Nearly 70 women crowded into a brightly lit studio at the JCC on March 12 to celebrate the 40th anniversary — to the day — of DancEnergy in Marblehead. Founder Joyce Colahan, who still teaches five times a week, led the milestone class. She made it through to the last song before she started crying.
“The love I get from everybody… I feel so honored and privileged. I look back at it in awe,” she said of her career. “I had no idea when I started teaching that it would grow into this.”
Colahan, who lives in Marblehead, was a professional dancer and traveled the world with the Joyce Trisler Danscompany. She started teaching at Energy Works on Barnard Street in 1984 and has worked with more than 800 students since. DancEnergy, which moved to the JCC 10 years ago, has seven instructors leading a dozen classes every week.
Colahan’s students are devoted to her and her choreography.
“I’m 76 years old; this has kept me alive,” said Susan Stelk of Marblehead, who takes DancEnergy classes seven days a week.
Stelk added, “This is such a special thing. It’s not just a place to dance. People care about each other. We’re here for each other… when we have babies, when we lose spouses. Joyce created that caring feeling.”
Claudia Rodenstein has been taking DanceEnergy classes for 28 years and teaching them for a decade.
“Joyce has created a community that is supported through good and bad,” Rodenstein said. “She is at heart an artist and a caretaker. It’s a family, and she’s kind of the mom.”
Colahan choreographs four songs a year, and students spend about three months learning and perfecting each piece before moving on to the next. She estimates that she’s choreographed and taught more than 300 dances over the years. The songs range from George Michael hits in the ’80s to Ed Sheeran today.
“I find the music, and then I feel what the music is telling me to do,” Colahan said, describing her process.
She often choreographs in her head while she’s driving, she added.
On March 12, she led her class through the music, calling out each move and encouraging her students, who have a range of experience and talent.
Jane Key of Marblehead started with DancEnergy in the early days on Barnard Street. In 2011, she suffered a debilitating stroke but was back in class just six weeks later. She still comes, in her wheelchair, at least once a week, moving her arms to the music.
Asked what keeps her coming, she answered, “The dancing and the music, and the wonderful group of people.”
Colahan has no plans to retire any time soon.
“We’ll just keep going and going,” she said recently at the JCC, where the lobby was decorated for her anniversary with balloons and banners.
Students arrived with bouquets of flowers, gifts and cards.
Amy Forman of Swampscott has been devoted to Colahan and DanceEnergy for years.
“We would be bereft without her,” she said.
