---

Creativity abounds this season at Wellspring!

After we have battled the elements for a few months, yearned for the sun, waited out the weather, spring comes as a series of delights, strung like glass beads on a necklace. Spring is letting go and starting fresh. It is a celebration of the mysterious dichotomy - the delicate impermanence of life and its boundless energy for renewal.

Wellspring/Cori Terry and Dancers capture that exuberance in their 2012 Spring Concert of Dance: Glass.

Artistic Director Cori Terry has been hard at work creating a new work of choreography, "2 Billion Heartbeats", inspired by the concept that all mammals experience approximately two billion heartbeats during the course of a lifetime. She ponders the idea, "How do we use our hearts? How do we use our time on the planet? How do we use our time with a lot of heart?"

Wellspring's exquisite retinue of modern dancers expresses the uplifting response through an energetic unity that appears effortless. "It's a chance to dance with my peeps!" Ms. Terry exclaimed cheerfully about including a part in her new piece for herself. The Brooklyn native founded Wellspring - Kalamazoo's only professional Modern Dance ensemble - in 1981, and remains an exciting artistic force in our community.

Artistic Associate Michael Miller has created "Open Signal", a duet for company members Rachel Miller and Jasmine Statzer who were both originally trained at the Southold Dance Theater's pre-professional company in South Bend, Indiana. The dancers agree that the piece is fun to do. Ms. Statzer says of the industrial feel of the piece, "It's challenging to adapt how we move to his natural movement style." Mr. Miller says his highly rhythmic, syncopated choreography is inspired by the way that popular dance music, "gets into your body like a heartbeat."

Also included on the concert will be "Desideratum" and "Rarefied Air", two new pieces of choreography by Cori Terry commissioned by the Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra and performed together at a spectacular debut performance in January 2012, and more.

The Spring Concert of Dance will take place in the Wellspring Theater at the Epic Center. Performances are April 19-21 at 8 pm, and April 22 at 2 pm. Join Ms. Terry and the dancers after the Thursday evening performance for a post-concert discussion, and on Saturday, mingle with the artists at a reception following the evening performance.

---