Kettering dance students win places on prestigious performing arts courses

Three girls from Kettering have been celebrating their success after winning places on prestigious performing arts courses.

Erin Rose and Zarah Minney, both 18, will be heading to the Stella Mann College of Performing Arts in Bedford to study a three-year course in dance while Lucy Heald, also 18, has won a place in the National Youth Theatre (NYT) Company.

All three girls have been dancing at the Anderson School of Dance under teacher Christy Anderson since they were young.

Erin said: "I'm so excited, I have been dancing my whole life. I started doing ballet, then I started doing tap and then more recently things like modern.

"At Stella Mann, they train you in absolutely everything."

One of the things Erin is most looking forward to is dancing all day, every day. The Southfield School for Girls student said: "Because I have been at sixth form doing normal subjects and then dancing in the evenings, I can't wait to be doing my favourite subject, dance, all day."

Zarah is also a student at Southfield and will be heading to Stella Mann with Erin. She said: "I literally did the audition and two days later I found out (I had a place). It was my first audition, I auditioned at five schools.

"My mum put me in classes because I wasn't very confident and it made me a lot more confident."

Zarah says she loves ballet and jazz but is looking forward to learning partner work, like dance lifts, at Stella Mann because she's never done it before.

Lucy, who had a year out after finishing school at KBA, said: "I'm so excited, Miss Anderson always encourages us to go to auditions.

"I did some for drama schools as well, I went to an audition for NYT, I think I found it online and it sounded good.

"I auditioned in June and I originally thought I hadn't got in because the email had gone to my junk, so I thought I hadn't heard back. When I found the email, I had to read it twice to believe it!"

The NYT summer course is virtual this year, but Lucy hopes to take part in other courses later on. She has a membership with the NYT until she is 25 and said: "There's lots of different workshops and things like that, it's like a different way into the industry."

Miss Anderson said: "It's so nice to celebrate it, all three of them are lovely girls and all help with younger students.

"The little ones absolutely love them because they help with their classes. It's such a shame they haven't been able to say goodbye."

Unfortunately, due to the current situation, the dance school has been closed since March and their summer showcase has been cancelled.

Miss Anderson said: "We do a show at the Lighthouse Theatre every other year and they were really excited to be finishing on a big show and say bye to everybody.

"It's so sad for them. We can't even get together to say bye."

The three girls expressed their regret that the show was cancelled, with Zarah saying: "We were all meant to have our show and obviously we're not doing that anymore."

Erin said: "It's so disappointing, we wanted to go out with a bang."

Lucy added: "It's meant to be my last show, I've probably done about seven or eight shows."

Despite the disappointment of the cancelled show, Miss Anderson has been telling them they'll get to do lots of performances on their courses and the girls have all said they'll be back to see future Anderson School of Dance shows.