The State Dance and Drill Competition
by Olivia Bachar
The Dance and Drill season spans from October until sometimes March, but it all leads to one event in December, the State Dance and Drill Competition in Des Moines.
Planning for the upcoming season usually begins over the summer. The four-year seniors choose what kind of dance they want to do, whether it’s hip-hop, jazz, pom, or novelty. Then the other seniors join in, and they all get together to pick music. Choreographers usually begin meeting to choreograph in September so that they can finish the dance before the real season begins.
The season usually starts in October with Sunday and Monday night practices. The first couple weeks are used to get everyone into shape again and practice the basics of dancing. After that, the teaching begins.
The full Monday through Friday season starts in November. Things really start to get hectic throughout November when the state competition begins closing in at the beginning of December.
After all the dances have been taught, every practice consists of doing the dances over and over again. We always make sure to emphasis how important it is to be sharp. Generally we will do a couple eight counts at a time and then critique. We will also split up into groups and have a few people at a time do the dance and then critique.
The state competition takes place at the Wells Fargo Arena and Vets Arena in Des Moines. We compete in the large schools category which takes place on Friday, so we leave after school on Thursday. Thursday night we always go out to a big dinner and have a lot of fun in the hotel rooms with games and activities. But it’s always to bed nice and early because the competition begins in the morning and our make up and hair always takes quite some time to do, especially since there are sixteen of us.
We always take the skywalk from our hotel down to the arenas. The earlier the better because it’s always very difficult to find a big area where we can stretch, warm-up, and go over the dances before performing.
When the time comes for us to line up backstage, the adrenaline skyrockets. Walking out from behind the curtain and out on to the stage is very nerve-racking. Our entire season is built up for this very moment. Once we walk out, every thought is pushed out of our minds and we do the dance like we’ve never done it before.
After the dancing is done, we have to wait until around seven o’clock for the awards ceremony to begin. It usually takes a couple hours, but when you’re team walks away with a D1 or a placing, it’s totally worth it.
