Instead of music scarves, pillows and paper towel tubes will assist dancers this weekend when the Southern Illinois Repertory Dance Theater hosts Dance Expresso, a concert showcasing ethnic, jazz and contemporary dances.

SIRDT is an SIUC student dance company and is also a registered student organization. The members of SIRDT get into the company by audition only, said Donna Wilson, faculty advisor for SIRDT and artistic director for the concert.

SIRDT’s main focus is on this concert, which has been performed each fall and spring semester since 1986. Dance Expresso will focus on showing different types of dances and dance styles.

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Wilson said seven dancers will perform in the hour-long show.

She said the dancers will be SIUC faculty, local dance artists and SIRDT members, who are SIUC students. The dancers have choreographed their own performances for the concert.

Wilson said her dance is done entirely without music.

I do my dance with paper towel tubes, she said. I get the rhythm for my dance by using the tubes as sound. My dance is called Tube Tones.

Some of the other dances in the show will be a Middle Eastern Dance and a dance using long scarves to do a percussion rendition of Johann Sebastian Bach’s The Great Fugue. The last dance of the show, Chair Pillow, is more modern and experimental than any other of the dances in the show, Wilson said.

Wilson said everyone will enjoy this show.

There are not a lot of dancers to go and watch around the Carbondale area, she said. This is an opportunity to see dancers and to expose children to the art of dance since this show is very family oriented.

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Dance Expresso is at 8 p.m. Dec. 1 and 2 at Furr Auditorium in Pulliam Hall. Tickets are $3 for general admission and $1.50 for children. Tickets can be purchased at the door the night of the concert or at the Student Center Ticket Office.