Dance Ensemble: The Legacy of Mary King Montgomery Kouns

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LEXINGTON, Ky. (April 10, 2014) — Seventy-five years ago a group of 12 students presented the very first modern dance recital in the original Guignol Theatre at the University of Kentucky. Since then, countless students have benefitted from the program, now known as UK Dance Ensemble.

Dance Ensemble students have choreographed their own dances and made their own costumes since 1939. They come from multiple colleges within the university, majors and levels of skill. Today, the students audition, practice and present their hard work in semiannual concerts that pack the auditorium. It all began with the gumption of a vivacious curly-haired blonde woman named Mary King Montgomery Kouns — the dance group's originator and first director.

Kouns enrolled at UK to study music. She was involved in a variety of campus activities, entered and won multiple beauty pageants and spent the summers of her undergraduate years working for Lexington’s Parks and Recreation Department. She was also president of her sorority, Kappa Kappa Gamma, in 1933. Kouns taught various classes throughout her graduate and undergraduate years under the Department of Physical Education including tap, tumbling and archery.

While she was working on her thesis, Kouns spent the summers of 1936 and 1937 in New York City studying under Hanya Holm, a major pioneer of American modern dance. Kouns came back to Lexington inspired. She completed her graduate work in 1938 and founded the UK Women’s Athletics Association Modern Dance Group that same year. The group hosted their first concert on May 11, 1939.

Kouns met her soon-to-be husband in June of 1939. Charlie Kouns was a dental student at UK but soon after they were married in 1940, he was called into service for WWII. The couple traveled together throughout the war. In 1945 they returned to Lexington and Kouns resumed her role as director of WAA Modern Dance Group.

The program grew under Kouns' direction until she moved to New Mexico with her husband and young daughter in 1950. WAA Modern Dance Group later became a dance fraternity known as Tau Sigma of Orchesis until the 1970s when faculty changed the group name to Dance Ensemble.

Mary King Kouns Montgomery’s daughter returned to UK in the 1990s to find the program her mother started still very active on campus. She established the Mary King Montgomery Kouns Choreography Award, which is awarded to a talented student choreographer each semester and the MKMK Founder’s Award, which is awarded to a student at the spring concert who has provided exceptional service to Dance Ensemble.

Since its origin, Dance Ensemble has launched the careers of many dancers and has even inspired some to open their own dance studios. It has brought students together and enriched campus life. Mary King Montgomery Kouns’ legacy and love for dance lives on through the University of Kentucky Dance Ensemble.

Dance Ensemble celebrates its 75th year at the upcoming spring concert at 8 p.m. Saturday, April 26 and 2 p.m. Sunday, April 27, in the Singletary Center for the Arts Recital Hall. Tickets are $10 for students or $15 for the public and can be purchased in person at the SCFA Ticket Office located in the main lobby of the Singletary Center or online by visiting http://finearts.uky.edu/singletary-center. For additional information about UKDE or to donate please contact Rayma Beal, rayma.beal@uky.edu.

MEDIA CONTACT:  Ashley McIntyre, 859-257-5374, ashley.mcintyre2@uky.edu