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The UCLA Chinese Cultural Dance Club (CCDC) was founded
in February of 2000 by UCLA alumnae Kelley Lee, Nancy
Lu, and Cheery Yen in conjunction with UCLA alumna Josephine
Louie. Under the tutelage of Artistic Director Louie,
the UCLA Chinese Cultural Dance Club offered free
dance classes to the UCLA community with the vision
of sharing Chinese culture through dance. During its inaugural
year, the club drew just five members. These members took
their love for dance and began to perform in outreach
events to the UCLA community and the greater Los Angeles
area, aiming to fulfill the club’s vision.
Lotus Steps, the club’s annual dance showcase,
was originally conceived to be a free, professional
level, cultural event to which UCLA students and local
patrons could attend. The show was designed to carry
on the tradition of the club and its mission statement
of “sharing Chinese culture through dance”
on a yearly basis. With fifteen performers, two completed
dance pieces, and a single act, the first Lotus Steps
in November of 2000 had modest beginnings. Performed
in UCLA’s Northwest Campus Auditorium, it was
the club’s first major performance. As the years
passed, the evolution of the club and Lotus Steps surpassed
everybody’s expectations.
As membership increased and more dance classes were
offered, it became difficult for Louie to shoulder the
load. In October of 2001, Jessica Lee, an award winning
performer and choreographer, joined the UCLA Chinese
Cultural Dance Club as a freshman at UCLA and began
choreographing her own dance pieces for the club. The
duo of Louie and Lee provided a spark for the club enabling
it to produce both quality and quantity.
In the summer of 2002, Josephine invited six young girls,
ages seven to twelve, to participate in the club and Lotus
Steps. All six girls were from Families with Children
from China (FCC), an organization that provides a support
network for families who have adopted children from China.
Since then, a wonderful
collaboration has been formed between the two organizations
along with programs such as the “Big Sis, Li’l
Sis Program” through which college level girls in
the club mentor the younger girls from FCC.
The UCLA Chinese Cultural Dance Club currently stands at a membership of seventy. An average of ten performances per year is put on around UCLA and the surrounding Los Angeles community. Lotus Steps has grown so large that it now has its own production team and for the past three years has been held at UCLA"s prestigious Royce Hall which seats 1,818 audience members. Lotus Steps 2006 showcased over fifteen cultural dance pieces and one hundred performers. The performance featured collaborations with the Chinese Folk Dance Troupe at UCLA and The Assocation for Chinese Americans Lion Dance Team at UCLA.
The rapid growth of the club and its many successes is
attributed to the commitment of its members. Their love
of learning about the Chinese culture and performing arts
is what drives the club year after year. Lotus Steps is presented in the spring every year. The production features student and alumni-choreographed pieces borrow from classical, contemporary, ethnic, folk, and martial arts dance styles. Email ccdc@ucla.edu for more information.
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