Archive for college
November 23, 2007 at 6:40 am · Filed under dance, SUSAN, los angeles, dance companies, college, fun
This past Saturday, at co-founder (co-director, choreographer and dancer) Betsy Uhler’s invitation, I attended the inaugural performance of LA Unbound. Based on Ithaca College’s IC Unbound, a student dance company that Betsy was a member of during her college days, LA Unbound is a dance troupe comprised of dancers in Los Angeles who represent as many different backgrounds, styles, and levels as can possibly be imagined. The company’s primary objective: To hold performances featuring a diverse array of dances in a non-competitive environment.
When Betsy first described LA Unbound to me, the organization and the philosophy upon which it is founded immediately struck a special chord with me because it reminded me so much of the college dance group that I myself directed during my time at Amherst. There, like here, the group existed fundamentally to facilitate dance for dancers (and non-dancers who wanted to dance). The group’s sole demand/s: dance and, more importantly, have fun. LA Unbound’s philosophy is very similar.
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Ithaca College alum Doug Hannah entertains the crowd
with unusual juggling and balancing acts. |
Ithaca College alum Peter Verdell provides musical
interludes in between dances. |
Because it is, in a way, a Los Angeles extension of the Ithaca-based IC Unbound, a majority of LA Unbound’s dancers are IC Unbound and Ithaca College alums. (Just as an aside: I never realized that so many Ithaca College alums live in Los Angeles. They must amount to at least half the city’s population! (Okay, I exaggerate…)) What a fantastic resource, though. Those Ithaca College alums who did not dance on Saturday helped out where they could, either selling tickets, passing out programs, queuing the music, setting the lights, performing in between dance numbers and, of course, supporting the dancers from the house.
Happy dancers.
What a great start for LA Unbound! Cheers to co-founders and co-directors Betsy Uhler and Elizabeth Tramontozzi for their hard work and for creating this special vehicle for dancers and dance lovers. And for keeping it fun.
Betsy and Elizabeth smile after a long day of rehearsing and performing.
Recent Posts by susan kim
November 4, 2007 at 4:45 pm · Filed under SLOAN, dance, wingers, education, new york times, school, college, LEAP, gia kourlas
Dont be scared… you’re in good company! (Photo from JP)
I just wanted to write a quick post to direct your attention to a great article that the lovely Ms. Kourlas just wrote for the NY Times about dancers seeking college education while working full time, and even touring!
Much of the article describes the new-to-New-York LEAP program (Liberal Education for Arts Professionals) which was started in San Francisco in 1999 by Claire Sheridan, a former dancer. Two hundred and nine dancers are enrolled this year, including our very own Mr. Matthew Murphy and Ms. Sophie Flack. Also Mr. Justin Peck, Ms. Gwyneth Muller and Ms. Taylor Gordon, are three other Wingers (and maybe I’m missing a few) who are juggling scholastic ambitions and dance careers. Way to go guys!
Recent Posts by kristin sloan
October 22, 2007 at 9:03 pm · Filed under dance, media, magazine, school, TAYLOR, college, dance spirit
After the September issue of Dance Spirit Magazine came out, focused largely on balancing college with a dance career, I thought it necessary to share my side of the story. Today there is so much of a pressure on young dancers graduating from high school: do we follow our dream and attempt to make a career from ballet, or do we follow a more conventional path to college, perhaps setting a dance career to the side or deferring it to a later date.
When I was at this point in my life (not long ago), nobody told me it was possible to have both. I had to find that out on my own the hard way. It’s been worth the effort, though, and I decided to share my story with the editors at Dance Spirit Magazine.
They printed a portion of my letter in the new November issue of the magazine. Buy it and turn to page 38…I’m there!
The part about Ajkun Ballet Theater is no longer valid (it was the plan at the time I wrote this, though), but many other things have taken the place of that (internship at Quick & Simple, Nutcracker with the company in CT…).
Anyways, I thought I’d share that. I’m off to do lots of work for midterms this week….
Recent Posts by taylor gordon
September 11, 2007 at 3:28 pm · Filed under dance, university, school, college, JUSTIN, columbia university, barnard dance
I just had my first day back at Columbia University since the long summer break. Initially, it always feels a bit discomfited and awkward getting thrown back into the swing of things there. Perhaps this is due to the unfamiliarity of new professors, new classmates, and new academic locations. Or maybe this type of feeling can’t be helped when a university abruptly brings together thousands of bright students seeping with intellectual vigor. Either way, once the initial clumsiness wares off, the focus of my school routine is free to kick in with full-fledged force. There is nothing that feels more productive once I get going with my school schedule paired up with my dancing.
I’m taking two courses this semester: an introductory Biology lab and a course called Dance Criticism. It’s a nice balance of classes, as the two are entirely opposite to each other. For example, today I dissected arthropods and earthworms in my 3-hour lab. Then I moseyed on over to my Dance Criticism class, where I analyzed old videos of Nureyev dancing classical ballet with well-known dance critic Mindy Aloff. The two are like night and day.
I’ve also worked it out so that I will have all my classes of the week only on Mondays (my day off from dancing). It’s a long day—from 10 until 6—but its worth it as I won’t have to wake up early before “work” (I quote ‘work’ because dancing for a living is really more like playtime) to go to school. Last year, I had morning classes Mondays Wednesdays and Fridays. It was neither fun nor easy having to wake up at 7 a.m. after just finishing a show at 11 p.m, along with a day full of rehearsals the day before. Mondays are when I get to pretend that I am simply a normal student at a University. Its sort of a taste of an entirely different lifestyle and pace for me. Refreshing.
Elliott Smith is always keeping me company, via my ipod headphones, when I am on campus. There is something cerebral and stripped down about his music that just pairs so well (like fine wine and aged cheese) with the gorgeous campus and constant student buzz of Columbia. Then again, I feel like any kind of music would put me in a good mood when strolling through a campus of the likes of this:
The Main Library and Centerpiece of the C.U. campus
Butler Library (where I do most of my studying)
Me Inside Butler Library
The Stacks!! These are the creepy half-floors in Butler where all the books are kept. It feels like a daunting deserted library up here, probably since so many people simply utilize the Internet these days. It would make a great location for a horror movie, hm?
The view of the C.U. campus from my lab room. breathtaking, no?
Ballet Dancers at Barnard
The Columbia entrance way
I’m heading down to Miami in a couple days to visit a bunch of close friends whom I knew while training at SAB. These friends felt like true family to me while living in the dorms at SAB. It was sort of like I lost an essential part of my family when they all ended up getting jobs with Miami City Ballet and I ended up staying in New York to dance for NYCB. Anyway, I can’t wait to see them! And hey, who knows, I might even run into fellow Winger correspondent Alex Wong? We’ll see. I’ve never been to Miami before, any recommendations of fun things to do there (restaurants, activity, etc.)?
Recent Posts by justin
September 7, 2007 at 9:10 pm · Filed under ballet, dance, class, choreographer, choreography, contemporary dance, process, benefit, TAYLOR, college
Hey everyone! I’ve been without a computer for the past 2 weeks because my laptop crashed, so I apologize for not posting lately. You don’t realize HOW much you depend on technology until you are forced to be without it (I’ve been lost without it…I spend hours on end online!). Anyways I wanted to write about an article I saw in the newest issue of Dance Teacher Magazine (no I’m not a teacher but I read it anyway) and then give you a quick update because I have a lot of new stuff going on.
Moving Story Class
In the September issue of Dance Teacher there’s an interview with choreographer Christopher d’Amboise, a former NYCB Principal dancer and son of ballet legend Jacques d’Amboise (and sister of Broadway star Charlotte D’Amboise). In the interview he discusses his unique concept of choreography and “making steps your own” through is workshop class, “The Moving Story.”
He actually brought this workshop to us back in June at Ballet Academy East and so I thought I’d share my personal experience learning with him. We had worked with him back in the winter, when he choreographed an original piece, “On the Edge” for our Studio Showing. For most of us it was our first time working with truly contemporary choreographing and it was definitely a challenge to move in different ways while still maintain our ballet technique. One of the major things Chris emphasized while working with us then was that we had a freedom within the choreography to individualize it. At the time, it was confusing and a bit intimidating to have that task: To this point, I had always been taught to conform to a choreographer’s wishes and do things exactly as I was told. Here he wanted us to take his movements and manipulate them, however slightly, to make them comfortable in our bodies and personalities.
It wasn’t until he came back to teach the Moving Story class that I was fully able to grasp this concept. He began the first session without speaking a word. He demonstrated a series of steps and we automatically imitated them. After a while he began to repeat the steps one at a time while saying what appeared to be random words. Soon the connection was clear. Each step was supposed to look like the object or action he was saying. For example, “fly swatter” was a loud clap as if you were literally swinging at a bug. “Jump over the fence” was a Jerry Robbins inspired jump (think the opening number in West Side Story) where you pretended to be going over something.
Over the following sessions we developed a “movement language” as a group. Every step we did had a name that we established together. Similar to the ballet vocabulary, every step led to something else and the connections and in between steps were important as well. The hardest part of all this was that not only did we have to work our way through the foreign choreography but, as we danced it, we had to speak the names of the steps out loud! It was truly a challenge, especially for me because I am quiet. I remember he actually made me dance and speak alone the very first lesson. He pointed to me and made me go first, and all I remember was that my mind went blank. I did the steps and said the words without even thinking about it, and all of a sudden it came so naturally. It was a very odd feeling - dancing and speaking without thinking. I don’t know if that was the intention, or even if I did the sequence correctly, but from that moment I knew this technique was something I wanted to explore and incorporate in my dancing.
As the workshop progressed we learned how to convey different emotions through movement and eventually how to create short stories through dance. It was very specifically not an acting workshop - the point was to create feelings through our bodies. For example, if you do something sharp and strong it might mean you’re angry, whereas a slower, legato movement might convey exhaustion. He had us create “emotional maps” and use them in his choreography to make the combination “our own.” The result was 15 very different interpretations of the same movement and a clear example of the point of the workshop.
(my “emotional map” and the long list of emotions to convey)
He also spoke a lot about back phrasing and front phrasing, namely playing with the music to decide which particular steps are “important” or emphasized. Already I did a bit of this naturally, but after hearing his explanation of this I found myself considering new ways to hear things, even just in ballet class. I can honestly say that since taking the Moving Story workshop I have implemented some of the concepts I learned about movement analysis and it has added a whole other dimension to interpreting choreography and even basic steps in class.
On another Note…
An Update
September is always exciting and full of new beginnings, but this years seems to be exceptionally busy. Here’s a few things that I’ve been up to and that are coming up soon:
-Last Semester of College!
This week I started my final semester at Marymount Manhattan. I really can’t believe I graduate in just a few short months. It went by too fast (only 2 years!) and in some ways I don’t feel like I’ve even had the college experience. I’m taking an overload schedule to finish all my required courses. I’m also working as the Features Editor of our school paper, The Monitor, so we’re getting set up for a new issue.
-Starting Grad School!
My school has this special program where you can take graduate courses in your last semester that will count for credit as both undergrad and grad school, so I’m also taking courses in Magazine Publishing at Pace University. We had orientation the other day and I’m really excited about the program. It lets me really focus in on what I want to do after dancing.
-Benefit Performance
Details for this are still in the works, so I’ll post more later…but on October 24 I’ll be dancing in a benefit performance for the Tyler Dunne Foundation. More on that soon…
-Nutcracker, already?
Next weekend I start rehearsals for Nutcracker with the Albano Ballet Company in Connecticut. Performances are in December at Mohegan Sun, one of the biggest arenas in the northeast!
-Ajkun Ballet Theater
I also officially start as a Trainee with the international company Ajkun Ballet Theater in a few weeks. Not sure what that will bring, but it’s an exciting new beginning!
Recent Posts by taylor gordon
August 19, 2007 at 4:35 pm · Filed under dance, new york city ballet, welcome, wingers, school of american ballet, school, college, JUSTIN, columbia university
Happy Sunday Wingers 
Today we’d like to introduce you to Mr. Justin Peck. Originally from Southern California, Justin is currently a dancer with the New York City Ballet (hey co-worker!) as well as a part-time student at Columbia University.
Despite having worked together for the past year or so, being away from the stage has meant that I haven’t had the chance to get to know Justin. I’m looking forward to learning more about him now and hopefully you are too.
Welcome Justin!
Recent Posts by kristin sloan
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