By Isle of Wight Observer
Community dance company ‘Samphire’ marked its 10th anniversary with a show which included more than 120 dancers at the Riverside Centre, Newport, on Friday.
Connect, the informal dance Sharing group, brought together 65 performers to share their love of dance, including Samphire, En-Core Silver Swans, Tia’s Tappers, and the Bollywood Belles.
Samphire director, Michelle Hainsworth, also brought along her dance for wellbeing groups, DanceMakers and Make a Move.
Michelle said: “It was an uplifting, joyous afternoon with people commenting afterwards about how inspiring it was. It was an ideal opportunity to show Islanders the array of dance classes and groups there are available for older adults.”
Michelle took the opportunity to show people the type of warm up that she does with her wellbeing classes. The Make a Move class is specifically for people with a neurological condition which affects their movement, such as Parkinson’s, MS, and stroke survivors.
She added: “At one point, I had everybody in the room joining in with some chair sequences and laughing and being silly. It was lovely to see everybody having fun.”
The audience donated £370 which will go towards the cost of carers who support the Make a Move participants.
Michelle formed Samphire in 2016 and said: “I was looking for a contemporary dance class but there wasn’t much on offer at the time, and nothing for older dancers, so I decided I’d form my own group.
“The group are a mixture of people who danced when they were younger and others who have found dance later in life.”
More information on Michelle’s classes from communitydanceiow@gmail.com, or 07503 153 329.