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CHARLESTON, W.Va. – Directors of dance companies and schools across West Virginia are invited to enroll students in the West Virginia Division of Culture and History’s 2018 statewide dance festival.

Directors have until Jan. 5 to submit applications to the division. Dancers’ and scholarship applications are due Jan. 12. Adjudication DVDs are due Feb. 9, and the adjudications will be held Feb. 16-18, 2018.

Student applications are accepted only from directors affiliated with full-time dance establishments in West Virginia. Dancers must be at least 12 years old and have at least one year of training in classical ballet with two lessons per week. All performers must be enrolled for classes at the festival.

The West Virginia State Dance Festival, set for April 27-29, 2018, showcases the talents of West Virginia dancers who come to the Culture Center at the State Capitol Complex in Charleston each spring to perform and take classes from nationally acclaimed dance instructors. This will mark the event’s 36th year. The festival’s evening performances will take place Friday and Saturday, April 27-28.

Lorraine Elizabeth Graves, former principal dancer at the Dance Theatre of Harlem where she is on the master teacher faculty, will return as lead faculty and adjudicator for the festival. Other faculty members will be announced later.

Applications and guidelines, along with additional information about the festival, can be found on the division’s website at http://www.wvculture.org/dance/index.html.

For more information, contact John Morrison at (304) 558-0220 or by email at John.D.Morrison@wv.gov.

The West Virginia Division of Culture and History is proud to be able to present its programs at no charge to the public, but without a solution to the state’s budget situation, this could be the last year that programs of this type could be offered. The division, led by Commissioner Randall Reid-Smith, is an agency within the Office of Secretary of Education and the Arts with Gayle Manchin, cabinet secretary. It brings together the past, present and future through programs and services focusing on archives and history, arts, historic preservation and museums. For more information about the division’s programs, events and sites, visit www.wvculture.org. The Division of Culture and History is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.

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