Choreographer's Corner
Tuesday, July 12, 2011 at 12:12PM Study Guide: Choreograper’s Corner
Below are some words from the Choreographer's of "Send in the Jazz". This year's pieces have been choreographed by Zoe Sealy, Molly Breen, and Judith James Reis. Each piece is filled with wonderful movement, but where does that movement come from? What inspires the choreographer's? How do they create the movement? Does the movement tell the audience a story? Or, is it meant to be interpreted in its own way by each individual audience member? Our choreographers were excited to tell us a little about the inspiration behind their pieces and answer some of the questions we are all wondering about. We start with Zoe Sealy. Enjoy!
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Mood Swings – Choreography by Zoe Sealy
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Mood Swings is a piece originally choreographed in 2006 on the jazz dance faculty [Cynthia Gutierrez Garner, Karla Grotting, Linda Talcott Lee, Laura Selle Virtucio] at the U of MN. In recreating the dance I reworked quite a bit in the first three sections. In the last section I decided on a different piece of music, which changed the movement considerably. I find reconstructing a work is equally as challenging as creating a completely new work, but in a different way. In reconstruction there is time to reflect on the previous work, fine tune the existing movement and make desired changes to strengthen the over all dance. Setting the piece on an entirely new cast is the most exciting part for me. Tailoring the movement to each individual dancer, playing on their strengths and personalities is an artistically challenging and interesting one. It always amazes me how two different casts can be so equally strong, but yet uniquely different, which brings me to my initial idea and concept for this particular piece of choreography.
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We are all different in every conceivable way. Based on our individual make up and backgrounds, we see, hear, taste, feel, and react to life experiences differently. This dance is primarily about recognizing and respecting our differences, but more importantly celebrating the commonalities we share as human beings. In this piece of choreography, each dancer beats to a different drummer playing off one another, and sharing a common bond, as we all do every day of our lives.
~Zoe
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Getting There-Choreographed by Molly Breen
Getting There is essentially a non-narrative piece of choreography, largely informed by the music (Brooklyn by The Youngblood Brass Band) and created collaboratively with the dancers. For the choreographic material, I wanted to use iconic jazz shapes like the contracted rib cage and cross lateral shoulder opposition and find ways to vary those shapes according to the musical changes. This piece of music is irresistibly dynamic, so the dancers really have to focus on ‘getting there’ to the end of the piece with some fuel left in their tanks for the final phrases.
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The piece is divided into musical sections with the dancers divided into trio, duets, and a solo. The dancers separate and return to each other as the musical themes reprise. For the small group work, the individual dancers had an opportunity to contribute ideas through improvisation. This leads to a unique representation of their skills and an ownership of the movement which I find compelling to watch. Musically, I was interested in highlighting the melodic line and finding texture in the syncopation of the rhythm; I think this is especially evident in the first trio. Both duets highlight some musical antagonism as the brass pushes and pulls against the drums, eventually finding unison. And that tenor saxophone! Part of the allure of the saxophone for me is the human quality of the tone. For the solo, I concentrated on the beauty of simple lines with continuous extension in the body to really be in concert with the saxophone solo. The unison sections feature call and response and big, melodic phrases underscored by a percussive playfulness which inspired the movement quality.
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For me as a dancer and choreographer, dance, even at its most somber, is a joyful expression of the human spirit. In Getting There, I worked to create an accessible, musical piece that is fun to watch and fun to perform.
~Molly
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While I Stand Watching- Choreographed by Judith Ries
The music came to me first. It always does.
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I was on my way home from choir practice, listening to Jazz 88.5. This haunting piece of music came into the car and I was immediately taken be the emotional depth of the cello, the driving pulse, and the out of the ordinary accents and phrasing. It was all telling me a story.
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Haitian Fight Song performed by Matt Haimowitz and Uccello was written by Charles Mingus one of the jazz greats. No wonder it spoke to me!
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I kept the music in mind as I waited through the winter for my rehearsals to begin. Then in February the international world exploded. An uprising in Egypt broadcast to the world over Twitter and Facebook. Events unfolded. The world was at attention while an impassioned people pleaded and demanded a new life. I watched on the internet as a people a world away made their voices heard and changed their life.
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I saw their faces, my heart reached out to them, I cheered for them, then did laundry. I worried about them, then bought groceries. I cried with them, then went to pick up my son from school. I chided myself that I was so far removed from the situation. Life as they knew it hung in the balance - and all I could do was watch.
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In While I Stand Watching I wanted to explore the emotions of being the "watcher" and of being "watched", the implications of interacting .....or not. Working with a wonderful ensemble, we explored movement in unison and chaos, counts and the absence of counts, impulse and feeling. We experimented with the nuance of looking, the language of standing and the implications of walking. We realized that sometimes the hardest thing to do is to stand and be.
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Which is, I think, a fitting realization.
~Judith
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A few words from the Director, Karis Sloss
What do you want to be when you grow up?
~ A choreographer and a director of a company!
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This may not be your typical answer from a 5 year old, but it sure was my answer! Since I can remember, I have always wanted to create dances, and did. My family was invited to many living room shows, when I was young, to watch the dances I had created. In high school, I was teaching and choreographing at the studio I was attending and also choreographed my high school musicals. South High, at that time, had never used a student choreographer before, but the director saw my work at a dance recital and offered me the choreography position for “West Side Story,” when I was 16. I then went on to choreograph South High’s musicals for the next 8 years.
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In 2002 I formed the theatrical jazz company, Eclectic Edge Ensemble, and for the past 9 years we have been producing work around the city. We have performed at The Ritz Theatre for the past 5 years, Intermedia Arts, Illusion Theatre, Kinetic Kitchen at Patrick’s Cabaret, Rhythmically Speaking at the Bedlum Theater, Hopkins Center for the Arts and 5 MN Fringe Festivals. I am so blessed and honored to be able to work with the highly talented dancers, artists, composers and musicians that I have been able to work with in EEE.
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My style breathes and lives in the form of jazz. How I define jazz dance is musically inspired and rhythmically based movement. My choreography takes on many different forms and genres in which I had studied. But, at the heart, it always comes down to musicality and rhythm. Whether the dance becomes another instrument, or brings movement to the score, purposefully goes against it, or fills in the lines between, my choreography is somehow always referencing the music.
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My goal is to bring a high level of artistic experience to patrons, and to make dance accessible to a wider audience. I hear from so many people who are not a part of the “dance community,” that admit they are often scared away of attending dance shows. They feel that dance is over their heads and don’t know how to relate to it. Often they feel lost or bored when they see dance work. I believe that there are aspects of dance that are approachable and relatable to everyone. Everyone has a heart beat and rhythms that are very much alive in their bodies. When they hear a piece of music their body wants to react to it in some form. This music may also bring them to a memory, thought or a given reaction.
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Using the music to draw people in on a gut level, I then try to pique their attention by dancing on universal themes such as love, competition, life lessons and choices, individuality versus conformity, human spirit and gender. When I am approaching a new theatrical work I spend a lot of time listening to people’s conversations around me, on the radio and television. What are people talking about? What are their concerns? Where do they find humor in life?
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What I can recommend for everyone is keep dreaming! Keep your goals and ambitions clear in the forefront of your mind. Anything is possible with passion and fever; don’t ever give up. I am amazed at the blessings I have received and to think it all started with performances for my stuffed animals.
~Karis
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This performance is made possible, in part, by MRAC and the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund as appropriated by the Minnesota State Legislature with money from the vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4th, 2008