Ballet Students’ Grace Should Carry Over To Life, Teacher Believes Dancers Schooled In Substance Over Style

At the 16th-annual Columbia Ballet Theatre’s spring concert Friday and Saturday, the words “dance recital” will cross no one’s mind.

The school’s 36 students perform one of the most professional theater productions staged in Spokane Community College’s Lair Auditorium.

Sets are by Spokane artist Val Pate, the lights by lighting professional Richard Adams. Costumes are original.

The annual event is a showcase of parental involvement, children’s sweat and the philosophy of the lone teacher, Katherine Crow. Amid the chaos of modern childhood, Crow paves a well-lit pathway to adulthood - through ballet.

“If you fall, you get up,” Crow says. “It’s the grace you get up with that matters.”

Among her students, ages 3 to 19, are those who lack genetically perfect “ballet bodies.” A student may have curvature of the spine, a femur turned inward, a weight problem or a misshapen limb. All dance without a trace of self-consciousness.

Crow emphasizes nutrition, not weight, muscle groups, never body type. Costumes are deliberately unadorned - the better to see the child.

“Katherine is more than a ballet teacher, she’s more of an educator for all of life,” says parent Shirley Riley.

“She pushes us to love what we do,” says Cesa Kobe-Smith, who came home from Western Washington University eager to rejoin the minicompany.

“When I’m dancing in Bellingham, I don’t have to feel anything, but just watching rehearsal here I started crying.”

Crow’s style first became obvious at the YWCA where she taught for a decade, attracting traditional and nontraditional ballet students including homeless children.

Since opening her own school in 1990, her philosophy has grown clearer: to incorporate as many talented adults into her students’ lives, to give them as broad a performing arts experience as possible, and to teach skills for the real world.

A typical Crow lesson starts with 3-year-olds holding hands in a circle. They learn not to tug on one another, not to dominate, to be aware that someone may be having a bad day.

She tells students: Pay attention to others. You’re part of a bigger picture. Respect your body and yourself.

“If they can dance like that, they can live like that,” Crow says.

“I get the image of a springboard,” says artist Val Pate. “She’s helping them get up the ladder before they make that next step into life.”

Raised in Baltimore and Birmingham, Ala., Crow, 49, earned a fine arts degree in dance, performed professionally, and taught at the University of California-Santa Cruz before moving to the Spokane area 18 years ago.

Classically trained in ballet, she also teaches modern dance and movement classes at her studio, 918 S. Cedar. She is married to Ron Murray and has two grown children and one grandchild.

Crow also choreographs and assists a troupe of mentally ill adults participating in a Washington State University research project. The study’s premise is that performing arts improve people’s self-esteem and self-confidence and prepare them for work and school.

“We all feel better when we sing and dance,” she says.

The spring concert has outgrown high school auditoriums and is lavish enough to attract patrons. The company draws heavily on parents - artist Pate is Leah’s dad. Adams is Jonathan’s dad.

Parents have become so emotional they’ve forgotten to pull the curtain.

“It’s a full-body, full-mind experience,” says Richard Adams.

“It isn’t bumblebees in point shoes,” says Pate.

It is also distinctly Crow. For three years one student refused to go on stage. She stood beside, calmly supporting the child’s decision. The fourth year, the student performed.

Another year, the reel-to-reel tape stopped and the entire company froze for a long delay. When the tape was repaired, they resumed in perfect synch. The audience exploded.

“It’s all about building information for growing up and coping with the real world,” Crow says.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: PERFORMANCE Columbia Ballet Theatre to perform at Spokane Community College’s Lair Auditorium Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m. Tickets are $4.