Keisha Grant. Photo: Chris Nash
After starting dance lessons aged three, and training in the West Midlands and London, Birmingham-born dancer and choreographer Keisha Grant knows a thing or two about dance education.
Brought up in Kingshurst, Castle Bromwich, Keisha, now 26, attended the Maureen Smith School of Dance where she learnt tap, jazz, and modern. After training at the Laban School of dance and studying dance at Roehampton UNiversity, Keisha is now choreographing a new work to be performed at The Patrick Centre, Birmingham Hippodrome, this Friday. But in her early years she never envisaged making a professional career out of dancing.
“I wasn’t very confident, but I had a lot of support and won a couple of most promising dancer awards.
“When I was younger I didn’t even think I would be a dancer – it was a hobbie – even though I always loved it I didn’t think I would earn money from it.”
After training in London, Keisha spent a gap year with Birmingham-based company ACE Dance and Music and has now gone on to produce three works entirely choreographed by herself.
Keisha says although her work is in the contemporary technique, and the foundations of her dancing came from her training, she is heavily inspired by African Diaspora movements – as well as capoeira, tap and jazz. After seeing how dance is taught in Birmingham and in the capital, Keisha feels the West Midlands could be doing a whole lot more to promote contemporary dance.
“On the whole there is scope to push things – a lot of schools want dance, even as an after school club – but it’s about making kids aware of contemporary.”
Keisha said while the West Midlands has a number of brilliant dance clubs and schools, it offers little for those wanting to take it further as a career, with dancers have to travel further afield for vocational courses.
“I’ve seen a lot of schools where kids only do one style. People can feel intimidated [by contemporary] – it can get too intellectual. If you open up what contemporary can be – you can infuse the genres together – then they see contemporary is where they can start experimenting.”
Her latest works, performed at The Patrick Centre, Birmingham Hippodrome’s DanceXchange venue, on Friday 2 October is the first time Keisha has choreographed on a male dancer, and her first duet.
She will be performing with Sean Graham in the piece, which explores a potentially sexual, but platonic relationship.
“I have found it quite challenging [choreographing on a male body] and I have realised how much I embrace my own sexuality in my choreography. The last piece I did was two girls, and it was quite playful and jokey, but you can’t really do that on a male.”
Keisha Grant will be performing in a Triple Bill of new West Midlands talent, alongside choreography from Laura Dredgor (who will performing her piece herself after a change in the programme), and Kate Mason’s piece Table Football Club -WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT? at The Patrick Centre, Birmingham Hippodrome on Friday at 8pm. For more information see DanceXchange’s website.
