qdd dance diary: Alixandra glance
Alixandra Glance is a 4th year DEVS student here at Queen’s University. She grew up in Ottawa, Ontario and during her time at Queen’s she has become actively involved in the Queen’s dance community.
“My mom would say I started dancing before I could walk” Alix told me during our recent interview. Her parents enrolled her in dance classes as soon as she could stand up and walk. Her mom once danced for the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and clearly passed her talent and love for dance onto her daughter. Alixandra grew up training and enjoying all styles of dance but did not feel particularly drawn to ballet. She took a few years off from dance to try other activities such as drumming and gymnastics but her passion for dance was re-ignited with the emergence of the show “So You Think You Can Dance”. Alex witnessed Latin dance on the show and soon registered for classes at a small Russian studio. She trained in this studio for several years, proceeding to travel to Toronto and Montreal for tryouts.
She then began training with ballroom champions Francis LaFreniere and Claudia Primeau in Montreal. This was a significant change in atmosphere for Alix. The studio was extremely competitive, trained intensely, and found great success in competing. This change in atmosphere pushed Alix to work harder, grow as a person, and made her fall even more in love with dance.
Unfortunately, she badly injured her knee during her final year of high school and had to have surgery, which temporarily stalled her progression. She came to Queen’s University and didn’t dance at all in her first year. She thought her relationship with dance was effectively over. One day, she answered for a job posting on the ARC website for a Latin and Ballroom teacher and began teaching weekly classes. She loved this experience so much that she reached out to Queen’s Dance Club in her third year and began teaching her own class and working on the executive team.
This year, Alix had worked with the arc to create a woman’s only dance class called “seductive dance”. It is extremely popular and reveled around campus, engaging a huge variety of people and providing everybody with a set of challenges in a fun and safe environment. This class is strictly heels based and Alix teaches a new combo and dance style every week incorporating jazz, hip-hop and latin influences. Her goal is to encourage confidence, empowerment and sensuality within her students. She feels so lucky that she can provide that creative outlet for people and facilitate their growth.
Alixandra really loves teaching and performing and has made herself a versatile creative force on campus. This year she is newly involved in The Vogue Charity Fashion Show as a dancer and choreographer. She finds this process very different than teaching in that she’s trying to craft and build an entire show within a larger community of driven individuals. She feels her skills have blossomed through the development of the show and she loves that her art has a strong purpose and is being used for a good cause. As she’s gotten older and left the dance studio, she’s transitioned into the role of a teacher and choreographer and explains that her favourite part of this role is being able to “pull certain attributes out of her more shy or vulnerable students”.
Alix is a big supporter of all of the various classes and clubs that the Queen’s Dance District provides, expressing that “dancing is such an easy way to build an easy intimate friendships”. Alix appreciates how dance emphasizes the sharing, bonding, and creative challenging of young artists and growing up in a dance environment has made her realize that, “there are certain things that only another dancer will understand. Most people stop dancing at university but Queen’s offers a lot of opportunities to keep exploring your passion with others who feel the same as you”.
Alix looks to bold up and coming female choreographers in the commercial industry such as Jojo Gomez, Galen Hooks, and Brinn Nicole for inspiration. These women are strong, fierce and “absolutely slaying” and she looks to them when she needs some motivation or ideas for her classes. In terms of post graduation plans, Alix is applying to several different schools for a law degree combined with a masters in Industrial Relations. She would love to continue teaching wherever she ends up and eventually transplant her class at the ARC somewhere else, whilst passing the torch to another student here at Queen’s.
This semester, you can catch the fiery and fabulous Alixandra Glance at the following:
Just Dance 2018 for Queen’s Dance Club
Queen’s Dance Battle at Stages Night Club
Vogue Charity Show – March 1st 2nd 3rd – proceeds of tickets go to the Kingston chapter of the Canadian Mental Health Association
Also, there are still some spots left in her seductive dance class so sign up at the arc front desk or online! You won’t regret it!