Class with Sean Curran

Sean Curran used to have to remind himself that dancing was meant to be a joyful experience. "I used to tell the dancers to point their toes!" Curran said in the middle of his weeklong workshop at Peridance Capezio Center yesterday. Now, he says, "I just tell them to smile." With this said, Curran beams with the giddy grin of the Cheshire Cat. The class responds with wide smiles of their own. In four days, Curran has obviously built a rapport and healthily silly relationship with his students. The class is eager to approach dance according to his requests, which include smiling, yawning like you just woke up, and laughing on command. This last task revealed the trust that Curran fosters in his classes. I was taking the workshop for the first time yesterday, and found that laughter was stuck somewhere inside my chest when he asked us to laugh. It wasn't going to happen. I was so caught up in my own judgements of myself that this simple task- one that probably is enjoyable to the participants- would not come naturally to me. I write this not to chastise myself, but rather to explain the true enjoyment that the students seemed to experience at Peridance this week. They were smiling and laughing heartily. And, possibly because their contentment spread all the way to the last tips of the hands and feet, they were pointing their toes, too.