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Flight lessons: as aerial dance soars in popularity, practitioners begin laying down a curriculum for training in the form.

Article Excerpt
Training in aerial dance is still relatively new. When Nancy Smith, founder and artistic director of Frequent Flyers Productions and founder of the Aerial Dance Festival in Colorado, wanted to add aerial work to her repertoire, she locked herself in a studio for eight months to experiment. Keith Hennessy, former Contraband founding member and director of the San Francisco-based company Circo Zero, learned aerials in the late '90s from circus artists while on tour with the French circus company he co-founded. For Joanna Haigood, artistic director of Zaccho Dance Theatre in San Francisco, it was a circus company that inspired her "to start thinking about choreography in a new way--vertically, horizontally, diagonally, laterally."

Today these artists are among the growing number of aerial dance teachers. Though they agree on many aspects, each artist maintains his or her own unique approach to the aerial dance curriculum.

Smith starts her...

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