Press releases

VITEBSK, 6 April (BelTA) – Vitebsk will host the fifth edition of the international interuniversity modern dance festival Make a Step Forward! that will gather over 200 participants from 18 higher educational establishments of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine, BelTA learned from the Vitebsk State Academy of Veterinary Medicine.

Best student dance companies from Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine (Minsk, Vitebsk, Polotsk, Moscow, Smolensk, Saint Petersburg, Velikiye Luki, Rostov-on-Don, and Kiev) will compete in different genres till 9 April. The official opening ceremony of the festival will be held at the Yakub Kolas National Academic Drama Theater on 6 April.

The competitors will be divided into two groups. The first one will feature companies performing show-dance, krump, jazz-funk, hip-hop. The participants of the second group will not only perform modern, jazz-modern, and contemporary dances but will also present to the audience their reflections on the topic Dream in Loud Silence in the form of one-act ballets. The money prize of the festival has become bigger. The organizers do not reveal the secret of the main prize but promise that it will be something special.

The program of the festival also includes workshops, meetings, and educational events by famous choreographers Alexander Zenchenko, Olga Labovkina, and Alexander Natarov.

The participants of the festival will take part in the campaign City of Friends – City of Vitebsk to pay tribute to the victims of the Great Patriotic War and to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the Great Victory. They will lay flowers at the memorial in honor of the Soviet soldiers-liberators, partisans and underground fighters.

The festival has been organized by the Vitebsk State Academy of Veterinary Medicine and the BRSM Youth Union with the support of the Federation of Trade Unions of Belarus.