High-energy music blasted across the room as Andover dancers filled the studio, each gearing up for upcoming auditions. From kicks that hit a perfect 180 degrees to split leaps and turns, the dancers demonstrated a show of flexibility and agility. These are scenes from auditions for Blue Strut, Andover’s jazz dance group that performs with flair.
Co-head Maggie Shu ’27 shared her journey from initially joining the club in her first year to becoming the group’s leader.
“At first I joined Strut because I heard about it through word of mouth. I kept continuing Strut because I feel like it definitely helped me grow my confidence. All the styles I did before were either individual routines or Chinese dance, which I feel like is a bit more mellow. In contrast, jazz is very out there, outgoing, and we have a very close bond as a group. It was really helpful to have a more confident stage presence or just learning to have fun with a dance group,” said Shu.
For many, Blue Strut auditions were the very first exposure to dance at Andover. Isabel Liu ’30 shared her past experience with dance and what motivated her to attend auditions.
“I used to dance for around five years with my local community college dance group. We did different cultural dances like Balinese, African, and all these other cultures, just really unique styles. I grew a lot from that, and I also did ballet for a few years. I really just wanted to try something new. Strut seemed like such a cool dance group, and I just thought, ‘why not try?,’” said Liu.
Others in the audition room were there solely for the sake of trying out, regardless of no prior experience in dance. Jonathan Oh ’27 shared what encouraged him to audition for Blue Strut.
“I’m very close friends with Yumi [Lai ’27], who’s one of the co-heads. Ever since Lower year I’ve been telling her I’d pull up to Strut auditions and that’s never been a reality until this year. It was our final year, Senior year, and I decided to hold true to my promise. So I went with some of my boys in Draper Cottage. I put a smile on my face, I was light on my feet, and I was just ready to get into it. I showed up five minutes late, so they were already getting into stretching so I immediately got on the floor and started stretching,” said Oh.
For Clara Cho ’29 the emotions of this experience intertwined with memories and nostalgia of her past experience in competitive dance.
“Before, I guess I was somewhat apprehensive, I didn’t really know what exactly the audition would be like, but it was actually quite similar to [a] conventional experience. During the audition while learning the combo, I felt so whole. After doing it, I was getting déjà vu or flashbacks from my past experiences. I was like, ‘wow, I really did miss this part of dance.’ Afterwards, instead of really caring about results, I just feel good about learning it and showing up. Even if I don’t get in, I feel completely content with how I did that day,” said Cho.
