Samuel
/ 5. oktober 2010 21:37
A warm welcome to readers for my very first blog!! My name is Samuel Denton, I have been dancing in Skanes Dansteater since August 2009.
Last weekend I led a workshop for Young Sundays which was followed by a performance by Helsinki Dance Company, choreographed by Kenneth Kvarnström. I was very excited to be teaching my first workshop at SDT, perhaps a little nervous, but super happy with the amount of freedom we had to play with and the overall outcome, and of course not forgetting my lovely bunch of people that came along!
I decided to steer away from solely teaching reperatory work from the company and give the group an understanding of the types of things we dancers undergo within a choreographic process. Of course each and every choreographer brings different approaches and have very different ways of working. I wanted to give a brief insight into some of my own experiences from the past and present. I then related that work into the current creation that I am working on with Ben Wright, Between Silence and Stillness.
Before working in Skanes Dansteater I danced as an apprentice within D.A.N.C.E -Dance Across Europe, a formation of 24 young dancers from all over Europe working with four established choreographers. William Forsythe was one of the four and is regarded as a hugely influential and important choreogrpaher within modern dance this century. I gained so much knowledge and experience from working with him and his respected colleagues, his ongoing practices and techniques with improvisation are incredibly inspiring. He was director of the Franfurt Ballet for many years before most recently forming the Forsythe Company. To make a long story short he is responsible for creating a system of improvisation techniques with a number of key principles, focusing on physical movement and its relationship to space. I beleive that his techniques have inspired many choreogrpahers all over the world and played a role in the ongoing development of different methods within contemporary dance today. I guess thats why I wanted to draw upon this within the workshop to give the group a taster of what I often think about during the different creations here at Skanes. Improvisation plays a huge role in the majority of creations within Contemporary dance and a necessary skill for us as dancers.
The group were lovely! All very enthusiastic and curious to explore, a big releif for me! They let go of all their inhibitions and threw themselves straight into the work, moving their bodies for a long long time!
I led them through a number of different exercises, allowing them to explore moving in different ways, concentrating on different focuses and tasks. We questioned and dicussed what we were doing each step of the way, analyzing peoples work and beginning to notice the body differently and how it was relating to the space around us. We focused on circles in the body, becoming aware of all the different joints in the body. We played with tracing circles in space, forming lines, imagining them in space. We transported the lines, we extruded lines from different parts of the body and the floor, we used different body parts with different coordinations of the head in where it was focussing. We folded the lines we produced, we extended them to further extremities. We dropped points of the body and matched different limbs together. The list is endless, to name a few, we played and played! As we improvised I think the group were mentally drained from thinking so much but they became so focused and in tune with their bodies that they surprised themselves with how differently they were moving, going away from their typical habitual patterns. I was so impressed with their tenacity and personal developments, there is no right or wrong in any of it but it is so exciting to see how peoples bodies react in different ways to the same tasks, so information comes from our bodies.
I was able to link an improvisation set by Ben Wright within his creation of Between Silence and Stillness that I presented to the group. We learnt a phrase taken from this improvisation exercise that they later delveloped using the techniques we had covered in the the first part of the workshop. The task was to imagine small man that you could pick up with your hands, he was running all over your body. The task was keep sight of where he was moving on the body, the dancers were to react using their bodies to trace where he was moving, that was the basic format.
I made them think.....alot....!! I made them dance.....alot.....!! I think after an hour and half everybody was beginning to flake and blood sugar was running low! Unfortunetley I didnt provide cake, perhaps thats something I will do next time round, always a winner!
So big thank you to the group for a incredibly focused and enjoyable workshop, it was a pleasure. Pictures are on the way, if only I knew how to resize them sucessfully, Peder King of the blog will have to help me out on that one! Online very soon!
That all aside....what else is happening.....in repsonse to Peders blog last week........whilst all the rest of the gang are busy performing Black Water in Helsinki, in big glamourous opera houses, luxury hotels and gala dinners......we five are left all alone in Malmo, in a very empty studio! Morning class at the moment is very surreal and quiet, almost feels like an audition. Working extremeley hard though in peparation for next weeks big premier of Ben Wrights Between Silence and Stillness. Everything is beginning to come together, beautiful costumes and a stunning light design. Of course ups and downs have played a role like always, dramas with floor types, slippy costumes, low stamina, injuries, fast fast fast and of course the nerves!! Five days to go and counting, I think its going to be very special, I have thoroughly enjoyed this creation, come and watch!!! Orchestra arriving tommorow, hoping it sounds the same as the CD that we have been working with!
Until next time.....!
Sam :)