4dancers – Page 39

DVD Review: Ghostlight

November 16, 2012 by 4dancers

by Emily Kate Long

Palisades Pictures and Mannic Productions

Produced and Directed by Christopher Herrmann

Introducing Richard Move as Martha Graham

The world knows Martha Graham as a dance icon. Ghostlight presents Graham as an icon in every aspect: her personal style is over-the top, her mannerisms are supremely theatrical, her speech is poetic and often cryptic. The tagline of the film, aptly, is “An impressionistic homage to Martha Graham.” It is loosely centered around the creation of Graham’s ballet Phaedra, but the focus is always Martha herself and all her eccentricities. In interviews with performance artist Richard Move and Director Christopher Herrmann (who worked for Graham and knew her personally), the phrase “truth is stranger than fiction” is used to describe Graham, and the film really highlights that. It’s obvious how much of a kick these two got out of making a film tribute to Martha.

Ghostlight features Ann Magnuson as a former Graham student-turned-filmmaker trying to capture the ins and outs of Martha at work—despite financial trouble and personal turmoil for both parties. The exploration of Martha’s relationships to herself, to dance as an inevitable part of her life, and to her former husband Eric Hawkins are not specific or detailed (the feature runs just 80 minutes) but they are highly suggestive. This is clearly a tribute paid with love, and extends its reach by making the viewer want to know more deeply its iconic subject.

dancer doing arabesque — Emily Kate Long, Photo by Avory Pierce

Assistant Editor Emily Kate Long began her dance education in South Bend, Indiana, with Kimmary Williams and Jacob Rice, and graduated in 2007 from Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre School’s Schenley Program. She has spent summers studying at Ballet Chicago, Pittsburgh Youth Ballet, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre School, Miami City Ballet, and Saratoga Summer Dance Intensive/Vail Valley Dance Intensive, where she served as Program Assistant. Ms Long attended Milwaukee Ballet School’s Summer Intensive on scholarship before being invited to join Milwaukee Ballet II in 2007.

Ms Long has been a member of Ballet Quad Cities since 2009. She has danced featured roles in Deanna Carter’s Ash to Glass and Dracula, participated in the company’s 2010 tour to New York City, and most recently performed principal roles in Courtney Lyon’s Sleeping Beauty, The Nutcracker, and Cinderella. She is also on the faculty of Ballet Quad Cities School of Dance, where she teaches ballet, pointe, and repertoire classes.

Young Adult Dance Book: Pointe Of No Return

November 9, 2012 by 4dancers

by Amanda Brice

“Glissade, pique arabesque, and now pull into retire en face!”

And thus begins the second chapter of my second book, Pointe of No Return, which features a kidnapping (and search for the missing girl) during Nutcracker rehearsals at a performing arts boarding school. My heroine, freshman ballet student Dani Spevak, is assigned to understudy her rival Hadley Taylor as the Sugar Plum Fairy, when Hadley goes missing. And in typical Dani fashion, he sets out to find her.

I’ve never solved mysteries, but Dani and I have several things in common. First of all, we love to dance. Okay, that’s a given. You probably share that with us as well, if you’re reading Catherine Tully’s wonderful 4dancers blog.

We both consider Nut season to be “the most wonderful time of the year” (even though my 3-year-old told me yesterday she can’t go see Nutcracker because she’s allergic to nuts). And we’ve both ended up getting to perform in a ballet even when we thought we’d been relegated to understudy status.

In my case, I was understudying a performance of Gaite Parisienne and one of the older girls in the company got hospitalized with bulimia. It was a weird feeling for me. A real paradox. On the one hand, I was super excited to get to perform, but that meant that Rachel was very, very sick. And you can’t exactly celebrate that, you know?

Same thing with Dani. Hadley’s missing, and it’s actually not in her best interest to find her – this way she gets to dance – but how can you really celebrate that (even if Hadley is the meanest girl in school)? You can’t.

So I took that awkward feeling and built a story around it. Only I changed the basic facts as to why my heroine got to dance. Because while a story about eating disorders might be relevant from a social commentary standpoint (and I do weave them in as a subplot), it probably wouldn’t make for a very good plot. (Or at least not the type of plot I write.) [Read more…]

The Cross Training Special: How To Survive Nut Without Cracking

November 7, 2012 by 4dancers

by Emily Kate Long

cross training for nutrcracker — Cross-training tools

It’s the most wonderful time of the year…Nutcracker season, of course! Nutcracker has never lost its magic for me. The fire was lit inside my nine-year-old soul as I hid under Mother Ginger’s skirt with eleven other curled, beribboned, lipsticked little girls, wanting more than anything to someday sit on the glittering throne upstage center. Fifteen years later, that throne is my domain for half an hour each Nutcracker night until a tiara and a tutu transform Clara into the Sugar Plum Fairy, bringing all her (and my) childhood dreams to life.

That’s the candy coating, anyway. Nutcracker is not a kind ballet, physically speaking. Classical pas de deux are lopsided as a rule, and it sure doesn’t feel great to sit still on foam-covered plywood for thirty minutes before dancing one. Many companies’ Nut runs are a dozen or fifty shows in duration, or involve extensive touring. Injuries are often rampant this time of year. In preparation for all things Nutty, this installment of Finding Balance is an early Christmas present to dancers in Nutcrackers everywhere: the Cross-Training Special (or, How to Survive Nut Without Cracking).

The first (and probably, the most important) step in developing an effective cross-training program is to identify what your general and specific weaknesses are, and to realize that they will (and should!) continually change as your technique and choreography do. For example, most ballet dancers are stronger/tighter on the left side and looser/weaker on the right, and overall our adductors and hamstrings tend to be weak. That’s a general and probably constant issue to address. Specifically, if choreography involves one-sided, one-directional, or very repetitive movement (many releves on the right foot, leg extensions mostly to the front, consecutive press lifts, etc.), building opposite or complementary actions into cross-training can prevent or alleviate symptoms of overuse.

Dancing alone can’t provide the strength to dance well, and it really pays off to be proactive. Time and money are two things most dancers need a little more of, and we can save both long-term (along with our sanity) if we take good care of ourselves to begin with. My routine is one I’ve developed and adapted to meet my particular needs, but it’s always evolving. I’m sharing it not because it’s a generic solution to everyone’s problems, but because of how much I’ve learned about my body and my dancing from developing tools to help myself. [Read more…]

Collaboration: Making Music For Dance

November 6, 2012 by 4dancers

4Dancers.org readers can download free music by Cory Gabel. Click here.

By now readers know that I am very much a fan of talking about music for dance. To that end, today we have Cory Gabel with us to talk about how an original piece is created for dance from his point of view…the music side!

1. Can you tell readers how you got involved with making music for dance?

Around 2002, I was transitioning out of my alternative rock band Limestone Rome. I moved into instrumental music and writing scores for film. Around that time I caught a great Pilobolus performance where they integrated all kind of modern rock, alternative, techno, electronica – all the styles I like to work in. Seeing the power of that music with dance a light bulb kind of went off – why don’t I write original music for THAT?!

2. What is your music like?

It’s such a cliche to say that’s it’s hard to categorize, but it truly must be – iTunes seems to put every release I come out in a different category! As far as musical styles, I combine elements of modern orchestral, industrial rock, electronic dance music, usually aiming for a fairly large, theatrical or epic sound. I always like to contrast those thick sonic textures with very minimal, simple sounding melodies of solo strings, piano or vocals. When my music gets reviewed or commented on, I often hear comparisons to Trent Reznor, Philip Glass, Moby, Danny Elfman and others.

3. What is the process of making music for dance like?

It really varies depending on the project and the nature of the collaboration. For more theatrical pieces, I may actually get involved with the development of the story, working with the artistic director to sketch out the acts and pieces and determining what styles and tempos of music will work for each. For pieces that are more thematic, the choreographer usually has an idea of what they’re looking for, and may even already have some music they’re working with. We talk about what is and is not working with what they have, really aiming to uncover the emotional core of what they’re trying to convey.

I almost always work remotely – so it’s lots of correspondence via phone and email – I send music as it develops, they send me back videos from rehearsals. It actually works very well!

4. What special considerations are there when working on projects such as these?

It’s recognizing that for the music to work at its best, it needs to be completely married to the dance that will be happening with it. Film music is meant to be felt emotionally, but not necessarily heard. Pop and rock music are their own sole attraction. But music for dance works when you really can’t imagine one without the other. I think that’s why many of the people I’ve worked with want to continue our collaborations – it’s hard to go back to picking out CDs and other music that weren’t written to perfectly compliment their choreography once they’ve seen how cool that can be!

5. What are the greatest challenges?

It seems increasingly hard for ballet and dance companies to commit to completely original works, I’m sure much of which is financial. Additionally, the idea of creating all new music, choreography, costumes, lighting, can seem a bit ambitious for many companies (and their boards!). So – navigating through all the conversations to get to the point where everyone says “let’s do it!” – that’s actually the challenge. In my experience, however, I’ve yet to have a project where everyone involved didn’t feel it was both creatively and financially successful at the end.

6. What about the rewards?

I absolutely love tech and dress rehearsals. It’s at that point that I finally get to see how the music that I’ve written and produced has also been the foundation for dozens of other creative people – dancers, choreographers, musicians, designers- to work their craft. Plus, I’m a junkie for the buzz before any kind of live performance – the nerves, the glitches, the last minute changes – that’s very much part of the thrill!

7. What’s next for you?

I’m collaborating again with Gregory Hancock Dance Theatre in Indianapolis, we’re going to re-stage and expand The Casket Girls (originally premiered in 2009) for Halloween 2013. I just completed Water Wars with Sonia Plumb Dance, and we’re also talking about a new production for 2013. I’m always having conversations with potential collaborators, which I can’t announce just yet, but I encourage dance companies of any size to reach out – I’d love to hear about your ideas for new works!

4Dancers.org readers can download free music by Cory Gabel. Click here.

The following clip is an excerpt-mix of nearly 20 original pieces written for dance by Cory Gabel.

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[soundcloud id=’39342032′ artwork=’false’]

Student Spotlight: Jorina Kardashi

November 5, 2012 by 4dancers

Please welcome dancer Jorina Kardashi from Princeton Dance and Theater Studio for today’s student spotlight….

When I was younger, I always loved to dance all around the house. I started out taking some dance classes at a local YMCA at four years old, but the lessons weren’t the challenging classes that my parents were hoping for. Our neighbors had a daughter who did ballet, so they recommended the Princeton Dance and Theater Studio to my parents. Taking their advice, my mom and dad decided to enroll me at PDT, and I have been dancing there ever since.

2. What do you find you like best about dance class?

Between the two parts of ballet class, barre and center, I would have to say that center work is definitely more enjoyable. Especially during more “dancy” combinations, I can let go of everything and just have fun. The technique that I gain from barre carries through to the center and becomes my second nature, and not something that I need to focus on. The euphoria that I have for dance mainly comes from the feeling that washes over me every time that I start a combination in center and find myself lost in the steps, enjoying every minute of class.

3. What is the hardest part about dance for you?

One of the hardest things that I’ve had to do is to correct the occasional bad dance habit. I’ve found that if I learn something slightly incorrectly, that habit is embedded in my muscles and becomes part of my muscle memory. Once the habit is pointed out, I have to force myself to do it correctly and to think about it every second. I’ve realized that it’s extremely difficult to continue this process until the new memory is formed, but it is a vital skill to reach success.

4. What advice would you give to other dancers?

I would advise other dancers to try to expose themselves to as many different styles of dance as possible. When I have gone outside of my comfort zone, I’ve actually improved my dancing in my field of expertise, ballet. Recently while working on a contemporary piece I learned how to loosen up my body a little more, something that has carried through to my every day ballet classes. I completely understand that trying new styles is hard, but taking other classes has helped me fix many of my technical ballet corrections.

5. How has dance changed your life?

Dance has impacted my life in a way nothing else ever has. It has given me an outlet where I can hone in on one activity without having to worry about anything that is going on in school or with my academic work. It has given me a way to challenge myself and attempt to use my body in a way it isn’t normally used. Finally, it has given me a way to express myself and an appreciation for different art forms. Although it can be hard to fit dance into my schedule, it has become a defining characteristic for my personality and who I really am.

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