SU DanceWorks celebrates 40th anniversary with DanceWorks with the Stars

This Saturday, Syracuse University’s largest student-run dance organization, SU DanceWorks, is hosting its first DanceWorks with the Stars event.

The event, modeled after the TV series “Dancing with the Stars,” will host 20 teams at Schine Underground, each consisting of one DanceWorks member, considered the “pro,” paired with a representative of an SU student organization.

Tickets for the event sold out within the first 30 minutes, said co-director Revati Mahurka.  Teams participating include Z89 Radio, South Asian Student Association and Gamma Phi Beta.

Who are some of the participants?

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The team representing SU’s Club Boxing consists of DanceWorks member and “pro” Sami Carnahan and boxer Molly Rojas, who is an officer of Club Boxing. In preparation for Saturday’s competition, juniors Carnahan and Rojas practiced two to three hours a week for nearly a month. 

Carnahan was initially worried about being the sole instructor and choreographer for the dance, especially because she is used to explaining movements through professional dance terminology and to other seasoned dancers. 

“There’s a lot of language we use just in dance, and a lot of times that doesn’t go through to a lot of people,” Carnahan said. “But I feel like she (Rojas) has been able to pick up the choreography and movement so quickly, and she’s very determined through all of it.”

Carnahan and Rojas were randomly paired through the competition process, with both students applying to DanceWorks to be a “pro” and a dancer, respectively. 

Carnahan has danced since she was just 3 years old, and this competition allows her to fulfill and share her passion for choreography.

“I’ve wanted to choreograph my own piece for so long,” she said. “I’d really like my work to be out there because I love choreographing, so I’m excited I get to do that with Molly.” 

Carnahan and Rojas will dance to Billie Eilish’s “Oxytocin,” chosen by Carnahan to bring “mystery and curiosity from the audience” that helped her choreograph her preferred style of jazz. 

Rojas has found that, despite having almost no experience in choreographed dancing, her extensive skill and passion for boxing give her a leg up during the learning process.

“When you’re in the ring and you’re sparring someone, you need to be constantly moving, and pivoting, and changing motion, and dance has a lot of that — you’re constantly moving in dance,” Rojas said. 

Rojas has boxed on the club team since her freshman year and said she hopes to win the competition for her teammates. 

Rojas said dancing has been a nice break from the physical blows her body takes while boxing. 

“It’s nice to be able to dance and not get hit in the head,” she said.

The team has learned about each other’s sports through the time they’ve spent together, and Rojas hopes she can teach Carnahan some of her boxing techniques after the competition. 

Both inherently competitive people, Carnahan and Rojas hope to win the competition. The team said it looks forward to showcasing Carnahan’s choreography skills to Rojas’ club boxing team members.

Photo by Leah Cohn

Sami Carnahan (left) choreographed the dance to fit the style of jazz.

This lasting experience Carnahan and Rojas have had was not easily earned. Many students wanted to be involved in the competition and represent their campus organization, but the selection process is competitive.

What was the selection process like?

Co-director of DanceWorks Ellie Cohen said the team received 60 applications — many more than expected.

“We were hoping for 10 (teams) initially, over the summer,” said Cohen. “But then so many people wanted to participate.” 

Cohen said that because of the high volume of applicants, the executive board had to deny 40 students.

The executive board decided to prioritize 20 upperclassmen, so they could participate in the competition before they graduate. Board members also wanted a diverse group of organizations from all areas and interests of SU, said co-director Revati Mahurkar. 

“We had a wide variety of orgs who applied, so we wanted to reflect that variety in our final decisions,” she said. “We were aware that we don’t want to do all sororities or all non-Greek life orgs. We just wanted to have somewhat of a mix.”

Cohen and Mahurkar said they hope to continue this event as a new tradition of DanceWorks, despite having to put in far more effort toward planning it than initially expected.

“I don’t think any one of us thought this would be as much work as it actually is turning out to be,” Mahurkar said. “But since we have so much experience from putting on a show every spring, we know we have to reserve the space, we have to do a budget request and all the logistical things.”

Getting the SU community involved

As an organization, DanceWorks has over 100 cast members, with 16 assisting with team production. Co-directors and seniors Mahurkar and Cohen, and co-producers and juniors Filip Piechowiak and Lexi Blank, have been planning the event since the beginning of the semester. 

All four executive board members have been dancing with the organization since their freshman year at SU as a way to continue their lifelong passion for dance.

Photo by Leah Cohn

Members of DanceWorks gather at the Barnes Center exercise studio to practice for the Spring showcase. 

They started brainstorming ways to celebrate the 40th anniversary of SU DanceWorks last June, and decided that a campus-wide Dancing with the Stars-type event fit the wants and needs of not only the organization, but also of their friends who wanted to dance with the group without becoming a member. 

“We usually only have one showcase a year and that’s in the spring in March, and throughout the year we don’t really do anything where the audience can get involved,” said Mahurka.

DanceWork’s collective love for “Dancing with the Stars” also brought the event to life. 

DanceWorks with the Stars is hosting the event to fund their organization, through the $1 pre-voting form fee, t-shirts, ticket sales and a raffle for gift cards to Marshall Street businesses. The event is sponsored by The Standard at Syracuse.

The pre-show voting, which is open until midnight Friday, was sent out to friends and family by the dancers themselves. This will be factored in for the final scoring process, Mahurka said.

The directors said the final scores of each team will be a combination of pre-show voting, voting by audience members in physical attendance and the scores given by the directors and producers, who are the official judges of the competition. 

Mahurkar said they have yet to decide how they will weigh each form of voting, though the judges’ votes will have the greatest influence on the team’s final scores.

The winning team will be awarded a prize for their organization, which will soon be announced by the DanceWorks executive board.

“We didn’t expect it to be as big of a production as it’s going to be, and I feel so much better about it now,” said Blank.