I am so getting late for work by posting this, but I just have to. Not only is this the ultimate Friday YouTube, but it’s totally inspired by my favorite choregrapher Mats Ek!
2007 is going to become the year of the modern dance music video. Seriously, there are so many great music videos out there now with interesting contemporary choreography in them.
Here’s one. Watch and smile. It’s Feist folks.
I was just asked to comment on Dance Place’s latest blog entry: Theater Etiquette. Dance Place is trying to convince the Washington Post to do a story on “how theater etiquette has gone down the tubes and how cell photos cameras a cell video capture is threatening the integrity of a choreographers work.” Here is my response:
Cell phones, and all that comes with them, definitely an issue, but there is one more issue that comes to mind. Number 1 rule - stay for the whole show. Even if you are a student and you are getting extra credit for going, don’t just grab a program and leave. Arrive at least 15 minutes early, try to get something out of the experience, and then bring THAT back to your class.
They are hoping that if they send all of the blog comments to the Post, they will write about it. So, I thought I’d pose the question to YOU. Feel free to comment here or on their blog at www.myspace.com/danceplace (yes - another dance blog in DC!)
Well, now it’s been a week since I was sucked into the stage at the Transformer Gallery during a performance of Daniel Burkholder’s “My Ocean is Never Blue.” I told Ilana I was going to write on this blog immediately after the concert, but I found myself too overwhelmed to compose any coherent thoughts. As a matter of fact, I didn’t FEEL like writing about it because the experience was somewhat indescribeable and I liked it that way. I didnt’ want to disturb the intuitive, impulsive, ecstatic reaction that I had to the piece by trying to reduce it to text. ‘Twould have been wholly inadequate at the time.
But now I’ve sobered up a bit, so I can step back and reduce away.
What amazed me right away was the immediacy of it all. The gallery is tiny, no seats, a floor the size of a suburban kitchen. So the audience was on stage with the dancers. The music by Jon Matis was both jagged and big, made all the more all-encompassing by the fact that he too was on the stage – processors, amps, and all. It was amazing how quickly the experience made me unaware of the fact that I was on U St. I could have been on Mars for all I knew; I was blissfully lost.
The proximity nearly gave way to my participation at one point; I literally almost jumped in to the mix. But it wasn’t just the closeness that precipitated this near-embarassment. It was the closeness combined with the intensity of movement. While the ready-to-burst-at-the-seams music soared, the dancers seemed to seek catharsis through their improvisations, yet tempered that seeking so as to never get there. I would have been let down had I been releived of this irresolution. With every movement, I felt my body predicting where the next moment was headed, my back clinched, my hips pivoted, my knees bent. I was ready to join. (in hindsight, they really should have had security there to prevent marauding fans from storming the stage.)
So, for me, the experience was highly emotional, but in a kinesthetic way, rather than an . . . uhh . . . emotional way. Here’s how I put in a recent email regarding the performance:
“I think what got me most was the thick tension expressed in the movements; so much potential energy just waiting to burst into kinetic, always teetering on the edge of cathartic resolution. I really dug that. I’m not a dancer but I’ve always felt that if I danced, I would tend towards movement that reflects some sort of internal struggle, expressed through phrases that pit one part of the body against another. A sort of decisive indecision if you will.”
And of course, it didn’t hurt that some of the phrases reminded me of Merce — the king of acathartic movement. And yet, they didn’t seem to imitate Merce; they were extremely inventive and pure and came from the inside out.
Looking forward to the Burkholder show April 27-29.
john lanou
i went to the fundraiser for the playground’s “my ocean is never blue” and it was really fun. so great great great to be around lots of dancers whom i know, and with whom i can gossip and talk about what’s going on in our lives and with our dance. onward and upward!
here’s a short you tube video of part of martha graham’s “panorama.” It was created in 1935–which is amazing since it really doesn’t look that dated at all. i’m not especially fond of it, however–though i love the red costumes–and it brings to mind the point lotta raised a while ago about how what she loves most of all about dance is movement itself, the body in motion. this piece, to me, is more about poses. of course, that can definitely be interesting. after all, it’s kind of like living sculpture. merce cunningham is a lot like that (check out his “beach birds”), and even better and more original than martha graham (i think). but for me, that kind of thing is just not that satisfying to watch. there’s something about seeing full-out movement, and even subtle slow movement, that just grabs and moves me in a way little else does.
two things:
we’ve found a great dance blog, check it out >> Great Dance Weblog
and…we have an invitation to a BEACH PARTY!!:
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image: detail of installation by Bronwyn Lace
