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Music

Orlando Residents Dance for Pulse in Moving Video Campaign

“Let’s show the world that love conquers all.”
Photo via Youtube

Orlando's Pulse nightclub shooting earlier this month hit home hard for the dance music world at large, whose roots run deep in the gay and minority communities. In the wake of the tragedy, support has been flowing nonstop, as Pride Weekenders celebrate extra hard for their fallen kin, clubs throw fundraising parties, and over 114,000 people have donated a staggering $5.9 million to aid the victims and their families.

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The latest act of kindness is a lighthearted one, but is equally as poignant. Yesterday (June 22), Orlando creative agency Push shared a video campaign, titled "Keep Dancing Orlando," a compilation of clips featuring local residents in various environments—from inside Walt Disney World to in front of another prominent gay club, Parliament House, to the Orlando Science Center—dancing to the soundtrack of Whitney Houston's "I Wanna Dance with Somebody."

Read more: I Went to Pulse Because It Felt Like Home

The Keep Dancing Orlando website says: "49 beautiful souls were taken at Pulse, but their spirit dances on in all of us. Let's cherish their memory and celebrate their lives by dancing in their honor. Let's show the world that love conquers all—that joy and happiness can't be stopped. Now more than ever before, Orlando is The City Beautiful. We will recover. We will grow stronger. We will keep dancing."

Catch the video and a Q&A with the organization below. Viewers are encouraged to contribute their own videos to the campaign, and to donate to OneOrlando.

1. Who or what is Keep Dancing Orlando? Why did you form this campaign?

Keep Dancing Orlando is a community-inspired platform designed to help the city and all those affected continue down the path toward healing. It is everyone who has ever lived in, visited or loved the city that we call home. We formed this campaign because we knew that once all the cameras were turned off and the news crews and reporters went back to their own cities, that it would be up to us, the City of Orlando, to keep moving forward and to keep hope and love alive. We also wanted to make sure that we continued taking care of the victims and their families emotionally, physically and financially. That's why we connected the campaign to OneOrlando.org. While we hope to raise millions, there will never be enough money to truly replace all that these amazing people we've lost.

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2. What inspired the making of this video?

Immediately following the shootings, several people in the media and in showbiz paid "tribute" to us and encouraged us to not let hate win and to remember what makes us such an amazing city. Of particular note was Jimmy Fallon who, towards the end of his tribute, said, "keep loving each other, keep respecting each other and keep on dancing." This was especially poignant given the location of the shootings at Pulse and the overall joy of dancing and the love and respect that people went there for. It has become a rallying cry not only for them, but for all of us.

3. Is there significant meaning behind the song choice?

At the end of of the day, love wins. And love is meant to be shared, just like dancing. "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" shows the importance of human connectivity and the subtext of "with somebody who loves me" shows that sometimes we need others to be with us in the dark and to help take us into the light.

4. What's your favorite, craziest, or most unexpected response video you've received so far?

There have been a few…can we piece several together to make one dream response? The Orlando City Derby Girls sent us one of them dancing on roller skates. Orlando City Soccer and Orlando Pride teams showed off their moves—which included a great worm. A local video production company had a (costume) panda dancing around in theirs, we had a news station join into the fun, and Independent Bar sent us one of everyone singing and jumping along with Whitney with our video playing in the background. That one definitely had the most participants. But all the responses have been so great.

5. What do you hope to achieve with this campaign?

To keep moving down the path from hurt and hate to healing and love. To remember who we are as a city and as a community. As Jimmy Fallon said, it was one bad person and 49 good people. We can't forget the good or let go of the love. We don't know how long the campaign will go on or what final impact it will have, but if we can change just one person's opinion of the world in which we live from hate to love, the message will have done its job.

Also: donate to the OneOrlando.com fund. And upload your own videos to encourage others to donate to the fund, too!