April's DotM: Haley Galloway

April's Dancer of the Month: 

Haley Galloway

One of my favorite dance memories was in my old studio, when I was probably 10 years old, for competition our song was "let's get loud" it was a great dance. When I was younger we performed really early in the morning, and our dance was one of the very first ones. The judges of the competition said our dance was the dance that got everybody awake and happy to start the day so that felt really good to have a dance like that.

My absolute favorite genre of dance has to be lyrical, because lyrical for me is a kind of dance that really tells a story and I like to connect with the dance. The movements of lyrical are beautiful and I get to really express myself. When I go to competitions I always love watching lyrical the most because the ones that tell a story are always memorable. 

My role model is Miss Katie. She always has been since the first time I had her as a teacher. She teaches me a lot and her dances are always the best. 

I hope that my dancing will take me through college and be part of my career. In college I will minor in dance, I hope to be a dance teacher or choreographer and inspire people to dance and to love dance the way I do.

I have plenty of favorite songs to dance to, but recently my favorite to dance to is holding out for a hero by Ella Mae Brown. I don't have a choreographed dance to it, but I wish I did.

I feel really nervous and anxious before a performance. Before a performance sometimes my team tries to give little pep talks, we huddle in a circle and we all point our foot.

My favorite thing about CoEXIST is that we get to dance with new people and try new ways of dancing. I like master classes also, to learn new styles and see what other people focus on when they're dancing.

The hardest thing I have overcome as a dancer is pointing my feet. Most dancers can point their foot and it looks beautiful but my feet don't point the correct way because of a certain bone, so it's hard for me because I have to work twice as hard. I used to get yelled at all the time because teachers would think I wasn't pointing my feet.

My favorite dance move is a calypso jump, it took me a while to finally get it, but I love it.

Thursday is my favorite day of the week for dance, because we start with comp jazz which usually exhausts me, but then I have pointe, pointe is a challenge but I like to challenge myself and see myself improve. Lastly, I have modern. I really like my modern dance this year, so it's a good end to my day.

My birthday is September 16, 1998.

CoEXIST has really helped me as a dancer and a person because it gave me a feel for how to handle auditions in the future, and it gives me experience with dancers that I really didn't know that well, it was overwhelming at first but now I feel accomplished because of CoEXIST.