Technical Rehearsal

Here is the dance, the sound and the lighting all coming together ready for the first (and final?) live performance.

Finding the structure and the music

A big thanks to Rachel Palmer for helping me sort my ideas into a structure before 3rd rehearsal on Saturday and to SamULG https://soundcloud.com/samgproducer for recommending some great ideas for music that we have used along with a great string interpretation of Joy Division's 'She's Lost Control' that I found minutes before the last rehearsal this morning.

https://soundcloud.com/futurebeatsrec/invention-xndxrgrxwth

https://soundcloud.com/mixmag-1/premiere-v1984-synchronized-joy-and-sorrow

https://soundcloud.com/ovallfun/hashfinger-a7-may12

https://soundcloud.com/bilo503/nero

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vs3fpB_L1qs




So now we have set the whole 12 mintue performance with a possible few tweaks to follow at the technical rehearsal next Saturday. The last two days have been so exciting and fantastic to see this piece come together with my ideas, improvisation from the amazing dancers and guidance from Sally and Rachel.  Further blog to follow about Jem and James' duet with Dan and Jack as the puzzled watchers who join in the dance in the final stages.

Second Rehearsal

I have just returned from a lovely family holiday in Santorini and didn't get a chance to blog about this before I left. My recollections now are that I wanted to lift the mood and work with a more calm, loving and fun vibe than the first rehearsal as a counterpoint to the anxiety, stressful and manic modes we had explored in the first rehearsal.

The dancers really engaged with the four areas of the room that I mapped out for different emotions and interactions and I will be going through the video rushes in the next few days to try to pick sequences and begin to 'set' (if that is the right term) for the final choreography.

During the week I also hope to work on music and sounds that we can sequence into some kind of timeline to structure the finished piece.

Here is Rachel's updated post on The DanceMovement blog:
http://www.thedancemovement.co.uk/every-day-people1/rosiesjourney

First rehearsal

Somewhat overwhelmed. I came away from this first rehearsal quite numb - even slightly traumatised - and needed to wait a few days to revisit the video and make some sense of what we had achieved. The dancers were completely awesome and gave so much energy and support to my ideas.  I didn't expect this so a massive thank you to you all.

I was a bit apprehensive, shy and not a very able communicator when it came to direction. Sally Marie spent a lot of time with me trying to understand what I am trying to achieve which is a complex task given I'm not even sure. But she teased out some meaningful themes and she guided the dancers to improvise around these ideas.

I have about 15 mins of video that I have edited back to 8 mins of great sequences that we can begin to develop next Sunday. On reflection - it all got a bit more angst ridden and violent than I imagined it would. We cut to the chase really quickly and that was weird. So next week I think we can work on calm and love! Perhaps explore that as a meaningful contrast and juxtaposition to the completely relevant and necessary structure of difficult themes around mental health for which the dancers have already created some amazing choreography that we can build on in future sessions.

Rachel made a great post on the DanceMovement blog that summed up the day perfectly... my video upload to follow later.

http://www.thedancemovement.co.uk/every-day-people1/rosie-edp-day-1

First reheasal tomorrow

So not sure where I am going with this... but excited about the first rehearsal with the dancers tomorrow. I will need a lot of help from Sally Marie to translate all this into some kind of sense for the dancers but hoping I can show them this blog to start developing ideas.

Push and pull
Chaos and calm
Fast and slow
Big and small
Loud and quiet

Need to think about music...maybe examples

And about space... here are some plans of the Brislington Asylum near Bristol that maybe helpful for mapping out movement in imaginary spaces.

Dance videos for reference

A film I found when searching for mental health and dance...

and this one which is perhaps a bit off piste but stunning nonetheless

In Our Minds

'In Our Minds' is a collaborative project between the National Archives and UCA Archives exploring representations of mental health. 3 MA students and 2 members of staff have produced works in response to the archives. This display will take place at UCA and at The Nation Archives and will feature in a panel exhibition to allow for travel. The panel exhibition will also sit beside the objects, including a small sculpture, glass work and a wedding dress. It will also have an audio soundtrack.

Due to my mother suffering from mental health problems all her life and presently in a care home, I have wanted to make creative work around these themes for a very long time and was keen to take part in this project. I was invited to visit the archive to look at some collections that had been preselected by Archivists Ann Chow and Vicky Iglikowski. Due to pressure of work I wasn't able to make the visit until Thursday 7th July when I was shown a number of collections that have narratives around the theme of mental health.

Four stories stood out for me:

Mary Smith - 'lunatic' taken into an asylum in 1811
Siegfried Lorraine Sassoon - 2nd Lieutenant in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers and a poet deemed mentally unsound in 1918
Sarah Petty - wife and mother who attempted suicide in 1917 but instead killed her 2 year 7 months old son
Olive Wharry - Suffragette and hunger striker 1912-1914

All these stories in some way resonated with what I have experienced with my own mother and were therefore of particular interest.

I hope to use some of the language and images from these collections to develop the choreography for Everyday People and have the first rehearsal tomorrow. The idea of this blog is to show some of the material to the dancers to help with the improvisation and to set movement tasks.