Innerviews: Brainy ballerina bowed to passion for dance

In her Kanawha City studio, Michele Raider looks back on the journey that culminated in her current dual roles as director of the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble and School of the River City Youth Ballet. A Clendenin native and a lifelong dancer with a penchant for math and science, she excelled in college and considered a more practical career before surrendering to her passion for dance. Craig Hudson | Gazette-Mail photo

By: Sandy Wells, Staff Writer | Posted: Feb. 12, 2018 | Source: WV Gazette-Mail

She’s a ballerina who graduated summa cum laude with a degree in chemistry. She earned a scholarship from NASA.

The brainy ballerina incongruity reflects a flirtation with reality. For a while there, Michelle Raider stopped dreaming about dancing and considered the practicality of a conventional career in math and science. She worked in research and development at Carbide.

Anyone who watched her grow up in Clendenin knew that her passion for dance would win out.

At 46, she’s the heart and soul of a nonprofit ballet company for aspiring young dancers called the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble. She’s also director of the School of the River City Youth Ballet.

Honing her skills demanded years of travel to learn from the best. Now, she brings the best to her students. Her classes include periodic teaching visits from nationally recognized dancers.

A devout dancer since girlhood, she auditioned with a grace that encouraged mentoring from prominent performers. They helped her qualify for study in Atlanta, New York and Montreal. She graduated from the highly regarded Walnut Hill School for the Arts in Massachusetts.

Her River City dancers stage two productions a year with the Charleston Youth Symphony and the Appalachian Children’s Chorus. She wants to turn the three-group collaboration into a permanent organization with a home of its own — her “absolute dream.”

Considering her past achievements, she won’t let it languish in dream stage for long.

“I grew up in Clendenin. My mom and I lived with my grandparents, and they were an important part of my life. My grandpa had a little store in Clendenin called Tater’s Market. His name was Byron but everybody called him Tater. He liked to eat raw potatoes.

“I spent a lot of time in his grocery store. I was ringing people up on the cash register when I was 5. He would deliver way out in Clendenin. We would get in the truck once or twice a week with huge bags of sugar and flour. His store was like the center of the community. People would hang out there and talk.

“I would get up in the morning when I was little and shine his shoes. He was very special to me. I named my son Byron.

“My grandma was extremely artistic. She came up with the Clendenin Lumber logo. She would write to the newspaper all the time and get things published. My whole family was musical. They played an instrument or sang.

“Mom remarried and I started living with them. My cousin started taking ballet. I was about 7. Mom asked me what I wanted to do. I said maybe gymnastics or ballet or the violin. She put me in everything all at once just to see. After about two months, she said to pick one. I said ballet. I think it was my love of music. And I’m very shy. I didn’t talk a lot. Ballet was a way to express myself.

“I started lessons with Andre Van Damme. He asked me if I would start doing two days a week the following year and I did. Then I started to assist with a baby class on Saturday.

“I was about 11 or 12 when he started giving me a check for being in the Charleston Ballet. I was one of the youngest paid members. I think my first check was $400. It helped pay for pointe shoes.

“Van Damme was putting on ‘Romeo and Juliet’. He brought in Nicolas Pacana from the Atlanta Ballet. Mr. Pa-cana wanted to work with me in Atlanta. We had family in Atlanta. So mom sent me to Atlanta and I took lessons from him that summer. The following summer, I went to upstate New York and studied two summers with Istvan Rabovsky, principal dancer with the Hungarian ballet.

“He told my mom the second summer that I should audition for the School of the New York City Ballet. He met us in New York, and I auditioned and got accepted, but there was no housing. I was 13. My mom didn’t want to send me to New York like that. So he took me to Walnut Hill School for the Arts.

“We flew up and I auditioned. I was accepted. It was nine weeks into the year, but they wanted me right then. I told mom I wanted to stay. I had one leotard and one pair of tights. Mom went home and packed frantically and shipped the box, but it would take a week for it to get there.

“I had a second leotard, but it was ripped up and the teacher made me sit out. I was in tears. It was a hard transition trying to weave into everything that was already going on at the school and being new and shy and thrown into something completely different than I was used to, but it was a wonderful experience.

“In the summer, I would study at Old Superior in Montreal.

“I graduated from Walnut Hill and came home and started training for a job at the Tidewater as a hostess.

“A friend from Walnut Hill was doing an exchange program in Australia and asked me to come. His father would buy my ticket. We stayed in Sydney one month and then backpacked north and stopped at youth hostels. It was an amazing experience. I hated telling my boss at Tidewater that I had this opportunity to go to Australia. He just winked at me and said to go to Australia. I was there for two months.

“I met some neat people at Walnut Hill. One student was like the dorm president, Sarah Sessions. We went to dinner and performances with her dad. It wasn’t until after I graduated that I discovered her father was William Sessions, former head of the FBI. That’s the kind of people I was in school with.

“I ended up getting married and decided to go to college because I figured I couldn’t make any money here doing what I love to do. I started teaching dance a couple of hours a day while I was going to college. And I worked for William Goebel, the artist, doing shrink-wrapping and helping him move drawings and paintings.

“I went to West Virginia State for a degree in chemistry. I figured I could teach dance, but I needed to make money. I took a couple of classes from a Dr. Cabell, a beginning science class, and I loved it.

“I really liked math. I had to work at it. I studied hard in college. I got a NASA scholarship. I was doing research on a drug called Taxol, and I got a scholarship to do that. They had a John F. Haskin science scholarship, and I was the first recipient.

“I graduated summa cum laude, but I really missed dance. I started falling in love with teaching the kids. I was teaching at January’s [January Johnson Wolfe] studio. She didn’t have a ballet program per se, but she said I could come teach one day a week to help me through college. I told her there were some kids I was teaching that I wanted to bring in twice a week. I could see potential in them.

“So the next year, some of them came in twice a week. They really needed a chance to perform. I was able to go to school and take classes and have the opportunity to learn choreography and perform, which is a huge part of becoming a dancer. So I started the River City Youth Ballet.

“I had started the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble at January’s. We started doing productions. We became nonprofit. We started getting a couple of little grants.

“When I graduated from college, I started working at Carbide in research and development. I finally had benefits.

“The same year we had Byron, 2002, I got a space for the company. I opened a studio at 5014 MacCorkle Avenue. That’s when I started a for-profit, the River City School of Dance, so I could make money.

“I had about 30 kids that came for classes outside of the ensemble. I was still working at Carbide, but I decided that I just wanted to teach and choreograph. We do two stage productions a year.

“The school was growing until about three years ago. The economy got us. People were moving out of state. Two years ago, I asked a group of 7-year-old students how many would be doing ballet next year. One little girl said they were moving to Texas. Another girl said they were moving, too. Of 10 kids, four families were moving, an exodus of people. Things are starting to get a little better, but it will take some time.

“About six years ago, I started a program in Clendenin. I rented the gym at the old high school. My numbers would grow and go down, then grow a little. Two years ago, I asked the Youth Symphony to come up and started giving lessons. We do a lot of productions together — the Youth Symphony, the Appalachian Children’s Chorus and River City. We got a grant. My numbers went from 17 kids to 25, and this was right after the floods. Their kids had nothing to do. Our gym wasn’t affected.

“With the grant from the Greater Kanawha Valley Foundation, we were able to buy ballet barres and mirrors. Before, we were using the side of the stage as ballet barres.

“My goal with the ensemble was to give them that performing arts experience that I had without having to go to Boston or New York or wherever. I bring in guest teachers.

“We are always looking for volunteers for behind the scenes. It costs a lot to put these productions together. We need people to come in and help with sets and props. We don’t have the kids buy their costumes or pay a fee to be in the shows. We try to provide everything for them.

“When I started the ensemble, I reached out to the Youth Symphony to do a production. When I was dancing, I got to dance with live orchestration. It was such a wonderful thing, having the music right there. The show was great for the dancers, the musicians and the audience. These collaborations are beneficial all around.

“The following year, I asked the Appalachian Children’s Chorus to join us. I finally suggested we make an organization with all of us under one umbrella instead of three separate nonprofits. We call it YOU, Youth Organization United.

“We looked at a couple of buildings, but a lot of funding was being pulled to complete the Clay Center, and the new library talk was starting, so it never got off the ground. That is still my absolute dream.”

Reach Sandy Wells at sandyw@wvgazettemail.com or 304-342-5027.

Herbert Hoover’s Show Choir High Impact Taking The Stage

Herbert Hoover’s show choir “High Impact” is in the middle of their competition season and so far it has been a great year.

The show choir is under the direction of Kathy Silber with Angel George doing choreography and assisted by Edward Fredrick.

High Impact is made up of 38 singers, 14 band members and 14 stage crew.

Hoover Show Choir High Impact

This talented group of students are representing Hoover at area and out of state competitions.

This years show is based on the 1950’s Addams Family Show. All of the Addams family members are depicted in the show through song and dance.

Hoover Show Choir 2018

The show choir is half way through their competition season.

So far they have earned the following awards:

  • January 27th – Hurricane Red Hot Competition – Grand Champions Class B, Best Costumes, Best Show Design and went on to compete in the Top 6 Finals in the evening. High Impact ended up as the 2nd Runner-Up. They beat all of the West Virginia Schools only coming behind two AAA’s schools from Ohio.
  • February 3rd – Poca Show Choir Competition – High Impact earned 1st Runner-Up in Class B.
  • February 10th – Winfield Emerald Classic – Grand Champion Class B, Best Costumes and landed in the Top 6 Finals and walked away with 5th place.

    Hoover Show Choir 2018

High Impact travels to Clover Hill Mass Show Choir Competition in Virginia on February 17th, followed by Robert C. Byrd and Martinsburg WV later in the season.

High Impact will be presenting their show one more time to the Elkview/Clendenin communities in the near future. This is a show you don’t want to miss. Stay tuned to The Clendenin Leader for dates and showtimes.

W.Va. Music Hall of Fame Honors Wheeling Jamboree

Fans line up to see Charley Pride perform at Jamboree USA at the Capitol Music Hall, now called Capitol Theatre, on Main Street in downtown Wheeling. Dave Heath of Wheeling Jamboree provided the historical photos.

By: Betsy Bethel | Posted: Feb. 4, 2018 | Source: The Intelligencer Wheeling News-Register

In a nod to the far-reaching influence of the Wheeling Jamboree in all its incarnations over a span of 85 years, the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame will present it with the Spirit Award during the biennial induction ceremony on Saturday at the Culture Center in Charleston. (more…)

Can’t get enough monster movies?

Posted: Feb. 3, 2018 | Source: WV Gazette-Mail (excerpt from Daily Mail short takes)

If you like monster movies, UFO stories and West Virginia history all in one, then this movie is for you!

“‘The Flatwoods Monster: A Legacy of Fear’ is a new documentary from director, Seth Breedlove, which will unlock a decades-old mystery that included a government-ordered military examination of a purported alien crash-site, and multiple UFOs seen by countless residents of Braxton County, West Virginia,” reports the Clay County Free Press. (more…)

WV Music Hall of Fame inductees come from various genres

John (left) and David Morris at the WV State Folk Festival at Glenville in 1974 courtesy of WV Division of Culture and History photograph by Carl Fleischhauer.

By: Julie Perine, The Exponent Telegraph | Posted: Jan. 11, 2018 | Source: WV News

CHARLESTON — This year’s West Virginia Music Hall of Fame inductees are rooted in various genres of music, but all are rooted in the Mountain State.

On Feb. 10, Hasil Adkins, Frank Hutchison, Ann Magnuson, The Morris Brothers, the late Fred “Sonic” Smith and Michael W. Smith will be inducted into the elite group of musicians. The awards ceremony, which will feature a musical segment for each inductee, takes place at 7:30 p.m. at the West Virginia Culture Center Theater in Charleston.

It’s an honor, said West Virginia Music Hall of Fame Director Michael Lipton, that is second to none. (more…)

Youth arts groups to stage ‘Wizard of Oz’

The Appalachian Children’s Chorus, the West Virginia Youth Symphony Orchestra and the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble will present “The Wizard of Oz” on Feb. 8 at the Clay Center in Charleston. This photograph was taken during a group performance of “A Winter World of Imagination.” Courtesy photo by Michael W. Keller

By: Clint Thomas, Metro staff | Posted: Jan. 5, 2018 | Source: WV Gazette-Mail Kanawha Metro

At 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 8, the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble, the Appalachian Children’s Chorus and the West Virginia Youth Symphony Orchestra will escort audiences to the merry old land of Oz — by way of the Clay Center for the Arts & Sciences in Charleston.

The three local youth groups will collaborate on two stage performances of “The Wizard of Oz” next month. A school performance will also be offered on the morning of Feb. 8.

The youth groups will present their own take on the fanciful tale of Kansas farm girl Dorothy Gale’s adventures in the Land of Oz based on the classic L. Frank Baum stories.

“We’ve come up with a shortened version of it, with an original kind of twist,” River City Youth Ballet Ensemble Artistic Director Michelle Raider said last week.

Michelle Raider

Michelle Raider of Elkview is the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble Artistic Director.

Raider said “The Wizard of Oz” was presented on stage by the Kanawha City-based River City Youth Ballet Ensemble and the West Virginia Youth Symphony Orchestra, along with Child Song, in 2006.

For this year’s production, “the Youth Symphony and ACC will be singing some of the stuff they’ve been performing last year. Basically, I sit down and come up with a storyline based on the music,” the Elkview resident explained. “We get together and put it all together.

“It’s pretty cool. We have close to 150 performers in it,” Raider said.

“The ballet kind of tells the story,” she said. “Some pieces will use the Appalachian Children’s Chorus singing, some pieces will have the Youth Symphony playing and some pieces will feature both of them together.

“Each group is working on their sections. We’ll get together for one combined rehearsal before we move into the theater, and we’ll have a dress rehearsal the evening before at the theater,” Raider said.

Thirty-five members of the Appalachian Children’s Chorus will participate in “The Wizard of Oz,” said Selina Midkiff, founder and artistic director of the ACC.

Selina Midkiff

Selina Midkiff is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Appalachian Children’s Chorus.

“It’s such a neat opportunity for the community, particularly to bring their children to see all these groups in one venue at one time,” Midkiff said. “When they see them performing, maybe a kid will say they want to do that, too.”

Midkiff said the ACC consists of students in grades five through 12 from a five-county area.

“The Wizard of Oz” will mark another stage collaboration of the trio of arts groups. Other productions the RCYBE, ACC and WVYSO have staged together include “Cinderella,” “Sleeping Beauty” and “A Winter World of Imagination.”

“The River City Youth Ballet Ensemble, the Appalachian Children’s Chorus and the West Virginia Youth Symphony have successfully joined forces for 12 performances over the past 12 years — and maybe more — to stage a collaborative ballet performance for the mutual benefit of our young dancers, singers and musicians,” West Virginia Youth Symphony Orchestra General Manager Marjorie Cooke said in a email. “We each represent the Official Youth Ballet, Chorus and Youth Symphony in the state of West Virginia, as designated by the West Virginia Legislature.

Marjorie Cooke

Marjorie Cooke is the West Virginia Youth Symphony Orchestra General Manager.

“We are each proud of our organization’s individual accomplishments, as well as this unique collaboration designed to let young emerging artists perform with other young emerging artists for young people and adult audience members alike,” Cooke said. “Artistically, we hope to expose young people to a beautiful, live performance including children performing in three disciplines – choral singing, ballet dancing and orchestral classical music playing. We hope to inspire other young artists, as well as increase audiences of tomorrow with a collaboration with approximately 150 RCYBE, ACC and WVYS students on stage and in the pit.

“A fairy tale theme will weave the performance together and garner excitement among the school children and young families,” Cooke added.

The West Virginia Youth Symphony is made up of more than 125 student musicians from 10 counties throughout the Mountain State.

Tickets for the 7:30 p.m. performance of “The Wizard of Oz” can be purchased through the Clay Center box office. Tickets cost $13.50 each for adults and children.

Tickets and additional information about the morning school performance are available at the River City Youth Ballet Ensemble website, www.rcyb.org, or by calling the RCYBE offices at 304-925-DANC (3262).

Metro reporter Clint Thomas can be reached at cthomas@cnpapers.com or by calling 304-348-1232.

 

One Month at a Time: Lending a voice to Clendenin choir’s annual performance

Courtesy photo. With scant rehearsal time and a worn copy of the score to Handel’s “Messiah,” reporter Bill Lynch joined the Clendenin United Methodist community choir’s annual performance of the Christmas classic.

By: Bill Lynch, Entertainment Reporter | Posted: Dec. 21, 2017 | Source: WV Gazette-Mail

After six months of singing bass in a barbershop chorus, I’d become a little brave. When I heard Clendenin United Methodist Church held an annual community singing of Handel’s “Messiah,” I signed up.

I’ve never been accused of being overly religious. But it seemed important that if I was going to spend some time exploring Christmas, I needed to acknowledge the reason for the season, which is the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ.

Arguments can be made that we’ve got the day and the month wrong, or that Christmas is an adaptation of old Pagan traditions, or that the current practice of Christmas has less and less to do with faith and more with commerce. (more…)

Clendenin Christmas Celebration Hosted by Clendenin Homecoming Festival

As a warmup for the Clendenin Christmas Parade that was held on Saturday, December 9th, the Clendenin Homecoming Festival held a fun event at the Rec Center in Clendenin the night prior in which they had a Christmas decoration competition. The following morning, just hours before the parade, Breakfast with Santa was held at Momma Payne’s Restaurant.

Mayor Shana Clendenin invited County Commissioner Ben Salango to assist with the judging of the lights and decorations around town. Homes and businesses were judged, and trophies were awarded for first, second, and third place in each category. (more…)