Louise Benes was 3 years old when she realized she wanted to have her own dance studio someday.
“I remember, even then,” she said Sunday, after her students performed as part of the Fall Family Festival at the Church of Our Savior in Munsey Park, the site of the Louise Benes Dance Company’s new Manhasset location. “I’d take all the kids in the neighborhood and had these steps I’d show them how to do.”
But the Port Washington native, who has taught dance for the last 37 years out of a studio in Richmond Hill, Queens, said she’s also always wanted a dance studio closer to where she calls home.
Benes and her husband, Ken, a contractor, visited different locations on the North Shore and settled upon the Church of Our Saviour, though she said the room she’d use had water damage and other structural elements that first needed fixing.
Now that she’s acquainting herself to the community in preparation for classes to begin Oct. 7, Benes said Manhasset has been the perfect fit.
“It really just started falling into place,” Benes said. “I heard from someone who was a ballet instructor, and then someone who was a zumba instructor, people came from all over. It was one of those meant-to-be kind of studios.”
On Sunday, the North Hempstead community welcomed Benes’ company to Manhasset, as Town Clerk Leslie Gross presented Benes with a citation and pried the dancers away from the afternoon’s face-painting and popcorn for an encore performance.
“I think when you find a method of expression, whether it’s singing or it’s dancing or drawing, the arts are so important, and I think it’s so important in all the things you do,” Gross said. “It’s all one very important piece. You have to study hard in school, but you have to do the things you love to do, and the way you were so excited, I know dance is so important to all of you.”
Over the years, Benes has taught dancers of all ages and ability levels – including her own daughters, Jaimee and Melissa, as well as her grandchildren – who have gone on to use their training in different areas of life.
“Dancing is great for developing a child’s self-confidence,” said Jaimee, now a doctor. “It gives a sense of poise and confidence that has certainly helped me in my career.”
Though ballet, jazz, tap, urban jazz, modern and belly dancing classes will be offered to kids out of the Manhasset studio, Benes said the studio will also teach adults ballroom and salsa dancing as well as yoga and zumba.
Benes’ students have also performed for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Port Washington’s “Port Holiday Magic” event and at Walt Disney World. The studio regularly puts on performances and brings its routines to various competitions.
“It’s really been this labor of love,” Benes said. “The effort that’s put in is far outweighed by the reward of the students taking their dance training on in life, and nothing’s more enjoyable to me than that.”
