OUR BACKGROUND -- HOW WE EVOLVED

The group got its start in 1995 with dancers coming from four different Studios where Jennifer Oldfield taught. Their very first major production was "Opening Number" in Sunoco's Fourth of July Parade for Philadelphia’s ABC television (WPVI Channel 6) where they were an immediate hit with both parade producers and audiences. They followed this up with a second success in Boscov’s Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade, also for ABC television (Channel 6), this time performing "Opening and Finale" production numbers. They continued with the Boscov's parade adding new production numbers each year.

It was the ABC producers and TV commentators who gave the group its name “The Jenn Oldfield Dancers”.

In the late 90's, Thanksgiving parade producer Valerie Lagauskis envisioned a new, high impact production involving a mass number of tap dancers - à la Busby Berkeley. This new venture would be under direction of the mother-daughter Choreographer team -- Gail and Jennifer Oldfield and it was called “Tap Yourself Silly”. During Valerie's additional three year stay as Producer it kept the name and the number of dancers ranged from about 150 to 300. Eventually, three new producers came on-board. The name was changed to “FanTAPulous” and the number of dancers was increased. The maximum that ever performed was about 700. Thumbnail to the right shows most the “FanTAPulous 2003" dancers in rehearsal (click to get full sized image.) Final 2003 rehearsal with full cast can be viewed by clicking "FanTAPulous". After eight years we left as choreographers -- on a high note with some terrific experiences, good times, friends, and many fond memories.

Last but far from least is one of the group's hallmark projects -- its annual presentation of the Christmas holiday classic "Nutcracker Ballet". Each year this would involve a full scale stage production that began in 2000 and continued for eight years. Cast size ranged from 80 to 150 and crews up to 50.

Today we're indeed fortunate to have some of the original dancers still active with us --Allison Clanton, Mindy Kendi, Barbara Powers, and Nicole Wood. Many of our dancers have gone on to College, majoring or minoring in Dance. Some have even received full college scholarships for Dance. Several have been recipients of the prestigious Pennsylvania Governor's School of the Arts Award. Many are dancing professionally, teaching or involved in other aspects of dance. While all our dancers are not pursing dance careers, they still maintain strong ties and contact through activities such as community theater, taking class, attending/supporting dance performances and JOD.