ABOUT —

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

OCTOBER 10, 2020 – Dancing Alone Together is winding down. The website will continue to post classes through the end of 2020, however the social media accounts will be taking a hiatus.

Thank you for your support through these past seven months. It has been truly remarkable to witness this online dance community unite so quickly and boldly adapt to the circumstances. Dancing Alone Together was conceived as a stopgap solution for providing access to digital dance resources until studios could recalibrate and reopen. Most essentially have now, either virtually or physically.

Please continue to support your local dance organizations. Thriving artists are essential to thriving communities.

DANCING ALONE TOGETHER

Created on March 16, 2020, Dancing Alone Together was constructed in response to COVID-19 closures with the mission of being a central resource for the rapidly growing digital dance world. The platform operated as a website and Instagram account, both of which began phasing out in late 2020.

Dancing Alone Together did not host classes or events, but rather collected information about the following types of online opportunities to make them easily accessible:

MOVE — Live-Streamed Dance Classes
In the spirit of togetherness and shared experiences, MOVE’s emphasis is was live-streamed classes and workshops as opposed to pre-recorded videos. The website listing focused on dance classes (no fitness, wellness, mindfulness, etc.)

CREATE — Dance-Making Prompts
CREATE featured virtual initiatives for movement-making, online creative communities, and choreography opportunities.

WATCH — Dance Performance Footage & Films
WATCH plugged the professional companies, presenters, and venues around the world who have made dance performances and dance films available online.

THE CREATOR

Dancing Alone Together was created and run by Katherine Disenhof, a professional dancer whose work was significantly impacted by COVID closures. For more about Katherine, please refer to the press articles below or visit katherinedisenhof.com

PRESS

Dancing Alone Together: Shared Classes, Movement

By Nancy Rosenbaum, iPondr, 2.10.2021

“When COVID lockdowns shuttered dance studios around the world, one dancer decided to do something about it.”

Meet the Dancer Behind Dancing Alone Together, Instagram's Go-To Hub for Virtual Classes

By Haley Hilton, Dance Teacher Magazine, 9.2.2020

“On March 13, Katherine Disenhof and her NW Dance Project peers were shocked to learn that their company was shutting down for (an optimistic) two weeks, which soon became an indefinite furlough. Shortly after walking away from the studio, Disenhof noticed virtual dance classes beginning to pop up on her social-media feed. “I realized this pandemic is a shared, global experience,” Disenhof says. “I saw dance as a unifying force that would keep people together.””

An Ad Hoc Hub for Digital Dance

By Emmaly Wiederholt, Stance on Dance, 4.20.2020

“Katherine Disenhof is the one-woman show behind Dancing Alone Together, a website she launched in March that has become a hub for the increasing number of virtual classes, performances and creative prompts being offered as a lifeline to dance artists during the coronavirus pandemic. Here, she shares how the website has grown, some of the unexpected ways it’s being used, and what she foresees is the future of digital dance.”

After layoff, Portland dancer turns website into popular collaboration space

By Rebecca J. Ritzel, The Oregonian/OregonLive, 4.8.2020

“One of the most popular pandemic websites for dancers — from appreciative amateurs to laid-off Broadway stars — isn’t an advice page from the CDC or a source for DIY mask patterns, but an online repository of classes and streaming performances created by a Portland dancer.”

How This Dancer Created the Go-To Hub for Virtual Classes in One Weekend

By Lauren Wingenroth, Dance Magazine, 4.2.2020

“When dancer Katherine Disenhof found out her company, NW Dance Project, would be shutting down indefinitely due to the coronavirus pandemic (on Friday the 13th, no less), she immediately went in search of ways to stay connected and in shape.”

Dancing Alone Together

By Irene Hsiao, Chicago Reader, 4.2.2020

“Dances are made in time and space, a minute or an hour in a dancer’s life never to be seen again. Dances do not last—they have to be made new each time and evaporate as they are appearing. Today, small freedoms—moving, gathering, and connecting—have been restricted to limit the movement of a virus that, whether we want to admit it or not, is showing us just how connected we are.”