Going swimmingly Bangor Youth Ballet prepares original production of ‘The Little Mermaid’

A row of girls in pale pink tights and black leotards lined up along the edge of the fourth-floor dance studio at the Thomas School of Dance last weekend, giggling to themselves and playing with their hair. Rehearsals for the Bangor Youth Ballet’s production of “The Little Mermaid” have been held here since February.

The opening performance will be Sunday, June 18, at Bangor High School, and the 32-person company of young dancers are putting on the final touches. It’s been a four-month process of endless rehearsals, homemade costumes and sets, and good old-fashioned hard work – from the cast to the all-volunteer crew – and everyone was a little antsy about getting started with that day’s practice.

The ballerinas age 11 and under took their positions, while the other dancers flopped down in a pile on the far side of the studio to watch their classmates practice their scene from the original ballet, conceived and choreographed by Bangor Youth Ballet artistic director Heinrick Snyder.

Their instructor, Thomas School of Dance owner and director Jane Bragg, called for their attention.

“If you are not dancing, keep your zippers on!” she shouted, miming zipping her mouth shut.

“Well, we are dancing, so we can jabber!” said one dancer, jumping with anticipation to begin. The girls had been gossiping about losing their baby teeth, and giggling about the hunky Prince Gustav, played by 16-year-old Bangor High School student Ben Malone.

“Well, you need to keep them on too!” Bragg said, sternly but kindly, her silver hair swept up with a tortoiseshell clip, pink satin ballet slippers peeking out from beneath her jeans.

The thunderous sounds of the “Storm” sequence from Rossini’s opera “William Tell” blared over the speakers, as the girls bounded and leaped across the floor, arms raised, conveying the destructive power of the hurricane. The storm wrecks Prince Gustav’s ship, leaving him stranded on a rock. The Little Mermaid, Cecelia, played by the lithe, delicate Erin Vasil, 17, of Swanville, finds him there and falls in love with him.

One doesn’t normally associate a fourth-grader with hurricane-force strength, but talk to Mikayla Lindsay, a Bangor dancer who’s 91/2 (almost 10), and you’ll see that she’s very serious about her craft.

“The hurricane scene is so interesting because it’s so different,” said the ballerina. “There’s a lot of moving of the arms. But I like the piranha scene, too. We jump up and down a lot, and it’s really upbeat.”

Her friend, dancer Skyler McLean, a 10-year-old from Amherst, agreed.

“We move around a lot,” she said. “I’m a tropical fish, too, so we follow around the Little Mermaid like pets.”

Downstairs from the studio, Bangor Youth Ballet vice president Lee Bickerstaff and costume designer Bonny Black daubed shimmering green paint onto plastic vines for one of the many costumes created for the ballet – when you have to clothe piranhas, caimans, butterflies, tropical fish, parrots, sea foam and a bunch of mermaids, there’s a lot of sewing to do.

“We’ve been down here all day, every day, for weeks,” said Bickerstaff with a laugh. “Thank God Jo-Ann Fabric had ocean-related stuff half-off. It’s hard work, but it keeps us out of trouble.”

The costumes for this production are full of sparkles and shimmers, with subdued, dreamy shades of blue and bold greens and yellows. They’re all made by volunteers, mostly parents, some of whom drive their children from as far away as Deer Isle every day to practice. This year’s ballet also features new set pieces and a backdrop, thanks to a successful fundraiser last winter that brought in several thousand dollars.

It has been worth the effort so far. For many of the dancers involved, this is the first ballet they have performed in, and the excitement shows in the levels of energy maintained after months of practice.

The impetus for Snyder’s original version of Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale came several years back.

“This has been gestating for about two years,” said Snyder, 41. “I read the story and thought it was a potential ballet. What the Little Mermaid goes through in the story appealed to me. She can’t make [the Prince] love her, so the only way she can return to the sea is if she kills him. But her love is so deep she can’t bring herself to do it. It’s the tragedy of trying to be something you’re not.”

The dances he has created for the ballet offer challenges for both the younger dancers (overseen by Bragg and ballet mistress Samantha Lott) and the older, more experienced ones, who have been taught by Snyder himself. It also involves some unexpected elements, including the scene in which Prince Gustav and his sailors celebrate the Prince’s birthday. Snyder has choreographed the scene to include a dance similar to a sailor’s hornpipe, with lots of clapping hands and syncopated rhythms.

In Snyder’s vision of the story, South American themes abound, especially in the character of the Sea Witch, who gives Cecelia her legs. Here she is a jaguar named Papaya who lives in the Amazon and is played by 16-year-old Brooke Black, an Eddington resident and student at John Bapst Memorial High School.

“This is my first real big solo,” said the dark-haired, graceful Black. “It’s classical, but it’s still so different. It’s a new character that no one is used to, and it’s very dramatic, which is fun.”

Malone, the Prince, is a relative newcomer to ballet. He started dancing only last October, but already he has landed a lead role. High athletic plies and confident lifts during his pas de deux with Princess Anna show that’s he’s progressed rapidly, considering the short amount of time he’s been learning.

“Around last September I heard they needed dancers for the Robinson Ballet,” said Malone. “I tried it out, and now I love it. It’s all I do now. I’ve been doing really intensive training. I’ve been instantly immersed in it. You learn it quickly that way, like a language.”

And it’s a language that all the student dancers have been learning, from the smallest butterfly to the Little Mermaid herself.

The Bangor Youth Ballet’s production of “The Little Mermaid” will be performed at 3 p.m. Sunday, June 18, at Peakes Auditorium, Bangor High School, and at 7 p.m. Saturday, June 24, at the Reach Performing Arts Center in Deer Isle. Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for children, available at Thomas School of Dance, Patrick’s Hallmark Shop and the Grasshopper Shop, all in Bangor. For information, call 945-3457. Emily Burnham may be reached at eburnham@bangordailynews.net.