Dance Masters BACK

When your event could use a pirouette or quickstep to liven up the program, Toronto’s dance community is primed with a troupe for every move.

Customize dance performances to theme and message with big-production staging, vignettes between speeches, demos among the crowd or simply interactive, talented scenery. Offer dance-floor basics or teambuilding instruction to bring guests to their feet.

To get your event dancing with the ... well you know, check out the styles and stellar talents of these hoofers:

Aerial Stars
Swinging lithely from trapeze hoops and draping alluringly around silken ropes A2D2 Aerial Dance Circus Company puts the dance moves overhead. Aerial-borne artistry continues to be a popular event must-have, elevating circus tradition to upscale cirque that dazzles in the most unexpected settings. Founded by a trio of high-flying sisters, the company’s roster includes acrobats, contortionists and fire dancers.

Sleek costuming and stylized makeup animate the spectacle. For earth-bound interaction, the cast also specializes in live statues and strolling entertainment. Venue not quite aerial-rigging friendly? No worries. A2D2  offers a new apparatus that gives flight to angels who are grounded.  www.a2d2.ca

---

Make It Hip And Make It Hop
It’s booty call time when dancers from DLM Dance & Entertainment hit the floor, shaking it down with street-savvy moves and grooves. Vibrant and young, DLM brings on ‘da funk of urban dance with hip hop, break dance, step and popping (isolated explosions and contractions of the body). Experience covers edgy choreography that’s backed up talent such as Seal to fashion show staging that gets the catwalk jumping.

Power up event themes with a specialty show that plies a high-energy twist to the customary — think a hip hopping Moulin Rouge. Couple a performance with lessons for guests. The company’s other services include models and musicians. Just added: Earlz Men, a coterie of hunky males with many talents – auction item presenters, bartenders, go go dancers are just the start. www.dlmstudio.net

 

---

International Moves Hosting an out-of-country theme? Check out this talent roster for dance moves steeped in global culture. African Ijo Vudu Dance Co. www.ijovududance.com East Indian Bollywood Grooves www.bollywoodgrooves.ca Middle Eastern Arabesque Dance Academy www.arabesquedance.ca Spanish Compañia Carmen Romero www.carmenromero.ca Chinese Chi Ping Dance Group www.chipingdance.com

Saucy Cabaret
Need a little crowd titillation? Inspired by the early days of burlesque, Les Coquettes Nouveau Burlesque offers a racy alternative to traditional event entertainment. In true turn-of-the century dance hall tradition, Les Coquettes’ ensemble of lovely courtesans celebrates the beauty of the female form through song, dance and vintage costuming, igniting the imagination with provocative illusion.

Dramatic and sensual – adult-rated for sure – this is upscale artistry that tastefully plays off what stays on rather than what comes off. Shows and performers’ on-stage personas are tailored for themes including a lavish Folies Bergère revue and an old Hollywood-style extravaganza. Talent also makes for flirtatious mix-and-mingling eye candy. www.lescoquettes.com

---

En Pointe
Whether it’s ethereal room dressing you’re after or the graceful aesthetics of tutued synchronicity, Hit And Run Productions casts ballet’s classical traditions in a more contemporary, dynamic light. Theatrical and adaptable, the corps has performed in the foyers of Forest Hill mansions to Mick Jagger’s birthday party and the roof of City Hall.

While ballet is the mainstay, its creative elegance innovates into other dance forms: salsa, break dance, hip hop, modern. A cast of 50 performers and an amazing costume wardrobe — a tutu for every occasion — fuel intimate and large-scale productions. Pull on the company’s connections to set dance to live opera, jazz vocalists and strings orchestras. www.hitandrun.ca

 

---

Swing Time
From staccato-tapping cigarette girls to jitterbugging hipsters, Capital Dance Productions captures the whole genre of early modern dance — the ‘20s to the ‘50s — with lively theatrical showmanship and era-perfect costuming. Among the troupe’s specialties are the Charleston, the Lindy Hop and Swing Jazz, but these fun-loving dancers can cut a rug in any style.

Pair choreography with live band sound, or order up song-and-dance cabaret-style. Audience lessons, subtle dance floor mingling and interactive partners inspire guests to get up and boogie. MC and hosting services also available. www.capitaldance.ca

 

 

---