NUS Dance Synergy

@nusdancesynergy NUSDanceSynergy

NUS Dance Synergy is a contemporary dance group that aims to achieve recognition for challenging movement and minds with a process-driven dance pedagogy and for winning hearts as a socially conscious arts group.

Founded in 1978 as the NUS Jazz Ballet Group, the dance company was renamed NUS Dance Synergy in 1994. Under Mr Fan Dong Kai, their former Artistic Director, the group primarily performed lyrical jazz works and established its culture of warmly welcoming dancers with a keen interest in learning dance. Synergy has since evolved to become a community of contemporary dancers who are committed to refining their craft through exploration and experimentation. The group is currently guided by Artistic Director and Resident Choreographer Ms Yarra Ileto and Technique Tutor Mr Albert Tiong.

Focusing on the values of Inquisitiveness, Awareness, Cohesiveness and Dedication, Synergy’s dancers undergo elementary and intermediate technique training weekly, with a progressive framework that allows them to continuously improve and excel in contemporary dance. Synergy seeks out-of-the-ordinary opportunities to question, explore and discover new forms of expression. This includes site-specific and cross-disciplinary performances that challenge artistic boundaries and encourage its dancers to be bold and daring in their own creation of movement.

Beyond an interest in purely practice and performance, Synergy believes in the power of dance to do good in communities and promotes Community, Outreach and Engagement (COE) efforts amongst members by engaging with diverse communities in Singapore to spread the joy, appreciation, and benefits of contemporary dance. This includes dance workshops and interactive sessions planned for targeted communities, such as the elderly and youths, that promotes dance as a sustainable and inclusive activity for all.

 

Key Past Events

2022 NUS Arts Festival Opening Show, Incandescent – A City that Never Sleeps
2021 NUS ExxonMobil Campus Concerts, Venture 4.0
2020 NUS Arts Festival Road Show, Focality: Where We Nest
2019 Fuse(d), Moving Thoughts
2019 NUS ExxonMobil Campus Concerts,TL;DR 
2018 NUS Arts Festival Opening Show, On The Shoulders of Giants (in collaboration with Electronic Music Lab)
2018 40th Anniversary Performance, #HumansofSynergy

Awards and Achievements

2022 Production of the Year — Incandescent — A City that Never Sleeps, 13th Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards
2022 Outstanding Community Service of the Year — Helping Hands, Moving Bodies 2.0, 13th Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards
2021 Outstanding Community Service Award, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards (Honourable Mention)
2019 Outstanding Community Service Award, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards
2018 Outstanding Community Service Award, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards
2017 Original Work of the Year, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards with the 2017 Commonwealth Short Story Prize Performance
2016 Outstanding Community Service Award, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards
2014 Production of the Year, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards with Traces
2012 Production of the Year, Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards with Hereafter

Yarra Ileto

Artistic Director and Resident Choreographer

Ileto holds a Master of Arts in Pedagogy and Practice with Distinction from Goldsmith University, London, and graduated with a BA First Class Honours Degree in Performing Arts (Dance) at LASALLE College of the Arts. Ileto joined T.H.E Dance Company as one of the pioneer full-time members, and performed in all the company’s works from 2008 to January 2015. She has toured extensively in Asia and Europe, working with noted choreographers such as Cheuk Yin Mui, Xing Liang, Zhang Xiaoxiong, Boi Sakti, Dimo Kirilov and Kwik Swee Boon to name a few.

She has also choreographed works for T.H.E Main Company, T.H.E Second Company and several local Universities and Colleges. In 2017, she received the Young Artist Award, Singapore’s highest honour for young people in the arts. Since then, Yarra has worked as a professional freelance dance artist, choreographer and instructor, choreographing and performing in M1 Contact Contemporary Dance Festival, M1 Fringe Festival and the Joint Dance Congress in Adelaide, Australia, 2018. That same year, she was appointed the Artistic Director of NUS Dance Synergy’s On the Shoulders of Giants, which opened the NUS Arts Festival 2018, marking NUS Centre For the Arts’ 25th Anniversary.

Albert Tiong

Technique Tutor

Albert Tiong graduated from the Hong Kong Academy of Performing Arts on a full scholarship. He was a professional dancer with Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan, a guest artist with Hong Kong Dance Company, a principal dancer with Odyssey Dance Theatre of Singapore, and the Singapore representative for the World Dance Alliance Asia-Pacific Dance Bridge 2007 Artist Showcase. Albert taught contemporary dance and yoga extensively in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, The People’s Association (PA), and was also a contemporary dance lecturer at LASALLE College of the Arts and Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts. He is currently a lecturer at Singapore Raffles Music College (Dance Faculty), NUS Dance Synergy and T.H.E Dance Company.

 

Albert has been invited to carry out academic exchanges with the Beijing Dance Academy (China), Macau Academy of Performing Arts (Dance School) and was one of the contemporary dance teachers who were invited to participate in the Beijing Dance Festival teaching week.

 

Albert was also the resident choreographer and training master for Frontier Danceland from 2007 – 2011, and founded Re:Dance Theatre in 2012. At the same time, he has created countless dance works and full-length works, which were performed both locally and abroad. Some of his works include performances for the Singapore International Festival of Arts, Esplanade da:ns Festival, M1 CONTACT Contemporary Dance Festival, M1 Fringe Festival, NUS Arts Festival, Huayi – Chinese Festival of Arts, and others across the USA, Malaysia, Japan, Macau, China, Korea, Australia, Hong Kong. His work Traces (2014) won the Production of the Year at the Tan Ean Kiam Arts Awards in 2014.