Tag Archives: Ballet

College Dance and the “Real World”

Posted on by
2
By Natalie Walters 

If you’ve hung out with a Senior in college lately, you’ve probably witnessed a least one breakdown or “freak-out”  about something along the lines of entering the vicious job competition underprepared and moneyless. If you’re hearing this from a Dance major, then they’re also worrying whether their body is pretty enough, strong enough, flexible enough, and whether they’re talented enough. And if it’s any one of my friends, then you’ve heard that they feel they have to face this transition all on their own.

Fear of entering “the real world” after college isn’t unique to dancers. Most new graduates step into the machine fairly clueless and jobless. But college is expected to equip a student with the skills they need for their projected career. Is this true for dancers?

Most dancers enter college with the intent and understanding that if dancing professionally is what they want to do, they are pursuing Modern dance. The dancers interviewed were well aware by high school that they would never be a Prima Ballerina; the career path for ballet is rather unique and set in stone over centuries. If you’re not apprenticing by your late ‘teens, the odds are bad that you’ll ever be in ABT or NYCB. That’s not to say a college graduate can’t dance for a small or local ballet company, but in Adelphi Senior and Paul Taylor Dance Company intern Elissa Cretella’s words, “I chose to go to college because I knew that I could never become a professional ballet dancer, and I was interested in learning modern and becoming a professional modern dancer.”

Attend nearly any modern dance show in New York City, and invariably, many of the dancers’ bios in the program will include the university at which they studied. This bodes well in terms of advocating the college dance route, because it shows that college graduates do get hired by modern dance companies.

But it’s worth delving into the question of whether a college education is the best choice for budding dancers. After all, it is a career that depends more on actual talent than on academic knowledge. There are no certifications or degrees required to become a dancer, as there are for, say, a lawyer or accountant. This raises the question of why a dancer should even bother getting a degree.

The answer is that for a lot of dancers, skipping college would mean not satisfying a big part of themselves as people. For those interviewed, college satisfied not only their need for technique class and dance training, but their academic pursuits as well. “I was very scholastically inclined in high school; I knew I wanted a college degree,” explains Ginanicole Caputo, an Adelphi graduate. While a substantial number of interviewees felt that attending college after high school was simply “the right thing to do,” for the others, college offered the opportunity they craved to explore and nurture interests and skills other than dance. “I wanted the best of both worlds, of my thirst for knowledge in writing and dance,” says Stephanie Falkowski, a Senior at Adelphi, currently interning with Dance Spirit magazine. College offers a special time and place to really focus on the “self,” serving as a kind of incubation period in which students have time to grow not just in their field, but as artists and as people. “Here, I am given the chance to grow. I’m being nurtured and prepared […]. Very rarely in life do you have the chance to be so openly self-centered for years,” says Sylvana Tapia, also an Adelphi Senior.

This isn’t without its drawbacks. Adelphi alum and LMProject dancer Jessie Niemiec cites a Kerry James Marshall quote from “Letters to a Young Artist” describing the cloistered, safe nature of art schools. “With any college,” she explains, “it is easy to get wrapped up in your surroundings, and the politics of each individual program, where everyone knows you; in ‘the real world,’ it is a lot of first impressions and direct contacts that get you ahead.

But mostly, after this “incubation period,”  dancers are ready and eager to enter the dance world. When asked if ready to graduate and begin their careers, Falkowski and fellow undergrad Hana Delong proclaimed very positive interest in taking the next step. “I’m ready to start the next chapter of my life,” Falkowski expressed, and she can’t wait to “work at a real job and be a real person.” Delong feels the same way: “I’m ready for a new place, a new environment.

But when asked if they actually feel prepared for this step, the answer was dramatically different. “Fuck no,” says Tapia. Falkowski: “I’m scared shitless.” Generally, when asked whether their university, Adelphi, is helping them to prepare for the upcoming stressful transition, this Senior class gave a unanimous “no.” Cretella “[doesn’t feel that her university] gave [her] enough guidance or preparation for the transition” and Tapia “simply does not feel their concern.” Delong says, “as a Senior no one has spoken to me about anything. They probably have no clue I’m graduating; no one is really looking out for us.” To be fair, they do mention that a few teachers are exception to the rule; but the department as a whole “shows little interest … in the wellbeing of their graduating Seniors,” Cretella explains

But it is not just this graduating class. “I think only one or two of my professors actually attempted to help me in the transition. Other than that, no,” added Caputo.

One might conclude that this lack of transitional preparation is part of the reason that only some comparable schools’ dance programs are regularly found in dance companies’ bios. Schools definitely differ, according to graduates’ responses, in career assistance and transitional help. Former dancer and Center Stage Hilo owner and director Pier Sircello felt well supported by her alma mater UC Irvine. “They allowed me to take classes there while I was dancing and auditioning after I graduated; and I also danced in their touring company.” She says that yes, she felt well prepared. So did Kile Hotchkiss, a graduate of the Ailey/Fordham partnership: “I felt prepared both physically and mentally for the dance world,” he says. And he describes “seminars and speakers pertaining to different aspects of the dance world,” which just might be key.

As in most areas of study, college selection does matter somewhat. But Adelphi graduate Ashley Chandler, currently employed by Circle of Dance Repertory, doesn’t think your school should define your career. She did feel prepared for “the real world.” “I received a great technical training, the opportunity to work with many different people and personalities, and [my school] provided me with a space to find myself as an artist and a performer.” She states her belief that “life is what you make it to be.” “I recommend experiencing as many different techniques, styles, teachers, and workshops as you can,” she articulates. This advice is repeated by many of the graduates. “Take techniques that may be new or uncomfortable to you,” Hotchkiss adds.

On top of technique training, other preparative tools are unanimously recommended by Seniors and graduates alike. One of these tools is taking on jobs in college, and, most importantly, saving money. “I wish I saved!” Niemiec laments. “I didn’t, and it made it very hard to go on auditions later on, because I wouldn’t be able to miss out on a day’s work because NYC rent will kill you!” In addition to savings, though, jobs offer something you can put on a resume. “I would definitely recommend getting a job at a studio, because it offers hands-on experience to another aspect of a dance career: teaching,” Adelphi Senior Kelly Leya offers

Another important tool for a dancer to utilize is the array of Summer and Winter intensives offered. Interviewees recommend going to as many as you can. “Intensives get your face exposed to the choreographers who are out there and the people you will be competing with for a job,” reasons Leya. “Every dancer should continue to stay in shape during the off season,” Niemiec points out. Another way to do this, Niemiec adds, is to regularly cross-train at the gym. “Dancing doesn’t always give you a cardio workout, and being that [dance] is such a visual art form, it is hard to maintain the physical expectations [of a dancer] without hitting the gym.”  Tapia hopes that “being disciplined and cross-training now will ease the transition from student to professional.”

The final recommendation by interviewees is to try to secure an internship. Internships can be acquired after graduation, which Leya points out may be the ideal time to do them, when the free classes that often accompany an internship can be a godsend. But for those who have participated in one during college, they felt that interning in “the real world” provides a great way to ease into it. “I am becoming a part of a community and making connections, and learning things about the professional world in a studio and behind a desk. I highly recommend doing an internship,” advises Cretella.

Despite regrets at opportunities not taken, and some dissatisfaction with transitional help and post-grad support, all interviewees responded with a resounding yes, they are happy with their college education. “I had regrets, but would not trade any of it,” discloses Falkowski. Cretella only adds that “I feel my school needs to look a little more into our futures, because if ours are successful, theirs will be, too.”

Natalie Walters is a Dance major at Adelphi University, where she has studied under Leda Meredith in dance and writing.

 

Is Ballet Humane?

Posted on by
3

By Leda Meredith

Today one of the young student dancers I rehearsal direct in a Nutcracker production came up to me and pointed to her right foot. A bad blister had bled through her tights and through her pointe shoe. She looked up at me with wide eyes and a well-trained ballet-school smile and asked if it was okay if she did the run-thru on flat. I said yes, the other ballet mistress said no. She kept the shoes on. During the run through, I heard, “Smile, girls, it’s Nutcracker not a tragedy!” shouted at the dancers. I looked at Susan’s foot. Her shoe was red with blood. She was smiling.

This is complicated. There are times when I think a dancer does need to perform despite bleeding blisters and such. When the curtain is going up and there is no understudy, for example. On the other hand, if this were foreign policy rather than ballet I’d say it was utterly inhumane.

I think ballet is beautiful. The ancient Chinese bound women’s feet because they thought small feet were beautiful. What did those women think? My ballet students are willing to put up with real physical and psychological pain in pursuit of beauty. Is it worth it? Is there an alternative way to get to the beauty without the torture? Are we willing to break with tradition to investigate what that way might be?

In a recent dinner conversation with Cynthia Gregory, she mentioned that during her performing career she was very protective of her body. For example, she would let whoever was running the rehearsal know that she could only do one full-out one through. This was not laziness, but a guarded attention to what her instrument could handle. She had no major injuries during her remarkable career.

Sometimes dancers abuse this principle. “I have to mark this run thru because the floor is slippery” (when it isn’t), “I can’t do the lifts today because my back is bad” (when it isn’t). Directors are sometimes right to be skeptical of dancers claiming physical excuses not to perform full out.

But then there is Susan with her bleeding feet at a rehearsal when it won’t make or break the show if she does the run thru on pointe or not. Given enough longevity, professional dancers learn how to make this call for themselves: yes, I can do this and it won’t injure me and it’s necessary vs. no, this would actually injure me and/or isn’t really necessary. But what are we teaching our dance students?

“Smile, girls, smile!” Right. Maybe that needs some rethinking.

Leda Meredith is the author of “Botany, Ballet, & Dinner from Scratch” (Heliotrope Books 2008). She is the winner of the 2007-2008 Teaching Excellence Award from Adelphi University. For more, go to www.ledameredith.com

Photo: Leda Meredith and Jonathan Riseling in Francis Patrelle’s “Macbeth”, Photo Credit: Eduardo Patino

The Ballerina Interviews

Posted on by
1

By Kim Knode
Published March 2004

Sven Toorvald’s life and his PBS documentary, The Ballerina Interviews, give an interesting behind-the-scenes look at the ballet world. Filmmaking is Sven’s passion. First and foremost, however, Sven is a danseur.

Ballet “mesmerized” Sven at age fifteen. He signed up for classes at a local studio after seeing the film, The Turning Point starring Mikhail Baryshnikov. (The former pride and principal dancer of the Kirov Ballet who defected to the USA in 1974.) The pretty girls in Sven’s class “helped” to foster his fascination with ballet. But more than gorgeous girls in leotards, Sven treasured the athleticism of ballet.

For example, he enjoyed the thrill of performing the various kinds of high-flying leaps found in ballet. (Balanchine protégé, Edward Villella’s penchant for jumping a la Peter Pan also thrust him into a love affair with ballet.)

In addition to the athleticism, Sven delighted in the art of the dance. He decided to train full-time. As a result, the danseur auditioned for and won scholarships for schooling at topnotch dance studios in LA. Sven’s philosophy is that, “You can have anything you want if you’re willing to work for it.” He lifts one eyebrow and states, “But you’ve got to be willing to work for it.”

And he did! As a scholarship student at the Stanley Holden Studio, before beginning the strenuous exercise routines at the barre, Sven was required to clean the lavatories. Then, from morning to midafternoon, Sven learned to spin, jump and lift ballerinas.

At the Roland Dupree Dance Studio, he acquired additional ballet agility and strengthened his jazz and modern dance skills. Sven kept similar scholarship hours. (But no toilet cleaning!) He adds, “A lot of scholarship students work the front desk. Some scholarships are partial – you pay to take classes.” Sven smiles, “Of course, you still have to audition to get in.”

To increase the chances of winning scholarships, Sven’s suggestion is to “Always advance your level. Put your best ballet foot forward.” (For higher jumps, he advises, “Squeeze and engage the gluteus maximus – or minimus!”)

Scholarship or not, students who are serious about careers as professional ballerinas and danseurs feel the pressure of perfecting their ballet proficiency. All the dancers in Sven’s documentary declare that competition is severe. The ladies agreed that out of one hundred ballet students, only two or three make the cut into a professional company.


Perhaps that explains The Ballerina Interviews’ 15-year-old Cathy Seither’s sacrifice of a high school social life. (Homework is squeezed in at lunch.) “I’m dancing seven days a week,” says Cathy. “Ballet is not like sports. You have to be focused. You can’t throw yourself everywhere…And you have to make it look effortless!”
Sven was fortunate. Spotting his talent, an older ballerina at Roland Dupree’s recommended the young danseur for an apprenticeship at the Houston Ballet. Sven was accepted without an audition. One year later, Sven was admitted as a paid professional into the company’s corps de ballet.

At the Houston Ballet, Sven had the honor of learning the steps for ballet classics (such as Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake) from celebrated choreographer/danseur, Ben Stevenson. (The renowned Sadler’s Wells Royal Ballet danseur and recipient of the Royal Academy of Ballet’s Adeline Genee Gold Medal.)
Sven also went on to dance with other ballet legends like Valentina Kozlova. (A big box-office draw at the Bolshoi Ballet. She defected from Russia to America in 1979 and joined the New York City Ballet as a principal dancer.) Sven danced and toured with her in The Daring Project.

Sven confesses that ballerinas have a tougher time than danseurs in the ballet world. There are always more ladies clamoring for positions in professional companies. Plus, once ballerinas are accepted into a prestigious company, they still have to exert tremendous effort to be considered for starring roles.

Former New York City Ballet principal dancer, Judith Fugate was picked to do a pas de deux with Mikhail Baryshnikov. However, she suffered from injuries. In The Ballerina Interviews, Judith confesses, “I danced on torn Achilles and tendons for a year.” Ballerinas “can’t go on stage with knee pads!” (In his research at the University of Washington, Professor Ronald Smith found that injuries were as frequent and damaging for ballet dancers as football players.)

Besides the strained muscles and stress of competition, ballerinas struggle with weight problems. In Sven’s documentary, former New York City Ballet principal dancer, Jenifer Ringer confesses that despite her star status, “I was taken off stage due to weight problems…It was difficult to want to dance but being kept off stage.” (When the frozen yogurt loving Bolshoi prima ballerina, Anastasia Volochkova was fired for excess weight, she sued. Anastasia won the case.)

Slim Sven who declines sweets and dines by six each evening is sure to circumvent such weighty situations. But will he leave the stage and ballet behind if he wins an Emmy or Oscar for The Ballerina Interviews? With an impish grin, Sven answers, “I’ll always keep teaching and dancing for fun!”

Currently, Sven may be dancing at a movie theatre near you in Disney’s Haunted Mansion. (Or you can catch him on DVD in Woody Allen’s Mighty Aphrodite.) He teaches at the Westside Academy of Dance in Santa Monica, California.

Copies of the danseur/filmmaker’s Ballerina Interviews can be obtained by calling Sven at the school at 310-828-2018.


Sven Toorvald and Martine Harley photographed in The Nutcracker by photographer Steve Mason.
Kim Knode © February 4, 2004
Kim Knode’s interview articles focusing on artists, celebrities and dance champions have been published in various print and on-line publications.

Bodies, Monks and Mourners, On Stage!

Posted on by
Reply

Bodies, Monks and Mourners, On Stage! (Backstage call for Act III “Romeo and Juliet.”)
By Cherie Magnus

I’m in an elaborate costume on stage in front of 6,000 people, there ‘s a full orchestra playing Prokovief in the pit, my teenaged son, dressed as a Renaissance servant, is standing next to Natalia Makarova, Barishnikov is watching from the wings. Am I dreaming? No, I’m a ballet mother and a Supernumerary for American Ballet Theatre’s “Romeo and Juliet.”

The Shrine Auditorium, cavernous, ornate, rarely used except for the Academy Awards, was ABT’s usual home when in L.A. While the company proper was off at a gala fete and fundraiser at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, a motley crew of thirty men and women hoping to make the Super cut lined up for appraisal in the Shrine’s freezing rehearsal hall on a cold Sunday in March, 1985.

We were all types, sizes and ages, not just the “tall, ballet type” advertised for on the bullet board at my son Jason’s ballet school. We all took off our jackets and sweaters and lined up according to height in front of a seated panel of three.

I had dressed for warmth and comfort not beauty, and I felt strangely vulnerable, fat and naked in the lineup. I’m too old for this, I thought. Immediately I was asked to step forward along with two other middle-aged women. They’re eliminating me at once because I’m not right, not what they want, I thought. The old insecurity and fear of rejection was lurking close to the surface.

But it was just that we three had been pre-selected to be “Market Ladies” because of our height. At first I was disappointed that I was not to be an “Elegant Lady” (due to my bust size–the first time 36A was ever too large) Our roles were determined by what costumes we fit, that’s all.

We Market Ladies had fun mixing with the company on stage, walk around acting naturally, participate in the action first hand. Some of us treated the dancers by sprinkling candy in our market baskets among the plastic products. I put M&M’s in with my grapes.

We wore different multi-layered costumes weighing perhaps twenty pounds each. Underneath was a full-length heavy petticoat with a ruffle. Then, in my case, a dress of heavy beige upholstery-like fabric with slit sleeves and lacing up the front and back, plus a long tunic of another beige fabric laced up the front and sides. My headdress, of faded-looking beige and violet muslin, had an Arabic flair and a wimple fastening under the chin. Each of us wore similar but differently detailed costumes.

Since there was only one professional union dresser, it was necessary for us Supers to help each other in and out of the difficult hooks and laces-no zippers! We formed a costume daisy-chain before and after each act with the dresser at the end. In this way we got our laborious changes down quickly, and I got an amusing snapshot of eight people concentrating hard on lacing each other up.

Jason was cast as a Green Little Bearer for the ball in Act I, and a monk in the Capulet tomb in Act III.

When the Supers arrived for our first rehearsal, the company class was just winding up. Dancers familiar to us from photographs and the stage looked like typical ballet students in their colorful and eccentric rehearsal clothes. But a sight unfamiliar in a ballet studio was the several animals stationed around the outside of the practice floor, tethered to the barres with leashes.

At that time, there were about twelve dogs and eight cats which traveled with the dancers, and the dogs usually attend class and rehearsals with their owners. There’s even a dog walk-on in “Giselle” and “Swan Lake, so often the larger animals get a chance to be on stage.

In the meantime, the pets add love, comfort, and companionship to the dancers’ life on the road. There were so many animals backstage (they were always polite and well-behaved) that a dog and a large bag came to mean “dancer” to the fans at the stage door. Opening night there was a black-tie reception after the performance in the rehearsal hall for the Friends of ABT–those who contributed substantially.

All during dress rehearsal and the performance afterwards, the caters were setting up. Topiary trees with fairy lights surrounded white tables topped with Cinzano umbrellas around a small dance floor. Festive tents covered the bar areas and the disc jockey’s equipment, which included Italian popular songs.

There were white flower carts filled with fruits and cheeses, an Italian ice pushcart dispensing zabaglione, chocolate-hazelnut, and wild-blueberry ices in little paper cups, and a long buffet of hot and cold pasta dishes. The preparations went on for hours before and during the performance, and as we hurried back and forth between dressing rooms and the stage, we Supers eyed the food and drink being set out. After the second act the lighted Italian fountain was turned on and we were ready to run over and stick a paper cup under it, hoping it was champagne.

The word went around that the cast was invited to the party and that the Supers were considered part of the cast! This was an unexpected perk to our $10 per performance with free parking, and one we enthusiastically appreciated; by that time we had been in the Shrine for ten hours.

Jason dashed over and grabbed a glass of champagne, and began a conversation with the late principal dancer Patrick Bissell. (“Loved your double cabrioles last night in “Raymonda!”)

But I didn’t know what to do; i.e., On the one hand, I love gala parties like this under normal conditions; On the other, I was dressed in a red corduroy jumpsuit and sneakers, not the latest word among the sequin-and-fur set now streaming through the doors from the auditorium.

On the one hand, many of the company dancers were wearing warm-up clothes; On the other, obviously I was not a skinny young company ballet dancer. But I was hungry, thirsty and excited, and so I sidled over and got some champagne (Italian, too, I supposed) and tried to look natural.

I got a plate of pasta and retreated from the glittering garden back over to a circle of metal folding chairs near the Supers’ makeshift dressing rooms, where several Supers were sitting like happy outcasts. Occasionally some of the regal people seated at the white tables inside the circle of lighted fichus trees would turn their heads and glance in our direction, not actually seeing us at all.

Most of the guests were looking for celebrities, of course, and Baryshnikov was there at one of the umbrella tables, as were most of the company dancers.
One of the little boys playing pages ran around asking the dancers to sign his program. Even Jason felt too much a part of the adult world, of the dance world, to ask, though he too would like the souvenirs.

Asking for autographs definitely divides the pros from the amateurs. There’s them and then there’s us, and for the duration of “Romeo and Juliet” the illusion of being part of American Ballet Theatre was worth more than autographs of the stars.

People were raving about the Italian ices, and so Jason grabbed me and pulled me over to join the short line in front of the cart.

Behind us stood two tall, black-tied men, who assumed we were ABT members and politely asked us questions as if we knew the inside stuff.
We ate our ices and faded into the background, and eventually out the stage door into the cold night, trailing stardust and fatigue.

After a few performances we felt like true professional company members as we hurried to sign in, put on our makeup, and prepared to wear our heavy, uncomfortable costumes.

It was difficult even to walk in those outfits, and we Market Ladies didn’t mind at all when we were ordered to remove them immediately upon exiting the stage and put them on again right before Act II. We were not allowed to sit down in them or eat, drink or smoke in them. I wondered about going to the bathroom, but knew it would be impossible to lift those heavy skirts anyway. Luckily the subject never came up for me.

By this time we had learned to quickly dress into our street clothes after coming offstage and sneak into the box right next to the wings. You could only see half of the stage from there, but it was better than standing in the wings where we were in the way. The large orchestra rendering Prokofiev’s powerful score sounded fuller and more immediate from the audience, too.
While onstage, we Supers were to react to the events taking place and join in with the company at certain times, acting and interacting.

We didn’t have to feign fear in Act I when the Capulets and the Montagues whipped out their swords and set about killing each other. The stage was crowded with people and the large set, and each performance of the fight got more wild.

Twenty men thrusted and parried with real swords (with tiny rubber tips), jumping from landings, leaping through doorways. It was different every time, but always skilled and exciting, and the supers didn’t always know where to stand to get out of their way.

As the bodies piled up, the “dead” Capulets and Montagues made jokes and funny faces to those onstage who could see them. They seemed to have a wonderful time.

Nor did I have to pretend sorrow and horror in Act II at the death of Tybalt. I was moved to tears every time Lady Capulet (Georgina Parkinson) rushed down the stairs to Tybalt’s body and seized the sword in a frenzy to attack the remorseful Romeo. Then, convulsed with grief, she sank agonizingly to the floor and rocked the dead Tybalt in her arms to the wailing of French horns, trombones, trumpets and the pounding of the tympani. It was incredibly powerful, indelible. (She always gave him a friendly pat after the curtain fell.)
The last performance was danced by Natalia Makarova and the house was packed, 6,000 people. I couldn’t believe she could be better than the other Juliets I saw, but she was.

When she died in the tomb to that poignant minor theme, the audience was on their third Kleenex. Even Martin Bernheimer, the Los Angeles Times’ Critic Terrible at the time, praised her performance, saying that “Makarova is Juliet!”

Fourteen-year-old Autumn, Jason’s ballet classmate who was playing an Elegant Lady super, pressed a beaded bracelet she had made into Makarova’s hands in the wings after the many curtain calls. Overcome by emotion from the performance, Autumn couldn’t stop her tears. We were all aware that Makarova, at 44, was nearing retirement by her own admission and that we may not see this Juliet again.

In seven performances with seven different casts, including six Romeos and six Juliets, we saw seven different ballets. The choreography was the same and was always danced at a high technical level. But this proved to us the importance of acting, personality, drama, interpretation beyond technique. When Danilo Radojivic’s Mercutio felt his wound in his death scene, I actually “saw” blood on his hand, and I was six feet away from him!

It was “our” last performance, the next ABT “Romeo and Juliet” would be danced in Detroit. Supers were frantically snapping instamatics on the “Cinderella” set which was being assembled near our dressing rooms, as that was the next full-length ballet planned for Los Angeles. We all wanted to see how we looked (no full-length mirrors in the ladies’ dressing room, no mirror at all in the men’s) and to record our moment of glory for scrapbook posterity.

As each costume came off after a scene, it was packed away, and by the end of the ballet, nothing remained of “Romeo and Juliet” in the dressing rooms but huge labeled and sealed cardboard boxes ready for loading onto the trucks.

Most of the supers were anxious to see Superstar Himself, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and since he wasn’t dancing at all during this Los Angeles season, we wondered if we would.

But we did see him, several times in fact, the first week. (What a shock to see my fifteen-year-old son Jason tower a good three inches over this bigger-than-life man!) Misha was there opening night, the next night for the party, and the night Makarova danced.

That night, during Act III, Jason and the other Supers playing monks were waiting in the wings for their cue, many still transfixed from watching Makarova. The monks were to enter the Capulet Tomb carrying huge lighted candlesticks. Seven monks on the right, eight on the left (the last one being the disguised Romeo sneaking into the tomb), circle the biers and exit up long flights of stairs on each side.

From my seat in the box, I saw the eight left-hand monks enter, but only three right-hand monks–Jason’s side. It looked strange and off-balance, and Romeo’s significance as an extra monk was lost. Jason and three other monks were waiting in the wings for their cue as they had the previous nights, but somehow missed it tonight. Suddenly they saw the lighted candles of the rest of the monks moving across the stage, too late for them to catch up.

“Great, that’s just great!” uttered sarcastically in a Russian accent caused Jason to look to his left and see the great Baryshnikov himself watching this blunder from the wings. Pulling his cowl down over his head, Jason slunk away in shame to take off his robe and to remain anonymous!

Afterwards, Baryshnikov was hounded for autographs inside the stage door by audience members who had found their way backstage. Jason and I made our way through the crowd with our shoulder bags as people stared at us, hoping we were somebody.

By the time we got into our cars and were slowly inching by the stage door on Exposition Blvd., we were just in time to see Baryshnikov gleefully carrying a cello case quickly through the crowd which was not on the lookout for a musician.

He nearly made a successful escape until the crowd as one body recognized him and took off after him into the parking lot like a swarm of bees. That was the last we, too, saw of the legendary artist during our ABT season. And for this whole two-week wonderful adventure, we had to say a most super enthusiastic, Great, just great!

With degrees in English, Dance, and Library Science from UCLA, Cherie has published many articles in professional journals and magazines. Her solo travels to Europe and Latin America have inspired several pieces published in Skirt!, PassionFruit, Moxie, JourneyWoman, Dancing USA, GoNomad, Open Spaces, Porthole, The Cusco Weekly, the-vu, and various online magazines. She was the dance critic for the Cerritos News in Orange County, California before moving to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. She is currently at work on a novel situated in France, when she’s not out dancing. Follow her blog at http://tangocherie.blogspot.com/

Passing the Torch

Posted on by
Reply

By Leda Meredith

Photo by Eduardo Patino of Leda Meredith as Francis Patrelle’s Lady Macbeth

I am standing in front of a full-wall tapestry in a museum. It is magnificent. Reading the museum’s pamphlet, I learn that it took three generations of craftsmen to complete. Did they stick to the original design, or add their own touches? Did the grandchildren’s generation have a hard time finding the exact same blue to match the sky? Did the symbolism of the tapestry have the identical meaning for them that it had when their grandparents’ generation was doing the stitchery?

The experience of passing on a role to someone else can be a delight or a strain depending on the people involved. Some choreographers will alter the choreography of an old work to suit a new cast, others insist that it be taught verbatim. Some dancers want to learn from a previous generation’s experience, others prefer not to be influenced by anything other than their own viewpoint.

This month I am restaging Francis Patrelle’s Macbeth. He choreographed it in 1995, and I was his original Lady Macbeth. Even while the role was being created on me, I was acutely aware of the centuries of actresses (and originally, actors) who portrayed Lady Macbeth. Turning to the play itself, I reached even further back through the generations, and delved into my personal understanding of what Shakespeare wrote.

But that was only my understanding, at that particular time. I would dance the role quite differently if I did it today.

Teaching a role that was created for me is delicate. I must communicate much more than the sequence of steps. I must also convey details of the choreographer’s intent that a second generation of dancers might not be able to surmise. If a dramatic choice I made was used and elaborated on by the choreographer, then that choice is now part of the choreography and needs to be taught. On the other hand, some artistic choices may have worked for me but be inappropriate for the dancer learning the role. My job is to provide enough information for the current dancer to develop her own interpretation of the role, keeping it in line with the choreographer’s original intent.

The magic starts after the steps have been taught, the information communicated, the role discussed: after the bridge between one generation and the next has been built.

It is my own belief that certain roles have a life of their own, and that the role itself steps in at a certain point to inform the player’s actions. So I watch as the current Lady Macbeth, Joni Petre-Scholz, begins to get a certain glint in her eye, a certain timing to her gestures. It is not my version I am seeing, nor should it be, but I recognize that Lady. I have looked out through her eyes, I have thought her thoughts. Shakespeare’s character has taken over the teaching, and I can turn to working with the other dancers knowing that Joni is well on her way to her own Lady Macbeth.

As a dancer, I’ve stepped into many previous generations’ shoes, found my own way across the bridge between learning and making it my own. As a teacher and director, I’ve tasted the sharp joys of letting go of my memories of how it felt to perform a role, and then of being delighted by a new dancer’s process of discovery. I have learned to be grateful to dancers like Joni Petre-Scholz of Dances Patrelle and Anne Kochanski of Jennifer Muller/The Works, who respect the past enough to learn well, but are fiery enough to find their own way. I find myself wondering how my mother, Penelope Lagios Coberly, herself a former soloist with San Francisco Ballet, felt when she sat in the audience watching me perform.

If you look closely at some of the famous tapestries, you can spot small patches that appear to be unfinished. A corner of a cloud left unstitched, a part of a border missing, a petal sketched but not sewn, as if waiting for the next generation to begin where the last had left off.

Leda can also be found at ledameredith.net

About the writer:
Leda Meredith’s biography deserves to be reprinted in full. the-vu proudly welcomes her exceptional talent to our pages.
As a performer, Leda Meredith’s career spans contemporary dance, classical ballet, and theatre. Her performances have taken her to twenty-five countries on four continents. She has been a principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre II, Edward Villella, Manhattan Ballet, Dances Patrelle, and others. She was a company member of Jennifer Muller/The Works for over seven years, and originated numerous roles in the repertory. She returned as Artistic Associate Director for the company’s 25th anniversary season in 1999-2000.
Her piece Lullabye Lane, premiered as part of Jennifer Muller/The Works’ 25th anniversary season at the Joyce Theater in New York. With original music by composer James Sasser, Lullabye Lane marked their seventh collaboration. They recently completed the full evening work Small Talk At The Volcano. In Spring 2000 she co-created a cabaret style piece entitled All About Angels and Eggs, with Michael Jahoda and Maria Naidu at Dansatelier in Rotterdam. Other choreographic credits include works for Malaparte Theatre Company, the Gene Frankel Theatre in New York, Dixon Place, Peridance International, the Hatch Saturday Series, First Fridays at Five, and the Arts on the Hudson Festival.
She is a returning guest instructor for the Henny Jurriens Stichting in Amsterdam, Western Washington University; and Dance Loft in Rorschach, Switzerland. Leda is currently on faculty with Ballet Academy East. She has taught as part of the 1996 Iles de Danse in France, and for the Artist’s Trusts International Course in England. In December, 1999 she was guest instructor for Carolyn Carlson’s Atelier de Paris. Other dance programs she has taught for include the California State University at Los Angeles, and Brigham Young University in Hawaii.

Part Four of The Essential Imagination Series

Posted on by
Reply

Living Other Lives
Part Four of the Essential Imagination Series
by Leda Meredith


Photo by Tom Caravaglia, of Leda Meredith and Michael Jahoda in Jennifer Muller’s ‘The Spotted Owl’

This is the article that inspired my quest to bring Leda Meredith to the-vu Jeffrey the Barak, Publisher.

Stepping onto the stage, I am living two lives at once. Three, if you count my life outside the theater which is waiting for me once I step back through the stage door into the night air. For the moment, though, that life is forgotten.

The lights are harsh in my eyes but warm on my skin. Part of me is keeping track of the necessary details of this job: The floor is a bit slippery tonight. I remind myself to drop my center of gravity to help give me more traction. I am counting the music for this next section, which is in counterpart to the other dancers. The lift we worked on this afternoon is coming up in eight counts and I am remembering the changes the choreographer gave my partner and I. Next come the spacing corrections I was told about in the dressing room at half hour. I am vaguely aware that my right shoulder is sore and stiff. The audience feels like a good one, packed house and several friends out there.

That’s one life.

In this dance I am portraying a woman in a classic love triangle, torn between the man she desperately wants who rejects her and the man who is trying to win her affections. The imaginative work has already been done in rehearsal. I know who she is, what motivates her to choose one man over the other, where this is taking place, what pleases her and what makes her despair. I have imagined, vividly, how she came to be at this point in her life where she cannot see her way out of unrequited love. I have tested all of these imaginative choices in rehearsal and adjusted them whenever they did not match the choreographer’s vision. Now there is only one imaginative leap left to make. I must become the character.

This is like the make believe games we all played as children, but with much higher stakes because I need to be believable enough to take the entire audience on this woman’s emotional journey. And for a dancer, there is the added challenge of using a highly athletic, specific physical esthetic as the vehicle for that journey.

When I am teaching, I sometimes explain the experience of performing a character by using a metaphor from the original Star Trek series. It is as if you are both Spock and Captain Kirk. One part of you is very calmly taking care of things such as musical counts, remembering corrections, pre-setting props. That is Spock, the logical mind. But Spock is not the captain of the ship. Romantic, impulsive Kirk is the captain. This is the spontaneous heart of your performance. This is the part of you that is responding to the dramatic situation as if it was happening for the first time (even if you’ve performed the piece a hundred times!). This is the part of you that is, during the performance, making the life choices of another person.

Both are essential. And neither, alone, guarantee success. That is one of the thrills and mysteries of live performance. A personal willingness to give one’s best and take what comes is a useful a cure for performance anxiety. So is recognizing that the butterflies in your stomach mean you have a wonderful reserve of exceptional energy at your command. Why perform if it’s going to feel as flat as waiting in line at the grocery store? Performing is meant to feel anything but ordinary.

What makes possible that final mental and emotional leap of becoming the character you and the choreographer and/or writer have imagined?

There is the preparatory work I mentioned of creating the character vividly in your mind (see Detail and Nuance, and Make Believe). Your imagination will work for you prolifically if you are incorporating elements from your own life. That third life I mentioned at the beginning of this article, my “real life”, is my source material for everything I do onstage. Perhaps I have been in something like the character’s situation at some point, or perhaps it is entirely foreign to me. Even in the latter case, I will have felt some version of the character’s emotions. I will be able to remember situations that called up those emotions in me. In the case of the love triangle I described above, I can remember wanting something out of reach so desperately that I believed I could not be happy without it.

It is also useful to remember that crazy people do not know they are crazy, bad guys think they have a reason for what they are doing, and even ingenues sometimes feel guilty or unworthy. I let the audience decide whether I am portraying a hero or a villain tonight. In order to step into the character’s point of view, I can not afford to be judgmental. I am playing a person, not a stereotype. My job is to flesh out that fictional character and make her real, make her feelings and actions believable. In order to do that, I cannot afford to step outside the action and judge whether she is good or bad.

As I wrote in Essential Imagination, “Many times I have had a performer back off from the specificity and choices I describe above because they would be ‘too real’ or ‘too personal’ or ‘too revealing’. Indeed. That is what we offer as performers. Our willingness to risk ourselves, our personal points of view in full view of an audience is what makes an audience willing to trust us. But when the curtain goes down, we must have the skills to step back out of the world we have been creating during the show.”

Coming offstage, I am drenched in sweat and grinning from ear to ear. My partner swoops by and gives me a hug and two thumbs up. This was a good show. I register a few compliments on the way back to the dressing room and nod my thanks. Make up off. Tell the wardrobe assistant that I heard something tear in my costume during the show and he might want to check it. Into a hot shower. The hot water feels good but someone is shouting that we have to be out of the theater in 10 minutes. When I come out, I see my husband chatting with one of the tech crew. He gives me a big, wonderful hug. “What do you want to do about dinner?”

Cherish your senses as a way to “come home” from living another person’s life onstage. The feel of the hot shower. The sight of a familiar face. The taste of food and drink. The sound of laughter, traffic, voices. Retell your favorite parts of the show, or write them down. Turn the lousy moments into tales to laugh about. Reach down to ruffle the cat who greets you when you step through your front door. When daily life is going through a rough spell, consider it part of your job to be as present offstage as you are onstage. That is what we do. A bridge must have two sides, and artists are the bridge between imagination and daily life.

Leda can also be found at ledameredith.net
As a performer, Leda Meredith’s career spans contemporary dance, classical ballet, and theatre. Her performances have taken her to twenty-five countries on four continents. She has been a principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre II, Edward Villella, Manhattan Ballet, Dances Patrelle, and others. She was a company member of Jennifer Muller/The Works for over seven years, and originated numerous roles in the repertory. She returned as Artistic Associate Director for the company’s 25th anniversary season in 1999-2000.
Her piece Lullabye Lane, premiered as part of Jennifer Muller/The Works’ 25th anniversary season at the Joyce Theater in New York. With original music by composer James Sasser, Lullabye Lane marked their seventh collaboration. They recently completed the full evening work Small Talk At The Volcano. In Spring 2000 she co-created a cabaret style piece entitled All About Angels and Eggs, with Michael Jahoda and Maria Naidu at Dansatelier in Rotterdam. Other choreographic credits include works for Malaparte Theatre Company, the Gene Frankel Theatre in New York, Dixon Place, Peridance International, the Hatch Saturday Series, First Fridays at Five, and the Arts on the Hudson Festival.
She is a returning guest instructor for the Henny Jurriens Stichting in Amsterdam, Western Washington University; and Dance Loft in Rorschach, Switzerland. Leda is currently on faculty with Ballet Academy East. She has taught as part of the 1996 Iles de Danse in France, and for the Artist’s Trusts International Course in England. In December, 1999 she was guest instructor for Carolyn Carlson’s Atelier de Paris. Other dance programs she has taught for include the California State University at Los Angeles, and Brigham Young University in Hawaii.

Part Two of The Essential Imagination Series

Posted on by
Reply

Detail and Nuance
by Leda Meredith

photo: Tom Caravaglia

Make believe

No, not fantasy, but truly how to make someone believe.

How to make an audience suspend disbelief in what they are witnessing long enough to be moved by what they have seen and to think about it for years afterward.

What do you remember from the performances you have seen in the past? Think not just of dance, but also of theater, music, movies and other arts that depend on live performers for their origin.

Among my personal memories I find the way Gelsey Kirkland’s Giselle stroked Albrecht’s arm before she faded into the wings, Janis Joplin’s laugh at the end of Mercedes Benz, Keith Jarrett’s voice chiming in over his melancholy piano during the Koln Concert, Angie Wolfe’s sky-turned face and arched chest as she was set down by a trusted partner, Cynthia Gregory learning how to strut with a feather boa in Francis Patrelle’s Red Ellington, Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones saying, “Why did it have to be snakes,” Makarova’s supple feet as she ran across the stage…

Look at the reviews in today’s paper – if they are well written they will mention specific moments that lodged in the reviewer’s memory.

We remember these moments – why? What did the performer, choreographer, director, writer, composer do to make them memorable?

Honesty and Imagination

Every human being possesses the potential for every conceivable emotion.

If you think this through, it can be a scary concept. It implies that given the right situation, anyone could feel an overwhelming passion, a murderous rage, a religious ecstasy, a suicidal despair.

How else to be able to portray something believably onstage? I have never died, nor killed, nor been a heroine, and yet I have portrayed each of these. If I could not imagine how someone could arrive at those circumstances, I could not dance them believably.

But every human being does not possess the character for every conceivable action.

So what might lead Lady MacBeth to encourage her husband to murder might only lead me to be frustrated by an inability to change circumstance. As a performer, I have to be able to imagine what it would be like to be someone else, making different choices. And there is no right or wrong in these choices, there is only what someone did because that is who they were and how they felt when this event (given by the script or choreography) happened. “There are no devils, only fallen angels” is a useful thing for performers to remember.

If I cannot imagine it as a performer or choreographer, how is the audience supposed to?

Internal Dialogue and Images

These are two invaluable tools for creators and performers.

To experience their effectiveness, try this simple exercise:

Raise an arm to shoulder height with the index finger pointed while saying out loud, “Get the hell out of here!”

Now perform the same gesture while saying, “You’re the one I’ve chosen.”.

Now do the same gesture imagining that you are raising your arm through the waters of a warm, Mediterranean sea.

Now that you are raising it in an ice cold, bitter wind.

Same gesture, entirely different messages. Onstage, dancers need to remember to keep specific, detailed thoughts going while they are moving. The alternative is the vague “eyebrow acting” that leaves no one moved (see my article Essential Imagination for more about this disease).

The Magic of Intent

When your imagination is fully engaged as a performer or creator, you understand the character’s intent and the details occur to you as you do them creating a completely believable spontaneity. If you are a teacher or director, you can guide your dancers in this process by asking them to consider:

Who the character is.

When they are living.

Where they are living (a city street leads to different body language than an open hillside, for example).

What they care about and what is at stake.

For a clear example of how specific intent changes visible action, try the same shape or movement done with different motivations. An arabesque can be done to show off its height and technical proficiency. Or to reach for a lover across the stage. Or to express melancholy. Or to aim an arrow-like accusation. Or many, many other things which do not change what is being done but drastically change how.

Keep It Personal

The details which will emerge from a performer’s or creator’s imagination will be highly personal. Each of our unique takes on what we are embodying will be ours and no one else’s. To be effective we must be willing to reveal these pieces of our soul.

Don’t censor your imagination while you are working, but do guide it with the parameters set by the director and the material.

Censorship is death to creative work, even if it is just a thought such as, “But I’m not the kind of person who…” If you are a performer, you can portray any kind of person and that is no reflection on who you are in the rest of your life. If a choreographer asks for it, you can deliver.


Leda can also be found at ledameredith.net

About the writer:
Leda Meredith’s biography deserves to be reprinted in full. the-vu proudly welcomes her exceptional talent to our pages.
As a performer, Leda Meredith’s career spans contemporary dance, classical ballet, and theatre. Her performances have taken her to twenty-five countries on four continents. She has been a principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre II, Edward Villella, Manhattan Ballet, Dances Patrelle, and others. She was a company member of Jennifer Muller/The Works for over seven years, and originated numerous roles in the repertory. She returned as Artistic Associate Director for the company’s 25th anniversary season in 1999-2000.
Her piece Lullabye Lane, premiered as part of Jennifer Muller/The Works’ 25th anniversary season at the Joyce Theater in New York. With original music by composer James Sasser, Lullabye Lane marked their seventh collaboration. They recently completed the full evening work Small Talk At The Volcano. In Spring 2000 she co-created a cabaret style piece entitled All About Angels and Eggs, with Michael Jahoda and Maria Naidu at Dansatelier in Rotterdam. Other choreographic credits include works for Malaparte Theatre Company, the Gene Frankel Theatre in New York, Dixon Place, Peridance International, the Hatch Saturday Series, First Fridays at Five, and the Arts on the Hudson Festival.
She is a returning guest instructor for the Henny Jurriens Stichting in Amsterdam, Western Washington University; and Dance Loft in Rorschach, Switzerland. Leda is currently on faculty with Ballet Academy East. She has taught as part of the 1996 Iles de Danse in France, and for the Artist’s Trusts International Course in England. In December, 1999 she was guest instructor for Carolyn Carlson’s Atelier de Paris. Other dance programs she has taught for include the California State University at Los Angeles, and Brigham Young University in Hawaii.