We've enjoyed a number of performances over the years- I ask for HSD tickets for my birthday every…read moreyear- and we always have a blast. Every time! The choreography is so innovative and the dancers are incredibly strong, each with breathtaking range and immense depth of expression. A night at the Harris Theatre watching Hubbard Street dancers perform followed by dinner at nearby Acanto is my absolute favorite thing to do in Chicago!!

I love this place. It's great for adults, whether or not you have prior dance experience…read more Signing up for class is really easy, especially your first time. Just arrive early and sign up & pay with the person at the front desk. I've been to the Intermediate Modern and the Beginning Hip-Hop classes. In both, people are very accepting -- I have not gotten any judgmental vibes from other dancers, which is awesome! (Because growing up in the dance world, competition is all around you.) I have been driving here form the northern suburbs, and there is free street parking in the evenings. Just read the street signs & you should be fine!

My daughter *loves* her Tiny Movers Tap & Ballet class at Little Beans Cafe in Evanston. My hopes…read morewhen starting the classes last year were for my daughter to have some fun, develop her motor skills, and be introduced to dance...her teachers have fostered all that while also expertly handling the roller coaster of toddler behavior. The other local options for us seemed pretty hardcore -- I'm not trying to develop a prima ballerina at this age, I just want her to enjoy herself and move. Thanks Dance to EvOLvE.

Attended Magical Munchkins Tap and Ballet Class with my 2.5 year old. Pros: Nice instructors and…read morethe curriculum thoughtfully attempts to teach real techniques (i.e. heel-toe steps, pirouettes, plies, etc.) in a simplified manner. Class size was also small - only 4 total kids - while I don't think this was by design, it made the experience more manageable for my child. However, we will not be continuing because the class lacked FUN. My hopes were for a more organic, free-form, dance atmosphere, but this class was more structured and technique-driven than what my particular little girl is ready for right now.

We LOVED Windy City Wedding Dance and were so happy we were referred to Jessica by our friends that…read moregot married in 2019. We had our first intro lesson pre-covid and Jessica put on our song, asked what style dance we were looking for and jumped right into it. She wasted no time! Both my (now) husband and I admittedly have two left feet, so we knew that we needed dance lessons to feel confident for our first dance in front of 245 people. Due to covid, we had to postpone our wedding date and Jessica was so helpful adjusting (numerous times) our lesson dates/times and honored our 2019 package rate. Jessica was also helpful spacing the lessons out appropriately and gave her honest opinion on how many lessons we needed based off where we were at. It's also nice that you can always add an additional one or two lessons as your date approaches, which we did. When we got back in the studio post shutdown, it made us really excited for our wedding and to finally dance to our song. It was also the perfect date night as the location is right in the heart of downtown. It was fun practicing at home too and brought the fun back into wedding planning after postponing. Jessica is so talented, skilled, a great teacher and most importantly: FUN! She gave us constructive advice/adjustments/tips to look less choreographed (robotic) and more confident on the dance floor. At our last lesson, she played our mother/son song as well as father/daughter song and taught us how to dance with our parents. This was something I wouldn't have thought of but was so grateful for. Our parents loved it too. Windy City Wedding Dance is a MUST even if you aren't half bad. Jessica knows multiple styles of dancing and can adjust to your needs/first dance vision. I've already referred multiple friends and they couldn't be happier. Thank you Jessica! Photos: @annkamphoto

Amber was exceptional to work with. She helped us with not only one, but two dances (Waltz and…read moreHip-Hop). Thankfully for us, she was experienced in both genres and started out as a Hip-Hop dancer. Amber is fun and also gets the job done. She was mindful of the floor space, the pacing of the dance, and our comfortability with the steps. By the end of our lesson, I felt confident and excited. We received many compliments on our wedding night from the dances. Lots of laughs and memories were also shared in our dance lessons. We now have this beautiful first dance and fun dance to look back on for years to come. If you're wondering whether to take lessons, do it!

I grew up dancing here and loved every moment of it. There are so many unique performance…read moreopportunities through the studios connections in the dance industry. Accommodating to learning and physical disabilities.

Coming to Dance Center is the highlight of our week and we can hardly express in words how much we…read morelove it. I started taking group classes and they were fun, engaging, and the instructors do a great job of making everyone feel comfortable. The best part was that you didn't have to bring a partner! After some convincing, my husband agreed to take private lessons for more personalized instruction and we are very pleased with our instructor, Jesus, for his knowledge and professionalism. We highly recommend coming here whether your interested in learning something new or wanting to progress you skills in a variety of styles. Dance Center and it's amazing staff has it all!

It's a great spot to learn dance. There's a main open large room for the bigger classes, and a…read morefew side rooms for smaller classes as well. There's 1 right across from the entrance, 3 in a hallway offset from the main open room, and then 1 more in the back, past the hallway and across from the bathrooms. As I was attending this venue as a rented space for a Brazilian Zouk weekender event, I didn't interact with any of the Dance Center Chicago staff-- but they have a great space!

This studio is not only visually fresh and clean but the teachers are so friendly and AMAZING with…read morethe children. Hands down the best dance studio in town. You will NOT be disappointed. The pricing is on point with most child courses in the city. The location is really the stunner for me. I can grab groceries, have dinner or meet up with a friend for a drink or coffee literally next door to the studio. Inclusive and diverse. Really wonderful programs for the real littles too! Can't wait for next season!

I took an adult beginner ballet class at Dance on Broadway. I've been taking ballet classes for…read morealmost a year now and wanted to try out this new studio. The classes are priced similarly to other adult drop-in classes in the area. The studio is spacious and welcoming with incredibly clean studios and tidy bathrooms. We were greeted warmly by reception when we walked in. The class itself was not my favorite. Their classes are only an hour long rather than the traditional 90 minutes. Our teacher also did not teach this class at a beginner level. It was definitely more intermediate. Many students in the class were struggling to keep up, so it was frustrating that the teacher did not adapt instruction. My friend did ballet for 15 years growing up and even she was struggling to keep up in this class. If you are new to the studio, it might be worth calling to ask about levels. I wish I had, as the class was too hard to be enjoyable for me. Overall, I would like to try another class here, but I will either wait until a different teacher is available for beginner ballet or I will come back in a few years when I'm at more of an intermediate level.

From the beginning, Nicole was short and sharp with my wife and I, and it was noticeable to my…read moreyoung 3 year old daughter. She clearly had favorites (we weren't one), and we observed her not even address my daughter despite her running toward her yelling her name out of excitement in class. Sure, you might have a couple favorite kids, but never show it. It got to the point that my daughter made comments to my wife and I at home that "Ms. Nicole won't say hi to me." For anyone with young kids or had young kids, for a 3 year old to say this, it must be a pattern of behavior. It broke our hearts. And to cap off the experience, the night of the recital, my wife and I admit we forgot to pay the remaining balance with everything else going on in our lives (expecting baby #2 in 3 weeks to name the biggest). Nicole greeted my wife and mother-in-law in quite possibly the rudest and most disrespectful way imaginable...."I don't have time for this tonight. She can't come in until you pay!" Thankfully we had enough cash to pay, but she released our tickets the day before and would have sent us home for an oversight we clearly were willing to pay. She caused a scene, and it was completely out of line. Her tone, demeanor, attitude, and overall treatment of people she doesn't care for is unbelievably disappointing and unfortunate. Not to mention, the lack of organization at the recital, the lack of food and drinks for young kids, etc. was all shocking (it was from 4-7p). Wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

My daughter has been dancing her for over a year and she LOVES it! I couldn't be happier with the…read moreexperience - from her perspective, or mine! She started at 3 years and has been with the same group of girls since starting. They are now her pals! The atmosphere is welcoming, kind and supportive. Miss Nicole (her teacher and owner) is a savant with the kids. They love her and are always so excited to see her. She teaches a well organized class that covers dance basics in a fun and creative way. The location is super convenient - big parking lot with a Dominics, Old Navy, Marshalls and Starbucks in easy walking distance! The facilities are great and well kept. The business is run smoothly, efficiently, and the communication is fantastic! I never feel like I wasn't notified about something or that I'm out of the loop! I would highly recommend Collective Dance to anyone wanting to put their child into a dance class. What a positive, nurturing and loving place for a little one to learn to creatively express themselves!

We saw Midsummer Night's Dream by the Joffrey Ballet at the Lyric Opera and, no, this is not a…read moreversion of the William Shakespeare play, but choreographed by Alexander Ekman. We also saw this when it premiered in 2018. It is a celebration of the summer solstice and Scandinavian traditions. In my opinion it is a mashup of Midsommar and Cirque du Soleil if you substitute the acrobats and contortionists with dancers and Swedish elders being pushed off a cliff with lifelike mannequins thrown from a floating table. It opens with a man in bed being woken by his alarm on Friday, June 21 and a woman greets him with hay? straw? And they join into a crazy scene of people throwing hay? straw? with the hay soaring in graceful arcs across the stage. There are frenzied dances, a large dining table that soars into the sky, and comedic bits. After intermission things get wild, with fish falling from the sky, people falling from the sky, a naked chef and more frenzied dancing, with an echo back to the hay throwing. There is a beautiful singer, Anna von Hausswolff, with a soaring, haunting voice, is she dressed like Elsa from Frozen or hair like cousin It? The singer and the wonderful music by Mikael Karlsson and the wonderful musicians make this an otherworldly fable. And the clock fast forwards to June 21 of the next year and it begins again. Is this a dream? Unfortunately this was the final performance of this run.

Even though I knew this Nutcracker ballet version had been revised to occur in the 1930s Chicago…read moreworld fair, I was unprepared for the lack of fantasy and beauty and elegance that is central to the theme of Nutcracker. The entire set was cheap card tables and chipped furniture, a nutcracker doll that was barely visible and with little explanation as to why it changed hands among the performers- who danced in raggedy clothing, maybe one actual tutu for five minutes(?). There was very little actual ballet that I could ascertain, leaving me with impression that a lot of the performers were on holiday. It's really unfortunate that something so beautiful could be made into a somewhat depressing and largely incoherent show. So many people who come to see this I'm sure would normally be inspired to come back for a different show, but this performance so much missed the mark for what should be an upbeat holiday, I'm not inclined to take the risk