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Lose yourself to dance

“We were super excited to dance on the dock by the Chief,” they said. “We’ve been really wanting to dance by the water like that, especially with how nice out it’s been this week in North Bay.”

You may have noticed over the past few days a troupe of dancers clad in black clothes and goggles around town, breaking into their musical performance—a mix of contemporary styles, street, and urban.

This is Gadfly.

From Discovery North Bay, during the Farmer’s Market, to the dock by the Chief Commanda, to their final performance at the Capitol Centre stage this weekend, Gadfly has been taking dance to the streets to help expose people of the community to the joys of expressing their selves through art.

Alyssa Petrolo, Daniel Gomez, Caitlin Superville, Samara Tong, and Peter D’Souza—members of the dance group—have been looking forward to this week, getting the opportunity to take advantage of sunny summer days this week to take their performances off the stage.

“We were super excited to dance on the dock by the Chief,” they said. “We’ve been really wanting to dance by the water like that, especially with how nice out it’s been this week in North Bay.”

A part of this year’s 4th Annual On The Edge Fringe Festival, Gadlfy has been bucking the trend and taking its performances off the stage and to the public at a dozen locations across four days, before their closing performance at the Capitol Centre at 8:45 p.m., August 19.

“We are definitely taking dance to the people this time, not so much trying to bring the people to dance,” Bernard Penney, OntarioDances animateur said.

Under the direction of Artistic Directors, Apolonia Velasquez and Ofilio Sinbadinho, Gadfly is an Urban Dance repertory company and choreography unit powered by passion.

“We’re here to try and expose dance more to North Bay and we want people to get more involved,” the troupe said. “Which is why we’re doing shows around the city instead of just on the stage. It’s more interactive, we can talk to people and get them to come and dance with us—It’s more engaging for the crowd to be right next to us when we perform.”

Coming from all backgrounds, dance has a similar but different meaning for each member of Gadfly.

“I was never really good with words growing up,” D’Souza said. “But dance has always been my way of expressing myself, and it’s good to see others express themselves too this week.”

Gadfly was especially excited for people to come see the final performance of the week, which will be a more complete performance.

This event is funded by the Ontario Arts Council (OAC) and delivered by the Capitol Centre. This OAC funding under the OntarioDances Program, now in its eighth year, is to promote dance by building on existing audiences while creating new audiences. Each of the scheduled pop-up dances will be streamed live and through social media.

In addition, local dancers of Global Groove will be performing a choreographed piece at the waterfront Saturday, August 19.

For the complete schedule:

FRIDAY AUGUST 18

  • Noon Capitol Centre (Main St. entrance), 150 Main Street East, North Bay

  • 2:30 p.m. Waterfront Beach, Memorial Park Drive, North Bay

  • 6:15 p.m. North Bay Mall, Lakeshore Drive, North Bay

SATURDAY AUGUST 19

  • 11:00 a.m. Discovery North Bay, Oak Street, North Bay

  • 1:00 p.m. Downtown Buskers’ Stage, Pedestrian Underpass & Memorial Drive

  • 8:45 p.m. Capitol Centre – Fringe Festival – 150 Main Street East, North Bay

     

     


Ryen Veldhuis

About the Author: Ryen Veldhuis

Writer. Photographer. Adventurer. An avid cyclist, you can probably spot him pedaling away around town.
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