Marlupi Dance Academy

History

Marlupi Sijangga

Marlupi Sijangga is one of the Indonesian dance and ballet artists and also is the founder of "Marlupi Dance Academy (MDA)" ballet school. It is one of the oldest ballet schools in Indonesia which has more than 40 branches throughout Indonesia. She was born in Surabaya, March 27, 1937 began studying ballet at the age of 15 years of a Dutch descent named Mevrow Zaller. Marlupi became an assistant coach in the first place to learn, before finally establishing her own ballet school in 1956. In addition to self-taught, Marlupi also developed the ability to teach ballet to attend courses in several countries such as Hong Kong, Zurich, Madrid, New York, London, and Canada. Some of the awards ever received by Marlupi in the work and hard work in the field of ballet dance are Best Executif Award of Singapore (1982), Adhi Karya Award (1993), and a Career Achievement Award Men women (1996).

Childhood

Marlupi and her other five sisters and one brother grew up in Surabaya. Her father died when she was 10 years old and her mother supported the family by selling the chinese medicines. One day, when 15-year-old Marlupi went swimming around, she saw the descendants of Dutch children were learning ballet at ballet dance school Tegalsari close to the place where she went swimming. Since then, she was interested to learn ballet in that school, even though at first she did not have money and took her mother's money to pay for the ballet tuition fees. A year after starting to learn ballet from M. Zaller, Marlupi eagered to open hew own ballet school because she thought that other ballet schools had teachers with only a medium of teaching skills and techniques that were not good enough, even though she was still a teenager at that time.

Marlupi Dance Academy

At 1956, Marlupi opened a ballet school with the name "Mary" in Bon Pedicab Simolawang (Bungaran), at that time she only had very limited funds so she could not afford to buy the glass and bars (iron stretch to lean ballerina legs and arms). In such a simple place, she taught using the chair as the dancers' holders. By having more and more students, Marlupi moved to a larger premise at Jalan Kebun Rojo, which has now become Bank Indonesia building. She taught with very good discipline as she had learned from the teachings of M. Zaller. At first, she also studied ballet teaching methods to Elsie Tjiok San Fang and Farida Oetoyo who were then domiciled in Jakarta. In 1970, from the advice of the Head of Education and Culture of East Java at the time, Moelyono Suryopranomo, the school name was changed to "Marry Marlupi". The word "Mar" is taken from Mary, while the "lupi" taken from the Goddess Palupi. In the 1970s, when Marlupi Dance Academy (MDA) began to develop, Marlupi had sufficient funds to study ballet abroad, such as the Zurich Ballet Academy, Jojo Dance Center and the Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre - New York, Toronto Dance Center - Canada, the Royal Academy of Dance - London, and several other countries. Since 2006, MDA has opened different classes such as Jazz, Modern Dance, Hip Hop, and Fitness for children ranging in age from 2.5 years to adults. In order to compete with the international ballet world, MDA uses a system of teaching classical ballet from the Royal Acedemy of Dance-London (RAD), Beijing Ballet Company, China and International system of gymnastics teaching of Fitness Proffesionals - San Diego, California (IDEA). In addition, the MDA students also went to Singapore to earn a diploma that is recognized by the Royal Academy of Dance, London. In addition, MDA also provides teaching modern dance / jazz with reference to Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing-London (ISTD).

Personal Life

Marlupi Sijangga married to late Willyanto Sijangga on March 20, 1965. She has twin sons, Mar Dwatmadja Sijangga and Mar Dwatmadji Sijangga, and one daughter, Fifi Sijangga who became the Dance Director of Marlupi Dance Academy. Marlupi has 2 grandsons, Rafferty Alim and Deverell Alim, and has 5 granddaughters ,Claresta Alim, Gwendelyn Sijangga, Karent Sijangga, Madelyn Sijangga, and Ashley Sijangga. Although Marlupi Sijangga is 80 years old now, she is still teaching Ballet, Jazz, and Aerobic till now.