Getting creative: Summer Stages' choreography program pairs students with dance makers.

The idyllic landscape of Concord, Massachusetts has long been a hotbed for radical thinking, from Revolutionary War days to the Transcendentalists. So it's hardly surprising that Concord is home to a pioneering festival and training program, Summer Stages Dance, a choreography-based program whose faculty has included Daniel Nagrin, Peter Boal, Neil Greenberg, and Donna Uchizono. Karole Armitage and John Jasperse will participate in 2006.

The 43 students who attended last year's program ranged in age from 19 to 50 and came from diverse backgrounds and training. Each one of them, no matter what their technical level, took the same daily technique classes. Then they split up into smaller groups to work closely with a visiting choreographer on a new dance. Students in the supplementary program (ages 13-16) got the same opportunity. "Most summer programs don't focus on choreography," says Richard Colton, who co-directs the program with wife and artistic partner Amy Spencer. "We are interested in both tradition and burning innovation."

Boston dancer and choreographer Anne Zuerner, 26, had attended performances at Summer Stages and was so impressed that she decided to apply to the program last year. "I was drawn by the artists and the intimate setting," says Zuerner. "I also loved that all of the dancers, no matter their age or level, were in the same class. Sometimes it gets tiring having dance experience only with people your same age. You forget where you've been or where you're going."

Sarah Levitt, a dance major at the University of Maryland, says Summer Stages was a good fit with her academic schedule because it is relatively short. She wanted a smaller program. "One of my favorite parts was getting to work with emerging choreographers from the Boston area," says Levitt, who was chosen to work with choreographers Alissa Cardone and Ingrid Schatz on a piece called Denizen. "Because it had to be finished in less than three weeks, the process was very intense," she says. "We had about three hours of rehearsal each night, as well as rehearsals on weekends."

Spencer and Colton draw on a wide range of experience as co-directors. Both performed with Twyla Tharp Dance and Mikhail Baryshnikov's White Oak Dance Project. Spencer also worked with Pilobolus and Martha Clarke. Colton danced with American Ballet Theatre and the Joffrey Ballet. The couple directs the year-round dance program at Concord Academy, a private high school, where they founded Summer Stages Dance in 1996.

The facilities on Concord Academy's 26-acre campus (located 35 miles west of Boston) are state-of-the-art. There's the elegant 2,500-square-foot Graham Gund Studio and a recently renovated 350-seat Performing Arts Center. Four additional studios are augmented by squash courts and wrestling rooms outfitted with marley floors. Most students live on campus along with visiting choreographers, and Colton and Spencer encourage the faculty to take classes with the students as a way to get to know them better. They want the experience to be "intensive and intimate."

Each day of the three-week program begins with ballet class, "the basis for all the contemporary work done here," says Spencer. Later in the morning is repertory class taught by one of the visiting choreographers. Often it has provided a forum for choreographers such as Dana Reitz to develop new work. After lunch, the students learn modern technique, which has varied over the years from Taylor to Cunningham and other contemporary styles.

"The students there have a sophistication that I think says something about what Richard and Amy are doing," says Greenberg. "They've gathered together some really good thinkers, people who are open to the possibilities of dance as an art form. They have very diverse programming and very high quality. They don't shy away from presenting anything to their students."

Theodore Bale is dance critic and columnist at the Boston Herald.