Performers showcase abilities in talent night event

By Lucy Dekkenga

Quiet music began to play as a dancer from Miami flowed her movements to the soft song. With her first turn, the crowd applauded. As the song progressed, became louder and more energized, so did she. In sync with the movements and song, the crowd’s cheers grew in Aalfs Auditorium.

On one of her last sets of turns, the performance reached its peak and the crowd erupted. With her last movement, the amazed audience gave Brooke Peterson a standing ovation and the loudest cheer Girls State has heard this session.

On the third day of ALA South Dakota Girls State, talent performances ended the evening general assembly in Slagle Hall to show off the talents of delegates such as Peterson.

“Recently, I’ve just won a big award at a solo competition and I wanted to show everyone and express how much I love dance,” Peterson said.

Between the 29 delegates who performed, there were seven different acts, and a guest performance by Julia Olson, Miss South Dakota. In order to perform in the talent show, delegates had to audition by performing their act for three judges.

One of the performances that made it to the stage consisted of a group of 16 delegates from Minneapolis who performed “Minnecups.”

“(The decision to perform) was decided in one of our town meetings,” Hope Johnson, Minneapolis, said. “People wanted to do a group thing and we were trying to find something to do.”

After the idea came the practice, which was done in a short amount of time. In fact, they only practiced a handful of times. Even with limited preparation, the group wasn’t nervous — all they wanted was to perform well.

Other performers, such as Annalese Taggart, a delegate from Philadelphia who played “White Water Chopsticks” on the piano, had much more time to prepare.

“I competed with this piece for Miss South Dakota Most Outstanding Teen, just at the end of April, and I placed first runner-up,” Taggart said. “So, I’ve been working on it since the fall.”

Taggart enjoyed playing this piece for special reasons, especially because the composer is from Pierre, S.D.

“I have been playing piano for 10 years and I really love that piece,” Taggart said. “It was actually played on the Miss America stage by Theresa Scanlan, who ended up winning.”

Although many people would typically be nervous to perform, Peterson was not, because of the positive feedback from the audience.

“I was a little bit nervous, but once I started dancing I was really excited to see people cheering for me and the applause at the end was very sweet,” she said.

Along with Peterson, Taggart was also comfortable on stage because of the atmosphere the delegates created.

“Girls State is just that crowd where it’s a ton of girls, a ton of friends,” Taggart said. “So it’s a super fun atmosphere and it’s unlike a lot of the different atmospheres I’ve had. I definitely had more fun performing it — just joking around with it.”