This week Ascendance presented their new zoom film at Leeds Digital Festival, hosted by Forum Central, exploring how the 3rd sector in Leeds is embracing digital tools & methods to stay connected during Covid-19. The […]
Celebrating 20 years of dance and wellbeing
About Ascendance
Ascendance is a charitable dance company, founded and led by Artistic Director, Rachel Wesson. This year we are celebrating 20 years of outreach, dance and film works for site-specific and theatre venues by leading choreographers.
The organisation currently works across the local community providing high quality arts projects for older people, which improve health & wellbeing through dance exercise, social interaction and performance driven projects.
Ascendance work closely with partners Kala Sangam, MS Society, Marie Curie Hospice, Parkinson’s UK, Fighting Fit, Yorkshire Dance, Leeds Rhinos ABC programme to deliver a broad outreach programme, which reaches the many different communities across Yorkshire.
DANCING WITH PARKINSON'S
We now run a thriving Dancing with Parkinson’s programme, Led by Rachel Wesson, Emma Clayton and Izzy Brittain in 4 locations across Leeds & Bradford.
This specialist strand is for people with movement disorders to keep the mind and body active, increase confidence, aid mobility, balance, flexibility and encourage more independent and active lives. The activity is also designed to empower individuals to discover talents and raise aspirations for themselves and their local communities.
Let's dance classes
All our dance classes are on now on Zoom - Find out more about our specialist classes for older adults who want to stay active for longer!
Ascendance films
Enjoy our gallery of videos and find out about our exciting 360 VR Dance Surrounds projects
Meet the team
Rachel, Emma, Izzy, Caroline and Lucy are the passionate professionals at the heart of Ascendance
Latest from Ascendance
It is a surprise progression, but in some ways a natural one, that DWP members have moved their weekly practice class onto video. Ascendance was already using video to promote the impact and benefit of […]
PARKINSON'S DANCE CLASS We (my wife and I) love coming to the Thursday dance class with Rachel. It is a very good dance class and you can feel yourself getting fitter with every week that […]
Ascendance is pleased to be part of Saltaire Arts Trail's Digital Programme with an uplifting documentary about the effect which dancing together has on a group of people with Parkinson's Disease, a condition which challenges […]
Ascendance Videos
