June 12, 2007 at 2:14 am · Filed under kennedy center, travel, dressing room, performances, candice thompson, CANDICE, ad hoc Ballet, Deborah Lohse
Posted by Candice Thompson
Suzanne Farrell Ballet was performing at the Kennedy Center this week, so Deborah Lohse and I decided to drive down on Sunday to see our friends perform. It was a quick day trip, but the weather was gorgeous and good times were had.
Here you see us in Georgetown on M street, in dresses that turned out to be quite similar, and in our comfy birks. Don’t worry, we put on fancy heels before we entered the opera house!
There was a beautiful sunset over the water during the second intermission. Deb decided to splurge on a box of chocolates and we each had one as we looked at JFK’s words of wisdom on the wall of the terrace.
The show ended with Slaughter on Tenth Avenue which was a great note to end on. We headed back to the dressing rooms to say hi to everyone and switch from contacts to glasses before the long drive back to NYC.
The drive back really wasn’t so bad and was completely worth it to see good friends dance; a rare opportunity when most are now spread out in companies all over the country. We played our music loud, talked about upcoming projects for ad hoc Ballet, and of course, wore our seatbelts!
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May 6, 2007 at 1:23 am · Filed under candice thompson, CANDICE, poet, ad hoc Ballet, Deborah Lohse
Posted by Candice Thompson
When Deborah Lohse (director of ad hoc Ballet) told us in rehearsal that our newest work would be titled The Lucy Poems, I must admit I was unfamiliar with Wordsworth outside of a very general notion of his place in history. She read us the poems that corresponded to each section of the piece and briefly explained how reading them brought her to name the ballet. I am an avid reader, but mostly of fiction and history, so I was going to need more than just hearing it once to know what to take from the source. Basically, I had never been able to “get into” poetry like a good novel.
Does the poem inform the work or does the work lead me to a greater understanding of the poem? I am finding both to be true as we head into the theatre this week with the show. I have lived with a large Wordsworth volume on my nightstand for the last four weeks and confess that I have not read too much more than the Lucy Poems. However, I have spent a lot of time with those few and have found them to be quite brave expressions of beauty and the unknown, both in the context and subtext. My opinion on poetry is starting to change and change, in my opinion, is the only worthwhile constant for an artist. If you don’t believe me, then I urge you to read a recent New Yorker article on Karl Lagerfeld.
And so I thank Dan, Deborah’s fiancee, who I believe first thought to make the connection between these poems and the choreography, and Deborah, for giving us more information and resources from which to make our artistic choices. It is truly a beautiful way to work.
I will try to post them all throughout the week but for today, I leave you with the poem which embraces my solo work in The Lucy Poems:
“Three Years She Grew in Sun and Shower”
1799.1800
composed in the Hartz Forest
Three years she grew in sun and shower,
Then Nature said,” A lovelier flower
On earth was never sown;
This Child I to myself will take;
She shall be mine, and I will make
A Lady of my own.
“Myself will to my darling be
Both law and impulse: and with me
The girl, in rock and plain,
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power
To kindle or restrain.
“She shall be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn,
Or up the mountain springs;
And hers shall be the breathing balm
And hers the silence and the calm
Of mute insensate things.
“The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her; for her the willow bend;
Nor shall she fail to see
Even in the motions of the Storm
Grace that shall mould the Maiden’s form
By silent sympathy.
“The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face.
“And vital feelings of delight
Shall rear her form to stately height,
Her virgin bosom swell;
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give
While she and I together live
Here in this happy dell.”
Thus Nature spake — The work was done –
How soon my Lucy’s race was run!
She died, and left to me
This heath, this calm, and quiet scene;
The memory of what has been,
And never more will be.
–William Wordsworth
Photo by Steven Schreiber: Me rehearsing the solo at BAC on a sunny day.
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May 2, 2007 at 12:17 am · Filed under rehearsals, lincoln center, traveling, candice thompson, CANDICE, LOLAstretch, ad hoc Ballet, The Lucy Poems, Deborah Lohse
Posted by Candice Thompson
Monday through Wednesday of last week, I was at the Silo artist residency in Pennsylvania (formerly Gelsey Kirkland’s family farm) with ad hoc Ballet, preparing for our upcoming show, The Lucy Poems.
Photo: Deborah Lohse in the studio at SILO artist residency.
It was a gorgeous setting to be doing some serious rehearsing in and the weather couldn’t have been better. We were able to get a bit of tanning by the pool in on our lunch break Tuesday. The grounds cover many acres and there are horses and dogs and bugs! so it was quite a change and respite from the city.
While running my solo shortly after arriving, a wasp landed on my head while I was in a deep lunge and as I straightened up into tendu, it decided to sting me in the face! Rehearsal was called off for the day shortly thereafter and we all had a good laugh (while I was icing my face:-() at what happens when four trinas find themselves rehearsing in a country barn. Lots of side glances in horror and sweeping movements in order to look at or avoid many large bugs.
Nothing like getting in touch with nature in order to get you really moving….. feel ready for the stage or pretty much anything coming my way while dancing now!
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