Mamaroneck High School's PACE Program Celebrates Forty Years Of Dance

MAMARONECK, N.Y. -- Forty years of anything can be hard to believe but at Mamaroneck High School, where the dance program at PACE (those in the "know" know it as the the Performing Arts Curriculum Experience) had a slow start, it's a celebratory milestone. November marks 40 years since the dance performance, "Kinesthesia."

Kinesthesia, now in its 40th year, is a celebration of dance. Photo Credit: *Allison Parsley*

Jeanne Muchnick

11/11/2014 5:00 a.m.

The show, with its diversity of dance styles, will be held at the high school's PACE Auditorium at 7:30 p.m., Wednesday through Saturday, Nov. 19-22 with an additional matinee at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 22. A special opening night reception will follow the show on Wed, Nov. 19 with PACE Program Founder Martie Barylick in attendance. ?

Barylick, now teaching at the college level, said she named her 1975 first dance event “Kinesthesia,” hoping if it was called something more abstract than “PACE Dance Show” it might sound like art and it might have a life that stretched a bit longer than two performances on one day in February.

Indeed: Between 1975 and 2011, approximately 1,000 original dances were shown on the PACE stage. Since then, MHS PACE students have gone on to various accolades (Director Allison Parsley took over in 2011). According to Barylick, 10 PACE dances have been auditioned and performed for the 92nd St Y Harkness Dance Youth Festival. More recently, her pieces “Don’t Die” (made twice in PACE as “Heartburn”) and “Magritte Feet” (with paintings by Jon Murray done in 1984 and danced by PACE alums from 1986 and 2008) were produced in New York City. It will have another outing at NYU in April 2015.

Tickets for the 40th anniversary show are $8 and can be bought at the door. Contact the PACE office at 220-3235 for more information.

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