[313] MTSU Will Host American College Dance Festival Conference

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Feb. 18, 2010
EDITORIAL CONTACT: Lisa L. Rollins, 615-898-2919, or lrollins@mtsu.edu

MTSU WILL HOST AMERICAN COLLEGE DANCE FESTIVAL CONFERENCE
Department of Speech & Theatre Welcomes Southeast Region Participants March 6-9

(MURFREESBORO)—MTSU and its Department of Speech and Theatre will serve as hosts for the 2010 American College Dance Festival Association’s Southeast Conference on March 6-9.
Throughout the event, MTSU will welcome students from 26 colleges and universities in its effort to support and promote creativity and talent from the surrounding southeastern area and across the nation.
Kim Neal Nofsinger, director of dance at MTSU, said the ACDFA annually provides a venue for students and faculty to engage in intensive workshops, panels, classes and performances that are led by instructors from the surrounding region and across the country.
During the campus-based event, participants will take on a rigorous schedule, with the opportunity to select from more than 150 master classes offered during the conference—from en pointe and pas de deux styles, to hip-hop and tap.
With some 500 people expected to attend, Nofsinger said the conference will provide a unique opportunity for students and faculty to have their works adjudicated by a panel of nationally recognized dance professionals in an open and constructive forum.
Selected pieces will be performed in the Gala Concert at 2 p.m. March 9 in MTSU’s Tucker Theatre in the Boutwell Dramatic Arts Building. The public is welcomed to attend this performance.
Tickets for the Gala Concert may be purchased immediately prior to the event at the theater’s box office. Tickets may be purchased only with cash payments. General admission is $10 and $5 for students/faculty. Seating will promptly begin at 30 minutes before curtain time.
In addition to the Gala Concert, MTSU also will present an informal dance concert, free of charge and open to the public, at 3 p.m. Wednesday, March 3, in Tucker Theatre.
Nofsinger said this free performance will feature student choreography, as well as performers Claire Porter and Stefanie Batten Bland, both of whom have served as artists in residence at MTSU. Additionally, dancers Teena Custer and Erica Randall will join guest artists Porter and Batten Bland for a featured concert that will be presented during the ACDFA at 8 p.m. March 8 in Tucker Theatre.
Community members interested in participating in ACDFA may purchase a daily pass for $50. For more information about the festival or its related dance concerts, please contact Nofsinger vie e-mail at nofsinge@mtsu.edu or by calling the MTSU Dance program office at 615-904-8392.
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With three Nobel Prize winners among its alumni and former faculty, Middle Tennessee State University confers master’s degrees in 10 areas, the Specialist in Education degree, the Doctor of Arts degree and the Doctor of Philosophy degree. MTSU is ranked among the top 100 public universities in the nation in the Forbes “America’s Best Colleges” 2009 survey.