MANDATE
To meet and collaborate over drama and dance activities and events that educate, challenge and further our members’ interests in the broad field of dance and drama.

MEMBERSHIP
​Dance:

• Criteria: potential members should either have a practical or research background in any dance form, or a strong interest in actively supporting the dance field.  
• Current members include a broad range of practitioners including dancers, choreographers, teachers, historians, critics, writers and administrators who work in a variety of dance genres.

Drama: 

• Criteria: potential members should either have a practical or research background in drama, or a strong interest in actively supporting the dramatic arts.
• Current members include a broad range of practitioners including actors, writers and teachers.

​SECTION MEETINGS
The Dance Section and the Drama Section are currently meeting together. They usually meet informally, often planned in connection with scheduled Dance or Drama Section events, to take place just prior to the event. More formal meetings for future planning of events are scheduled as required. There are approximately three meetings per season.  

SECTION ACTIVITIES
Dance:

• Appointment of a Dancer-in-Residence each season since 2011. The artist presents two performances during the season, the first is an informal rehearsal with Q&A and the second  performance occurs near the end of the season.  
• Occasionally host small performances of local performing organizations. In the past these have included Toronto Heritage Dance, Ballet Jorgen, Canadian Contemporary Dance Theatre, various solo performances.
• Periodically host scholarly Dance Research presentations
• Occasionally hold movement and dance workshops and classes
• Participate and collaborate in other section events, i.e. Art Exhibitions, Concert Series
• Planning and executing an annual Dance Salon event to reach a wider audience of Club members and their guests

Drama:

• Appoint a Playwright-in-Residence.
• Present an annual Drama Salon to reach a wider audience of Club members and the public.
• Hold workshops lead by the Playwright-in-residence.
• Attend theatre productions with an introduction by the playwright, director or member of the cast.
• Participate and collaborate in other section events.

PLANS FOR THE FUTURE

• Day trips and performance outings with reduced group rate tickets

​CURRENT CHAIR
Jane Spooner trained in classical ballet although she enjoyed a long professional career as a geologist and consultant in the minerals industry. Retirement gives her the time to return to her early love of dance and allowed her to publish “A Life Well Danced” which explores the relationships between dancers and teachers influenced by the Russian classical tradition of the late nineteenth century. She is very aware of the importance of preserving dance history and the context of its development, and serves as Chair of the Board of Dance Collection Danse, Canada’s dance archives. She was appointed to the Board of ProArteDanza in 2024. With Jan Garvey, Selma Odom and Mary Jane Warner, Jane contributed “Terpsichore: Delighting in Dance” to “Musings”, the Anthology published by the Heliconian Club in 2021. She and Kathleen Fraser, a former member of the Club and author of “Before They Were Belly Dancers: European Accounts of Female Entertainers in Egypt, 1760-1870”, presented “Flirting with Terpsichore: Scholarly Obsessions in Dance” at the Dance Salon in 2018. Jane serves on the Planners Committee of the Club.

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