Vic Theater as Riviera Ridge middle school students presented community productions of “Seussical the Musical” and “Wonka, the Musical.”
In her new role, Dance will continue to use an interdisciplinary approach to her methodology. “You can’t do theater without collaboration,” she said of the ways students benefit from practicing communication and teamwork skills as they notice the results of working together.
Her plans include working with humanities and visual arts faculty to teach students woodworking for building sets; creating a season of the arts when student work is showcased throughout the school, whether visual or performance-based; and taking students to see plays at local theaters, and perform in these theaters.
“The sky’s the limit; we have so many possibilities,” said Dance, who studied playwriting, theater and directing at UCSB, and is a singer songwriter. She is on the board at Center Stage Theater.
“I’m very connected with publishers, writers and musicians, which I think is very beneficial to connecting our students to people who are actually doing it, who are professionals,” she said.
Her ties with these musicians is likely to help foster one of ther goals: to bring a concert band to the middle school. Dance hopes students can learn music theory and eventually have a house band to play in their musicals.
The program will also enhance their current popular elective offering, School of Rock, in which students form a rock band and perform for their peers.
“I want the students to learn the language of art, to learn the language of music,” Dance said.
Dance’s new single, “Journey” about her recent experience with breast cancer, was featured on the Breast Cancer Research Foundation’s website and social media accounts on March 3.
“I like to use my art and my gifts to tell my story and encourage people who are maybe going through the same thing,” Dance said.
For more about Riviera Ridge School, email info@rivieraridge.org or call 805-569-1811 ext. 131.