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Late-blooming dancer Thomas Dwyer has for the last three weeks been putting in 12-hour rehearsal days at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. He and fellow dancers from the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange prepared 57 community participants, from ages seven to mid-70s, for the premiere performances of "Language of the Land"  Feb. 12-14 before packed houses.

A couple of days before opening night, Thomas noted that performance anxiety was rising along with the demand for the kind of heightened focus required for a professional show. "That's sometimes hard for the folks from the community (who are) not used to" the scale of production the Dance Exchange was staging. "But everyone at the Kohler has been great."

In addition to readying for his own role as naturalist John Muir, who spent much of his young life in Wisconsin studying and writing about the land, Thomas, 75, and the other dancers have worked hard to translate ideas from a variety of groups into a single dance and to teach dance skills. 

The dance, choreographed by Cassie Meador, mixed images from Muir's journals with stories and dancers from Hmong and Hispanic groups from Sheboygan. It featured whirlygigs and kites, including a giant one Thomas made and painted, and others made by participating members of the local carpenters' union. "Our cast danced beautifully! It was wonderful to see each person really shine," dancer Sarah Leavitt wrote on the company blog after the performance.

The Dance Exchange troupe threw Thomas a surprise breakfast on March 4 to celebrate the release of What Should I Do with the Rest of My Life? A former U.S. intelligence officer, Thomas, now a principal dancer for the the Dance Exchange, began studying dance in his early 50s.