University Dance Company Spring Concert to feature uplifting student performances
LAWRENCE — The University Dance Company will present its Spring Concert from April 10 to 12, featuring jazz, disco, hip-hop, tap and modern/contemporary styles. Audiences will witness new work by University of Kansas faculty choreographers and a guest choreographer from Kansas City.
Tribute videos will honor two late KU dance professors, Willie Lenoir and Joan Stone.
The concert also will feature local music. Guest artist Sam McReynolds selected music by Christina Silvius, a violist from Kansas City. Both Silvius and McReynolds are studio residents at the Charlotte Street Foundation. A composition by Forrest Pierce, professor of music, performed by the members of the Night Heron Zikr Band, inspired choreography by Michelle Heffner Hayes. The song “Redtail Zikr” features performances by Pierce; Stephanie Zelnick, KU professor of clarinet; and members of the Tallgrass Sufi Community in a meditative chant based on zikr, the devotional act of recitation as remembrance.
Audiences will witness performances by 40 KU students as well as the work by student members of the creative team and crew during performances at 7 p.m. April 10-11 and 2 p.m. April 12. The concert is staged in the Crafton-Preyer Theatre at Murphy Hall, with a livestream available during select dates. Tickets can be purchased via the show's webpage, in person noon-5 p.m. at the box office in Murphy Hall, or by calling 785-864-3982. More information about the digital performance can be found on the theatre’s livestreaming page.
McReynolds’ piece is a physically challenging work that his cast learned during an intensive, two-week rehearsal process while he was in residency at KU this spring. McReynolds worked as a freelance dancer and choreographer in Los Angeles from 2016 to 2024 and currently dances with the Owen/Cox Dance Company of Kansas City.
Heffner Hayes will debut a modern/contemporary work grounded in in the ideas of meditation through movement called "Liveness." Dancers explore connection and heightened awareness: spiraling, flowing, finding the places where care becomes motion and attention becomes contact.
Maya Tillman-Rayton, the concert’s producer, choreographer and a KU lecturer in dance, and Claire Buss, a KU lecturer, are co-choreographing the concert’s finale with a large ensemble embodying their 1970s-inspired “big production” vision, taking patrons back to a place where all walks of life came together to move, the disco.
“It was the place where everyone met to briefly forget about the cares of the world and uplift one another,” Tillman-Rayton said. The piece centers around young dancers looking for belonging and community.
“This UDC, all of the choreographers felt strongly about using our voice as artists to tell stories about the human condition in adverse and uncertain times. Though all of the choreographers individually chose their themes, this concert is indicative of our desire to uplift and unify our audience,” Tillman-Rayton said.
The creative team is rounded out by Kelly Vogel, head of theatre design for the Department of Theatre & Dance and associate teaching professor, as scenic and costume designer; Logan Fixsen, a sophomore in theatre design from Olathe, as costume designer; Nicholas Sibert, a senior in theatre design from Kansas City, Missouri, as lighting designer; Jenna Link, production manager/lecturer in the department, as production stage manager.
Student cast members are Caitlin Belmont, freshman in math from Powell, Wyoming; Christian Boudreaux, graduate student and lecturer in theatre; Abby Boyd, a junior in dance from Topeka; Chelsea Brennan, a graduate student in museum studies from Richmond, Virginia; Penelope Brown, a sophomore in dance from Kansas City, Missouri; Dinah Criswell, a sophomore in media arts and production from Brooklyn Park, Minnesota; JT Czoch, a junior in dance and anthropology; Sofia Dunkelberger, a junior in dance from Wichita; Alexandra Escalante, a freshman in exercise science from Wichita; Nicole Fronek, a sophomore in marketing from Plainfield, Illinois; Rania Fuleihan, a junior in visual art education from Olathe; Mia Godinez, a senior in digital marketing communications from Chanute; Karli Greder, a freshman in pre-law from Omaha, Nebraska; Ann Hance, a freshman in accounting from Leawood; Kaitlyn Harris, a sophomore in dance from Omaha, Nebraska; Sophia Harrison, a senior in dance from Topeka; Keaja Hodge, a sophomore in psychology and criminal justice from Wichita; Paige Katz, a freshman in psychology and dance from Omaha, Nebraska; Jadyn Kaufman, a senior in management and leadership from Humboldt; Kaylee Lempke, a sophomore in dance from Omaha, Nebraska; Kate Long, a sophomore in dance from Dallas; Abigail Lorenz, a senior in exercise science from Schaumburg, Illinois; Emily Mask, a sophomore in speech pathology and audiology from Grapevine, Texas; Esther McBride, a senior in dance from Alameda, California; Dylan Pope, a junior in communications from Naperville, Illinois; Mallory Price, a senior in journalism and dance from Leavenworth; Paul Ruf, a senior in accounting from Overland Park; Maggie Schneider, a freshman in behavioral neuroscience from St. Charles, Missouri; Madi Seelye, a senior in dance from Lawrence; Dana Shamir, a senior in finance and international business from Overland Park; Emily Shaw, a junior in interior architecture from Hutchinson; Quinn Stahly, a junior in psychology from Topeka; Sloane Smith, a senior in dance and exercise science from Littleton, Colorado; Maggie Stephan, a first-year student in dance from Davenport, Iowa; Molly Stover-Brown, a junior in dance and journalism from Wichita; Sydney Thomann, a freshman in criminal justice and dance from Topeka; Lizzy Tucker, a freshman in psychology from Bentonville, Arkansas; Joslyn Vetock, a senior in dance from Omaha, Nebraska; Whitlee Walker, a sophomore in dance and economics from Fayetteville, Arkansas; Elizabeth Wellman, a senior in dance from Lawrence; and Rizzy Xiong, a senior in dance and student from Shanghai, China, via Los Angeles.
About the choreographers
Sam McReynolds is a freelance dance artist originally from St. Louis, where he received his BFA in Dance at Lindenwood University and trained under hip-hop choreographer and instructor Anthony “REDD” Williams. He expanded his approach to movement through his experience exploring Gaga technique in the U.S. and in Tel Aviv, Israel. He has danced for several notable choreographers and dance companies, including Sarah Elgart / Arrogant Elbow, Micaela Taylor, Brian Friedman and Marguerite Derricks. His choreography credits include LA at CONGRESS: Legalize Dance, Club Jete, LAVENDER, Stage & Screen Show, VOICES: Queer Artist Showcase and the Los Angeles Dance Festival. He has also taught and choreographed for the Joffrey West/Joffrey San Francisco Summer Intensives since 2022. In 2021, he won the Best New Filmmaker Award at the Dare to Dance in Public Film Festival. Most recently, he presented his first ever evening-length collaborative work "C Yu" with Osq Trujillo, which premiered at Greenwood Social Hall. He lives and works in Kansas City, Missouri, as a company dancer and collaborator with Owen/Cox Dance Group, artist in residence at Charlotte Street Foundation and faculty teacher with Kansas City Ballet Academy.
Michelle Heffner Hayes is a professor of theatre & dance at KU, where she teaches choreography, improvisation, critical dance studies, pedagogy and flamenco. She has a wide-ranging career as a scholar, choreographer, arts administrator, performer and teacher, with more than 25 works for the University Dance Company and University Theatre. Her publishing history includes "Flamenco: Conflicting Histories of the Dance" (2009), "Flamenco on the Global Stage: Historical, Critical and Theoretical Perspectives" (2015) and a chapter titled “Burla y Bulla: Humor and Critique in Flamenco” for "Funny Moves: Dance Humor Politics" (2025). She is a member of the AUMI-KU InterArts Research Consortium.
Maya Tillman-Rayton is a KU lecturer of hip-hop technique and director of dance. She debuted her work “Stingy Lulu’s Jumping Jook Joint” at the 2023 KC Fringe Festival. Her works have previously been shown at KC Fringe Festival and at National Dance Week KC. Tillman-Rayton is also a contributor at the Lawrence Arts Center, where she recently choreographed for the dance show “In Frame” and the musical “Alice by Heart” with Justin Harbaugh. This summer, she will choreograph the Arts Center's Summer Youth Theatre production of “Once Upon a One More Time.” She is co-founder of House of Dragons dance company. She also is a Kansas Touring Artist, teaching community dance classes and lectures for all ages during the summer.
Claire Buss is originally from Salt Lake City, Utah, and moved to Lawrence in 2017 to attend KU, graduating with a BFA in Dance and a BSE in Physical Education. She’s worked with Tristian Griffin Dance Company, House of Dragons and Liat Roth in City in Motion Dance Theatre’s Modern Night. She has been teaching at KU for almost three years now in jazz, hip-hop, modern and creative movement for the Department of Physical Education. She also serves as the interim dance program director, and she teaches youth dance classes at the Lawrence Arts Center.
The University Dance Company is a production wing of the Department of Theatre & Dance and is funded in part by Student Senate fees.
KU Theatre & Dance is one of three departments in the School of the Arts. As part of the KU College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, the School of the Arts offers fresh possibilities for collaboration between the arts and the humanities, sciences, social sciences, international and interdisciplinary studies.