Many of the members of Legend Dance Company have been dancing for 20 years. The group includes mostly non-dance majors who have been dancing all their lives, but wanted to pursue a different path in college. As a happy medium, they are a part of the tight-knit RSO focused on various types of dance.

“Because I’m not majoring in dance, I wanted to be able to dance in college,” said Brett Eaton, senior in FAA. “So this is just the perfect balance between having a performing group and then being able to balance schoolwork.”

Legend Dance Company was co-created in 1995 by a male and female student, Jeremy Glass and Sasha Vargas, who wanted to establish a dance troupe for non-dance majors at the University. The first group show was in 1996, and since then, Legend has been featuring a variety of different styles in their performances: ballet, hip-hop, jazz, lyrical, modern, pointe and tap.

There are 15 members of Legend Dance Company for the 2012-13 school year. Unlike other companies on campus, which may have as many as 30 members, Legend is a small group where the members are all close friends, said Legend member Becca Braida, senior in AHS.

Several different majors and ages are represented in the Legend troupe.

“We have some girls in sororities, but some of us are not,” Eaton said. “Some are engineering, some health majors, we have a dance major, I’m an art major.”

Another thing that sets Legend apart from other dance RSOs is that the troupe doesn’t focus on one genre of dance; it encompasses a wide assortment of styles, depending on each member’s experience.

“Since we’re all self-choreographed, the people on the troupe can pick whatever style they want to do,” said Jacqueline Handley, senior in Engineering and president of Legend Dance Company. “That’s kind of nice so you can get a lot of variety.”

The choreography goes through a cycle; each person gets a chance to choreograph a dance for a week, choosing the song, style and number of people to perform. There are three two-and-a-half-hour rehearsals each week, where the girls review the dances, go over choreography and prepare for the next performance.

“We do guest performances, charity performances, sporting events, talent shows, and then sometimes we’ll have alum contact us (about other performances),” Handley said.

Legend performed on Quad Day in August, and each year they have a spring show in late April at the Lincoln Hall Theater.

“A few months ago, we did a date auction that was held (at the Union), then we ended up auctioning ourselves off as a team,” said Alisa Holtman, senior in Engineering and treasurer of Legend Dance Company. The auction, she said, raised money to fight breast cancer.

The girls also performed at a women’s volleyball game earlier this year, and they often do charity performances such as the date auction.

They hold auditions for new members at the start of every school year, and everyone tries out — even current members — so prospective dancers start on equal footing as veteran Legend dancers.

Presently, the troupe is all girls, but Legend welcomes anyone to audition in the fall.

Above all, the members of Legend enjoy coming together to dance and spend time with each other, whether it’s at practices, bonding activities or performances.

“Legends is a huge part of my college life,” Eaton said. “We’re all from different dance studios, and so some of us have learned one style, one learned the other, and for us to be able to share those different techniques or different dance moves is really cool.”

Reema can be reached at [email protected].