Friday, August 4, 2017 5 Brooklin Town Crier Local Dancer In CNE Rising Star Competition When 12 year old Keira Doran takes to the stage on Aug. 18 at the CNE's Rising Star competition, it will be one more step towards her goal of becoming a professional dancer. The St. Leo's grade 7 student has dreamed of it since age 3 when she began dance lessons in Brooklin. The CNE Rising Star, now in its 31st year, showcases young artists between ages 6 and 21 in a variety of disciplines, all vying against each other in a sort of open talent competition for anyone in Ontario. There are two age brackets: junior for ages 6-12 (where Keira will be) and youth for those 13-21. Contestants are judged on their natural ability, audience appeal, stage presence and the quality of their performance. The Grand Champion of the junior competition will receive $1,000 with the youth competition winner receiving $2,500. From the outset, Keira seemed destined for a life in the music arts. Her mother Barb, father and older brother are all involved in music as sing- ers or songwriters, or both. In fact Keira's older brother Matt, now 15, himself competed in the CNE competition in 2014. Copied steps "Even when she was tiny, age 3," Barb Doran recalls, "Keira was trying to copy the dance steps of whoever she saw, Rihanna, anyone. She's always had a natural stage presence and a great feel for music, probably because of the musicality of the family." By the age of eight and taking lessons at Oshawa's Step With Style dance studio, Keira had already decided this was to be her future. To that end, she practices about 20-25 hours per week in variety of dance types, from ballet to lyrical dance, a form of storytelling but with less emphasis on positions. When she takes to the CNE stage for her performance, she'll dance a contemporary solo to music written by her mother. "Yes, I'll get teary-eyed," Barb admits. It's not the first time though that Keira is in the CNE show. Three years ago, she and two fellow dancers formed a trio and had been accepted into the competition. However, she broke her ankle the day before the event and was off the dance floor for four months. Controlling nerves For this event, Barb Doran says Keira has matured greatly from the days when her nerves would get the better of her. "Sure, she's excited and a bit nervous which used to be one of her big stumbling blocks," she says. "She'd be okay in a group but alone was a problem. Now though she's learned to cope with it and feeling better." As to the future, Keira has that plan laid out. She and her mother recently returned from a five day long dance convention in New York which featured some of the best choreographers and dance teachers in the world. On some days, Keira danced for eight hours. The exhausting hours and training though have not deterred her from a dream of joining a professional dance troupe some day and then perhaps becoming a choreographer or teacher herself. "She'll come home after hours of dance, flop on the couch for a bit, then jump up and get going again," says Barb. "She can't sit still. She needs to be moving." The Rising Star event is free with all shows starting at 6:30 p.m. at the International Stage in the Enercare Centre. The preliminaries run from Aug. 18-21 with the semi-finals Aug. 28-29 and the finals on Sept. 2 Town Getting Calls About Newest Scam Please be advised that the Town of Whitby's switchboard has received 15 calls from residents complaining that someone pretending to be employed by the Town of Whitby has called to request access to their home to inspect water and gas pipe pressures. We have advised residents that these calls are not from the Town of Whitby and are a scam. Corporate Communications has retweeted the Region's warning about similar scams involving requests to inspect pipes. The Region's release, published in the July 21 BTC, can be found here: http://www.durham.ca/news.as p?health=no&type=NR&nr=dne ws/2017/Jul13171.htm