TONY SCHULTZ Dance + Technology Expert Bronxville, NY USA BIO | POSTS

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Tonight I am going to see Ashley Byler’s Champions of Dance: Make Millions! at Dance Theater Workshop. Since last fall Ashley has been in creative residency at DTW as part of their STUDIO SERIES. The residency consists of a 100 studio hours culminating in a final showing.

Tickets for tonight and tomorrow are sold out though I have one extra ticket if someone would like to accompany me this evening. dance_plan at yahoo dot com. The showing starts at DTW’s rehearsal studio at 7:30. Act now, this dance is a hot commodity.

I have had the ongoing pleasure of visiting rehearsals during the process of making this dance. I have learned much from these visits about directing dancers and the elusive art of how one actually makes a dance. This is something that confuses me to no end and to which the Bylerian science provides many answers.

The Science

• Start with dancers. Caitlin Koch, Jeremy Pheifer, Sarah A. O. Rosner, Elizabeth Schafer, Lynne Schlesinger-Rudeman and Enrico Wey. These are your subjects. Love them and rule them.
• Understand that a dance consists of real human beings. Step back motion capture, we cannot extract the dance from the dancer. This is a social science. Cultivate interactions between subjects.
• Communicate by any means necessary. Use sound. Stron Softi. Use video. Give descriptions or rules for improvisatory trials. As in cybernetics, communication is control so be expressive to your subjects.
• Curate, harvest and distill movements and qualities. Take what you like and burn the rest. Be the master of your dance. You are caesar so fill out every cranny in your aesthetic universe.
• Make their organs move. This means being funny and sexy. Dont be afraid to show a little skin or body hair (respectively).

I cant wait for tonight when everybody turns up and the dancers turn on. I have lots of favorite parts in this dance and I don’t care if thats oxymoronic. Caity’s solo, Lynne’s monologue and when Sarah goons on Jeremy are tops. Other jewels are when Enrico gets kicked in the stomach and when Elizabeth lifts her leg.

You too may be a champion of dance if you act now for the only ticket left on the entire planet.

dance_plan at yahoo dot com