ZACHARY HARDSTAFF

Keeping Zachary Hardstaff ON HIS TOES

Some youngsters seem to have the world at their feet, but that’s definitely true of Zachary Hardstaff, Lincolnshire’s 14-year old dance prodigy, who is hoping to take up a full-time place at The Hammond school of performing arts in January. We meet Zachary, mum Kay and dance teacher Miss Josie to find out why the UK’s National Boys Dance Day ambassador will be kept on his toes in 2023...

I’VE NEVER SEEN anything as painful or as physically demanding as the warm-up that Zachary Hardstaff embarks on before his dance class.

At 14 years of age, the dance prodigy is looking forward to an exciting new year and to enrolment at The Hammond, one of the country’s most prestigious dance schools – a sort of Eton for the next generation of professional performers across all different dance disciplines. Zachary’s talent warrants comparison to the eponymous star of Billy Elliot. But unlike the film – with Billy’s father sceptical of his son’s inclination towards a career in dance – Zachary’s parents Joe and Kay are both really supportive towards and naturally in awe of their son’s talent. And his 19-year old brother, a keen footballer, is equally in awe of Zachary’s core strength and flexibility! One aspect of Zachary’s life in which a comparison to Billy Elliot does stack up, however, is the presence in his life of a really good and very supportive dance teacher, Josie Clarke. “I always really loved dance,” says Zachary. “Right from being young I couldn’t sit still and was always dancing around the house. At about seven years of age mum and dad reasoned that if I was going to dance, I might as well have professional tuition and really learn to do it properly.” Zachary began attending JCADA, the Josie Clarke Academy of Dance and Acrobatics. The studio has around 250 dancers, of which just four are boys, a fact she’s keen to change. Miss Josie’s youngest starlet is just three year old, but she has clients up to their 70s too, and the school’s dance disciplines include everything from the three core subjects of ballet, tap and modern dance to belly dancing – which is entertaining, but also very good for achieving core strength and developing isolated movements of the body – and acrobatic dance, which is ideal for improving a dancer’s flexibility. Less common but ideal for a career-minded dancer is freestyle dance – choreographed routines of which are commonly seen on TV, at concerts or in commercial dance videos.

Dance is in Miss Josie’s family, with her great great aunt Winifred Greswell launching the Boston School of Dance in the early 1930s; both Josie’s grandmother, Nan Stanwell, and mother Alison Noble, have run very successful schools in Boston too.

“Dancing is great for strength, flexibility, balance, coordination and overall physical health, but it also provides opportunities for developing friendships.” “We’re a really close, collegiate team, very welcoming and inclusive regardless of age or ability. Most of our dancers come here for the enjoyment, with fitness being a bonus. Only a few dancers go on to pursue dance as a professional career, because there are so many other career choices and opportunities in education available to a young person.” “But we can educate right up to professional dance standards, and that’s been the case with Zachary, given that he’s such an incredibly talented, diligent, hard-working dancer. We really will miss him enormously, but we know that he’s going to one of the top schools and that it will really open up lots of opportunities to him.” >>

Zachary started dancing from about seven years of age.

>> Miss Josie often works with professional dancers like professional dance artist Mark Hindle, who spotted Zachary’s talent when he visited JCADA and subsequently offered Zachary a place at the Hammond’s summer school.

This led to Zachary also being offered a full-time placement to the specialist performing arts school. In addition to its excellent facilities – the school has its own dance and drama studios, music suite and recording studio, numerous practice rooms and 420-seat theatre – The Hammond is also sufficiently prestigious to underwrite Zachary’s talent on his CV. “It’s a place geared up for performing arts so I’m really excited,” says Zachary. “It’s a school in which academic subjects and the performing arts run parallel, with mentors and access to independent auditions.” “I can study for GCSEs and A-Levels, and after that, possibilities include working in musical theatre, the West End or as a full time dancer in performances on cruise ships.” A pupil of Boston Grammar School, currently in year nine, Zachary and his parents are hoping to move to Chester, where The Hammond is based, ready for the school’s January intake. Also standing Zachary in good stead is the fact that last month he was named 2022/23 ambassador for National Boys Dance Day, promoting his profession and attempting to alleviate some of the unhelpful stereotypes about male dance being effete. With Strictly Come Dancing giving a wider audience a greater understanding of dance techniques, and with the Billy Elliot effect haloing over male dancers too, much progress is still being made to challenge the idea that dancing isn’t for boys. Still, if a few of his less enlightened peers at school have been uncomplimentary about his interest, they’ll definitely be silenced if not by his future fame, then just by watching one of Zachary’s routines... even just his punishingly demanding warm-up.

Zachary’s ability to stretch and his range of movement is superhuman. Of course, I’m no Strictly judge, but even observing a warmup session at the dance school anyone can see that his ability to land precisely and crisply, to hold his frame absolutely still and to complete an hour-long class without breaking into a sweat – and without breaking a hip bone, as I would have done – is the result of hours of discipline, hard work and training to achieve epic strength, balance and stamina.

During the summer, Zachary performed alongside Lincolnshire Youth Ballet at the Stamford Corn Exchange and this December sees Zachary’s last performance on stage in Boston at Blackfriars Theatre, as part of the dance ensemble for the local pantomime ‘Jack and the Beanstalk,’ with dancing choreographed by JCADA. As Pride goes to press he’ll be performing an acrobatic dance routine at Butlins in Skegness, for Children in Need. After that, though, it’s hoped that Zachary will begin his first term at The Hammond, and will soon be on the way to an epic career as a professional dancer. Take another look at the tremendously talented Zachary and commit his name to memory because if you don’t spot him in a few years on stage, on Strictly or in some similarly prestigious dance role, we’ll be very surprised indeed! n

Find Out More: Zachary Hardstaff is the Lincolnshire dance prodigy and National Boys Dance Day ambassador hoping to begin schooling at The Hammond in January. He’s currently a pupil of the JCADA dance school run by Josie Clarke (www.jcada.co.uk) and can be seen as part of the school’s choreographed performances at Blackfriars Arts Centre’s Jack & The Beanstalk from 10th-31st December.