Thursday, 10 November 2011
Tracing the Traipse
In the past few weeks Tessa, Rocky, Kirsty and myself have been visiting the five locations in Yorkshire, Humberside and North Lincolnshire where we'll be traipsing in 2012. Our intention is to meet local arts officers and practitioners with a view to working with their knowledge of the area and venues where we can perform. Also we've started to collect stories from people in the street, cafes and market places which will provide us with our initial calling on song material during our studio based research and development at the end of this month 'Nov'.
Sunday, 2 October 2011
Audition blogs . . .
Ms Ellen Turner
"When turning up to the brightfurnace audition, I was a little apprehensive, as my knowledge of rapper sword dancing was limited to say the least. But the moment I got in the dance studio, the atmosphere was very welcoming and accepting. I knew that my lack of rapper sword knowledge wouldn't be judged harshly. When someone says sword dancing I initially think of Scottish sword dancing and was expecting to have to weave in out of two crossed swords with fancy delicate footwork, so when I saw that the dancing at the audition, my first reaction was of surprise!! Working in a group, and having a strong, fast, masculine and aggressive approach was the last thing I expected. It was definitely more up my street, and I really enjoyed the competitive and arrogant style that was being asked of us. One part of the day which I enjoyed was figuring out the complex group formations at a fast pace. I felt my brain was in overdrive, but when our group figured it out, it was very rewarding. Just as I was getting used to the traditional dance, Harry introduced us to Precious Cleaver and told us more about the tradition of the Betty. A traditional mischievous character who introduced each dancer to stage. This new additional tradition, was an aspect that I would never had expected to happen, but was pleasantly surprised to enjoy, the Betty character and their role in the traditional dance. We were then asked to improvise our entrance and make it however we want. It was quite exposing, as this entrance really introducing ourselves to the audience for the first time. It was quite high pressure to make sure that the right impression was to be made, whilst also juggling the unpredictability of the cheeky Precious Cleaver. I am thrilled to be part of the Traipse project and I'm really excited to learn more about traditional rapper dancing. I can't wait to see where our progress takes us."
Sophie Arstall
I am familiar with Yorkshire Dance and Beth Cassani who led the class so this instantly put me at ease as I love her class and her approach so it was a good start! I also really enjoyed learning the Rapper dance, mastering the formations and working very closely in small groups, it is a real team effort which can prove challenging but everyone was eager to learn. Once we put it to music the rapper really began to make sense, the drive and rhythm really helped to give us a sense of attack which Tom from Black Swan Rapper kept talking about. He was extremely clear in his instructions and the manner in which he approached this dance and I was impressed by his commitment and experience. It was great to learn from him. I would also enjoy exploring other approaches or attitudes towards rapper dancing.
I also enjoyed the comedic aspect of this dance with the Cabaret/clown character who introduced us into the space as we progressed and in the afternoon exploring the verses we had written about ourselves. I really enjoyed working within character and it was interesting to explore this, however as my verse was more abstract and poetic I felt it was more difficult to portray a specific character. I also need a bit more time to do this and felt there was a lot of literal translation of these verses. I would like to go deeper so that our character work has substance and does not rely on cliches....or resort to showing off... however maybe this is what the project is about which is also fine! This did bring up a lot of questions for me in regards to dance and physicality and theatrical work, which I can begin to articulate here:
"When turning up to the brightfurnace audition, I was a little apprehensive, as my knowledge of rapper sword dancing was limited to say the least. But the moment I got in the dance studio, the atmosphere was very welcoming and accepting. I knew that my lack of rapper sword knowledge wouldn't be judged harshly. When someone says sword dancing I initially think of Scottish sword dancing and was expecting to have to weave in out of two crossed swords with fancy delicate footwork, so when I saw that the dancing at the audition, my first reaction was of surprise!! Working in a group, and having a strong, fast, masculine and aggressive approach was the last thing I expected. It was definitely more up my street, and I really enjoyed the competitive and arrogant style that was being asked of us. One part of the day which I enjoyed was figuring out the complex group formations at a fast pace. I felt my brain was in overdrive, but when our group figured it out, it was very rewarding. Just as I was getting used to the traditional dance, Harry introduced us to Precious Cleaver and told us more about the tradition of the Betty. A traditional mischievous character who introduced each dancer to stage. This new additional tradition, was an aspect that I would never had expected to happen, but was pleasantly surprised to enjoy, the Betty character and their role in the traditional dance. We were then asked to improvise our entrance and make it however we want. It was quite exposing, as this entrance really introducing ourselves to the audience for the first time. It was quite high pressure to make sure that the right impression was to be made, whilst also juggling the unpredictability of the cheeky Precious Cleaver. I am thrilled to be part of the Traipse project and I'm really excited to learn more about traditional rapper dancing. I can't wait to see where our progress takes us."
Sophie Arstall
I am familiar with Yorkshire Dance and Beth Cassani who led the class so this instantly put me at ease as I love her class and her approach so it was a good start! I also really enjoyed learning the Rapper dance, mastering the formations and working very closely in small groups, it is a real team effort which can prove challenging but everyone was eager to learn. Once we put it to music the rapper really began to make sense, the drive and rhythm really helped to give us a sense of attack which Tom from Black Swan Rapper kept talking about. He was extremely clear in his instructions and the manner in which he approached this dance and I was impressed by his commitment and experience. It was great to learn from him. I would also enjoy exploring other approaches or attitudes towards rapper dancing.
I also enjoyed the comedic aspect of this dance with the Cabaret/clown character who introduced us into the space as we progressed and in the afternoon exploring the verses we had written about ourselves. I really enjoyed working within character and it was interesting to explore this, however as my verse was more abstract and poetic I felt it was more difficult to portray a specific character. I also need a bit more time to do this and felt there was a lot of literal translation of these verses. I would like to go deeper so that our character work has substance and does not rely on cliches....or resort to showing off... however maybe this is what the project is about which is also fine! This did bring up a lot of questions for me in regards to dance and physicality and theatrical work, which I can begin to articulate here:
- How do we explore characters in the best possible way so that this is convincing and interesting?
- How do these characters exist in the form?
- How much will it stay in the theatrical or comedic realm?
- How much will we stay with the folk tradition and in reverse how much will we bring our 'Contemporary' selves to this?
- What does this dance mean now in our society?
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