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Week Whatever Wrap-Up
…And belated third-quarterly #goals review 😛
I’ve lost track of which week we’re on, since it turns out that break weeks aren’t counted in the company calendar and I apparently can’t be bothered to check ours while I’m writing this.
Anyway!
This week was all over the place. I felt pretty good on Monday and Tuesday, left my brain at home and just couldn’t even on Wednesday, wasn’t at the ballet on Thursday (I had a previous engagement for Cirque), and had a pretty darned good Friday, even though I was in Goldfish Mode* throughout most of class in the morning.
*Yes, I am aware that goldfish actually have decent memories. Work with me, here, people.
“Oh, G-d, what was the combination? Was there even a combination? Where even am I? WHO EVEN AM I?!” (Public domain, via Wikimedia.)
Technique-wise, this wasn’t always the best week ever. I realized during break week that since I’ve managed to stick myself with the Shawty barre, I need to learn to work with it and not just be like “OF COURSE I LOOK LIKE AN IDIOT THIS BARRE IS WAY TOO SHORT FOR ME.” Which in turn made me realize that I’ve been using the Shawty Barre as an internal excuse for things like leaving too much of my weight in my heels (note to self: WTF?), not being tall on both sides of my body, only halfway pointing my feet, doing this bizarre thing where I let my weight drift towards my free leg which doesn’t help anyone, etc, etc, etc.
So this week was, like, Remedial Ballet 083 while I concentrated on undoing all the stuff I did to my body while I was being an idiot. Which meant sucking it up and dialing down the turnout, etc.
On the upside, Mrs D gave us this useful and memorable correction about using our cores: “You know those six-packs** you all have because you work so hard? DON’T LET THOSE CANS FALL OUT OF THE FRIDGE.”
**The visibility of mine varies … but, holy heck, am I ever growing some abs.
For whatever reason, that particular visual is really helpful for me. It also made me realize that when I notice that I’m getting swaybacked, I tend to try to use my actual back to fix the problem instead of re-engaging my core, which is how you really fix that problem.
I guess that none of those things are really negative, now that I’m thinking about them. Working like this every single day, twenty-plus hours per week, gives me a lot of time to think about everything.
Also, I finally nailed my first double cabrioles through the sheer force of peer pressure … or, really, the effect of a sentiment very like, “If they can do it, I can do it; don’t want to let the side down.”
So that’s a couple of goals knocked off the Great List Of Technical Goals.
We’re well into Nutcracker now, and next Saturday is New Works & Other Voices (which, due to some marketing SNAFUs, has garnered such nicknames as “New Works & Other Stories” and “Works and Other Works”). We’re going to be sharing the stage with a pair of artists who will be painting a giant mural as we dance. Depending on the materials that the muralists will be using, it’ll either be really cool or, “Dude, waaaaaaaaay far out bra.” Good thing that the works and other works are pretty contemporary.
I forget whence I ganked this hilarity, but it’s pretty much what I suspect the average non-dancer thinks of when they think of contemporary dance.
In related news, I’m now on the company page on the website under “Trainees,” which is AWESOME, though I don’t have a headshot yet because I wasn’t there on headshot day. I will content myself for now with being the official Man of Mystery (regarding which, I am as mysterious as a shoebox, y’all). I have a cute li’l bio and everything.
…Which brings me, albeit indirectly, to the quarterly-ish goals review bit.
Way back at the end of last year, I set a bunch of goals, as you do.
I’m rather surprised to say that I’m making quite good progress on them. I’ve finally nailed down that pesky double tour, and the progress of my turns has been solid–not in terms of the number of revolutions I can achieve, but in terms of the overall quality of the turns themselves.
I’ve gone to enough auditions this year that auditioning is starting to feel fairly routine, and I’ve had more work at times than I’ve known what to do with. I didn’t actually audition at LexBallet, but I’ve wound up dancing there anyway, which in turn is affording me the opportunity to work on artistry, coordination, and all that stuff consistently.
I set the first two-thirds of “Tenebrae” and had an opportunity to show it at an actual, real dance concert; I choreographed and performed “Loverboy;” and I’ve made vague advances towards working on “Bolero,” which is no longer part of Simon Crane, but simply a dance about riding the South Shore Line into Chicago.
The one glaring oversight is the commitment I made to BW to work on balances. I paused that effort a while back when I was getting over that case of strep that made my ears weird, and it’s time to really get back on it.
Back at the beginning of this year, I hoped I would be where I am now, but I don’t think I really believed that I would.
Now it’s up to me to keep working and to actually begin using my brain as a dancer. I still have a lot to learn, and because I’m a bit older than your average company trainee, I need to learn it fast and well.
Also, because I faffed around forever with headshots on Thursday, here, have this one:
What is it about this shot that makes me think I look like the secret love-child of Nureyev and Mr Bean???
Weekend Round-Up, I Guess?
Totally failed to write about my own show, as you do. 😆
It went well—not perfect, but well enough that the audience thought it was. I got a nice word from our director, BG: “Your musicality was perfect.” As a dancer, that’s not a word you hear often.
Also quite a few nice words from folks in the audience—friends and perfect strangers both. E’s husband told me: “You stole the show—I mean that as a compliment!” That was a lovely thing to hear, but I think the best thing was K’s friends, who described my dancing to her as “powerful,” among other lovely words I wish I remembered right now.
K, meanwhile—my friend-turned-ballet partner who made me take myself seriously as a dancer some while back by telling me that I reminded her of Nureyev— described my attitude turn as beautiful, floating, and apparently effortless, with the free leg raised to 90 degrees.
I was glad to hear that, because in both the tech run and the full dress run I didn’t account for how remarkably grippy this particular batch of Marley was and wound up with 3/4s of an attitude turn and the world’s tiniest promenade 😅 During the actual show, it felt great, but that’s not always the most accurate barometer!
In the end, I think everyone was pretty happy with things.
There’s an immense peace that comes over me when I’m on stage. It’s like being immersed entirely in the stream of the present. Time is at once infinite and fleeting. Choreography appears like a divine gift. I don’t have to think about it: it’s just there.
“Did someone order a choreography?!”
There was a weird moment right at the beginning when I realized, with surprise, not only could I actually see part of the audience quite clearly[1], but was sharing a moment of eye contact with a woman out in the seats. That was really, really cool—also a crystal-clear visual memory that I’ll carry forever.
- In many theaters, the lighting renders the audience effectively invisible. You might catch the glare off an eyeglass lens, but that’s about it.
There’s something special about realizing that, hey, there are actual people out there, and they’re connected with what you’re doing, and it means something to them. For some performers, that’s kind of a nightmare, but I loved it—especially for this piece, which was full of emotion and human connections (both literal and metaphorical).
Anyway, we followed our terpsichorean triumph with one heck of a party, then hauled our heineys outta bed for class (my calf was iffy, so I opted not to jump—Memorial is a beautiful house, but the floor is pretty hard, and we did a bunch of jumps in our warm-up class before the show). Followed that with an hour of contact improv and 3 hour rehearsal: #dancerlife never stops 😛
This morning I opted to stay home and rest the legs a little, even though I’m adding Monday AM to the rotation. Back to class as usual tonight.
Possibly the best news: BG asked us at our party how we’d feel about performing more often. He has plans in the works. Obviously, I’m so there.
In the meanwhile, though, the next blip on my radar is another gala thing, this time with an excerpt from the Culture of Poverty, on April 30th.
Four years ago, when I stepped back into the studio, I never would have imagined living this life.
Nor would I have imagined becoming Sir Twinkshirt of the Footroller.
Honestly, if you’d described it to me, with all its chaos and exceedingly complicated scheduling, I would have, like, fainted (though it was wouldn’t have changed much, if anything).
In the end, though, this is what happens when we stumble into a driving passion: it, like, you know, drives.
And now, back to our regularly-scheduled laundry day.
Looking Ahead
Because evidently time and I have a tenuous relationship at best, I realized yesterday that I was beginning, rather than ending, the third week since my surgery, and as such I still face four weeks before I can resume my usual workload. Oops.
On the other hand, that does mean I’m healing very, very well. I’ve been obsessing over reading other people’s accounts of healing from this kind of survey—initially to figure out what to expect, what was normal, and what was cause to panic, and but now because they’re just plain interesting—and it seems that a lot of folks still have a fair amount of discomfort and so forth at this stage. I’m chalking my relatively easy recovery up to a really awesome surgeon and above-average physical fitness.
Anyway, Golden Retriever Timescales[1] not withstanding, I’m starting to make plans for next year.
- I’ve probably used this analogy before: while my sense of immediate time is pretty decent, once I venture beyond that, my perception of time flakes into two distinct categories—the ones you might imagine a not-very-bright Golden Retriever understanding, which is to say say, Now and Not-Now. Anything further than two weeks out, meanwhile, exists in the realm of absurd fantasy. Evidently, this also applies retroactively 😛
I auditioned for more things this year than last year. I expect to continue that trend next year. I’m looking at dance companies (ballet and modern, but mostly ballet), cirque companies, and cruise-line dance-and-cirque companies right now, as well as the usual gig-based auditions.
Ideally, I would love to work in ballet, but I realize that my particular skill-set makes me a good candidate for progressive circus companies. Likewise, while many classically-trained dancers turn their noses up at working for cruise lines, I like the idea of living and working on a self-contained floating city, and cruise-line companies value versatile performers. I suspect that my strong classical dance background and existing aerial skills will place me well (I’m also a pretty good singer, which doesn’t hurt).
That said, my best asset is simply the ability (and willingness) to up stakes and go wherever the work is.
It seems like a good idea, when you’re trying to work in a ridiculously competitive industry, to identify all of your strengths (not just the obvious ones) and seek opportunities where they’ll be useful. Given that I’ve taken a really, really atypical path to working in dance, I plan to use the heck out of that strategy. My goal is to audition as often as possible for jobs that will find my collection of both skill- and non-skill assets highly desirable: in short, to target companies that need people with strong classical (and progressive) dance training, strong aerial arts training, a background in gymnastics, fearlessness, willingness/desire to travel, and flexibility (both physical and mental). Being a ballet-and-trapeze boy who also performs on lyra and fabrics shouldn’t hurt, either.
I’m not operating under the illusion that, should I work for a cruise line or a touring company, I’ll get to see a great deal of the places we visit—but opportunities do arise, and I’m not seeing much of the world from where I am now, either 😛
Anyway, the primary goal next year is to continue training and gain as much professional experience as I can—basically, either to work with a company that rehearses and performs across a regular season for much or all of the year, or to continue to work with a company like CirqueLouis and take every additional gig that I can.
I’m not defining my ballet goals quite yet: I think I’m going to buttonhole Killer B, BG, and BW about those first. I still don’t have an intentional double tour, so I’ll be working on that through the end of the year once I’m cleared.
danseur ignoble 