January 25, 2008

What Is It About Argentine Tango and Bellydance Bloggers?

Why is it that Argentine Tango and Bellydance bloggers are the most active, numerous and passionate dance bloggers?

Why do they write more about their actual dancing, what it feels like to be dancing and generously offer guidance and support to newcomers to their dance forms?

Is it the people that are attracted to Bellydancing and Tango or is it something about the dance forms themselves and the culture that surrounds these dance forms? Or, a combination of these different elements?

There have to be answers to these questions. I'm just not sure what they are.

Here are some Argentine Tango blogs I've been following - I started taking Tango classes this month and there's a wealth of helpful information and insight on these blogs:

- Tangologue
- MsHedgehog
- Argentine Tango Videos
- Del Tango, El Amor y Otros Demonios
- An Ever Fixed Mark
- Sallycat's Adventures
- Siguiendo Mi Corazon
- Sorin's Blog - tango, motorcycles and misc other
- TangoSpam: La Vida Con Deby
- Tangri-la
- Houston Tanguera

And yesterday, Lorna of BellyLorna posted a comprehensive listing of bellydance-focused blogs.

There are obviously bloggers who are passionate about many different dance forms. But as a collective, Bellydancers and Argentine Tango bloggers do stand out. How do you explain this social/cultural phenomenon? I would like to know.

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:40 AM - Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

January 14, 2008

Subscribe to 150+ Dance Blogs

I use Google Reader to track dance, art, technology and not-for-profit blogs.

In this post I'm including two files that you can download and then upload to blog reader software applications such as Google Reader. This way you can easily and quickly follow the latest from dance and other blogs without wasting time jumping from one website to the next.

The files are in OPML format and can be uploaded to your favorite feed reader software program without modification.

It's a bit stunning how many dance blogs there are. When I started blogging in 2005, there were maybe a handful of dance blogs.

Dance Feeds

The first OPML file is for dance feeds. In this file there are over 150 dance feeds. About 20-30 of them have not been updated since before last November. But I track them anyway because sometimes people start posting again. In this file, I've also included feeds to the dance-focused social networking sites. Here's the file that you can view and download.

All My Feeds

The second OPML file includes all 200+ feeds that I read on a regular basis. This file includes all the dance feeds from above. Here's the file that you can view and download.

If you have questions about which feed readers to use or how to upload these files, please post comments.

Did I leave out dance feeds? Please email me.

In the near future, I'll also create a list of all dance blogs so that you can link to them directly.

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:27 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

January 10, 2008

Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet Reaches Out to Dance Bloggers

Last night I attended a dress rehearsal for Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet to which local dance bloggers were invited. The event was a lot of fun and it was a real pleasure watching the company's talented dancers perform works from three very different choreographers. Philip at Oberon's Grove is first out of the box with a write-up of this event and the performances. And Tonya just wrote this event wrap-up about famous-people sightings as I'm about to push the publish button.

It was great to see and meet fellow dance bloggers - there were about 10-12 of us - more on this topic coming soon along with a list of bloggers and a group photo.

I really appreciate Cedar Lake reaching out to dance bloggers. This type of event is the first of its kind and my guess is that more dance companies and presenters will more actively include bloggers in their future publicity efforts.

After the performance, we talked with Artistic Director Benoit-Swan Pouffer. He has a very positive attitude about the value of the unfiltered, personal writing style of bloggers, and expressed his appreciation for the diverse ways that bloggers go about covering dance.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to meet Caleb Custer last night - he was sick so he didn't attend. He's an intern with Cedar Lake and he helped put together this dance blogger event. Caleb definitely shares my interest in exploring how dance companies can leverage the Internet, blogs and videos to connect with audiences in new ways. So I hope to meet with him soon to discuss dance, the Internet and related topics.

Does This Event for Dance Bloggers Have Real Significance?

On one level, you could say this event is not a big deal. Cedar Lake was just smart to invite bloggers to a dress rehearsal, treat them to wine and cheese and host a post-performance talk with the artistic director. And in return get some good, quick coverage in the dance blogs - it's already happened.

All true. But, how come nobody else has done this before?

My answer is that many marketing people in the arts have a fairly traditional way of thinking about publicity, audience development, audience engagement and fundraising. There's still a huge emphasis placed on getting coverage and great quotes in the prestigious and mainstream media outlets such as the New York Times. These quotes are then taken and inserted into advertising/marketing campaigns and funding proposals.

I'm not actually discounting the importance of these favorable quotes to the financial health of dance companies. What I do believe, though, is that the emerging blogging outlets for dance ought not be ignored and offer many possible benefits to dance companies.

Bloggers are part of the community-oriented, participatory spirit of the Internet. And I think we will see many more dancers and dance companies exploring how to use blogs, social networking sites and related offerings to engage audiences in extended conversations about their work.

We turn around stories quickly, which means that you'll get coverage before the last curtain goes down. We include multimedia so that our readers can see videos of your work and make-up their own minds.

Collectively, dance bloggers, especially in New York City, get a good amount of traffic. Dance blog readers tend to be avid dance fans and are probably more interested in dance than the average reader of dance reviews in traditional newspapers.

Finally, dance blog posts can easily show-up toward the top of search engine results. Do a Google search for "Cedar Lake Ballet" and see what happens. A link to a story I wrote about Cedar Lake is right under the links to the Cedar Lake website. The same thing happens if you do a search for this week's "APAP conference" or "Arts Presenters Conference." Great Dance is very high in the search results listings.

What do these Google search results mean? They mean that if publicity people considered how Internet users searched for information about their organizations and performances, then they would reach the conclusion that dance bloggers are important. And, in addition, that it's worth the time and energy to support bloggers in their efforts so that they will hopefully offer positive coverage of your programs.

This post probably sounds like I'm going overboard patting myself and other bloggers on the back, which is somewhat true. But I do believe that there is a large discrepancy between the way in which marketing and publicity people in the arts see the world, and the way the world actually is.

Posted by Doug Fox at 12:34 PM - Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (0)

January 2, 2008

Dance Blogging in 2008 - Blogging Application Round-Up

I think that 2008 ought to be the year for dancers to blog.

By "blog" I really mean that dancers might want to consider sharing their first person stories and perspectives with their online audiences. I don't mean that every dancer ought to create their own comprehensive dedicated blog and devote large numbers of hours every week to writing about what they're up to - although they can. I'm just encouraging dancers to speak directly to their audiences on an on-going basis in a more or less conversational style. And providing these blog updates on their websites and social networking pages. And promoting them through email and other communication channels.

There are a number of blogging software programs to choose from. So in this post, I offer a round-up of the most popular blogging applications. Some of these programs are meant for short, quick posts, and others are intended for more formal blogging.

Blogging Tools and Applications

I'll start with the short-form blogging tools and follow with the more feature-rich applications.

- Twitter is a very streamlined application that is intended for people who want to share what they're up to in just a couple sentences or so. Two examples of Twitter blogs for dancers are from Terrence Taps and Article19. Twitter feeds, as with all blog feeds, can be embedded in your website, social networking pages and blogs.

- Another short-form blogging tool (but not intended for supper-short posts like Twitter) is Tumblr. Two Tumblr dance blogs include Danciti and Quodlibet.

- You can also use social network sites such as MySpace, which includes blogging functionality. Here's the MySpace blog for Troika Ranch.

- There are a number of popular choices for hosted blogging platforms. You can take a look at Blogger, TypePad and WordPress. Boris Willis Moves, Clare Byrne's Weekly Rites and Moving Space and Time use Blogger. Bellydance: Experiences uses TypePad. And A Time to Dance uses WordPress.

- Blogging software can also be integrated into the overall look and feel of your website. Dance Theater Workshop's new blog uses WordPress and, as you'll see, the blog is a seamless part of the redesigned DTW website. And Swan Lake Samba Girl , which also uses WordPress, is integrated into the overall design of Tonya Plank's website.

- You can also use blogging software to host multiple bloggers and blogs. The Winger uses WordPress. And Great Dance uses MovableType. Personally, I'm a fan of MovableType for hosting multiple blogs. But WordPress does have a lot of fans.

So that's a quick round-up of blogging applications. The tools toward the top of the list are pretty much do-it-yourself programs. As you move down, you'll either need more technical experience or want to hire a consultant for the design and implementation.

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December 14, 2007

Scanning the Dance Blogosphere

I feel like I've been losing touch with posts to a lot of dance blogs as I've been focusing on Great Dance blogs and dance in New York City. So I went on a reconnaissance mission this morning:

- Joe Grohens of The Topic is Tango links to MSNBC video story, "For blind teens, tango is a way to connect."

- Boris Willis hits the 25-hour mark for his Dance-A-Day video series.

- Maria at A Time To Dance points to news story about yet another dance site focused on social networking. This one is from MC Hammer and it's called DanceJam - in beta.

- The Evil Imp blog offers skeptical take on the rise of social networking sites as they relate to dance. I think that their criticisms have some merit, but there is also a very important upside that I will write about in upcoming post.

- Nutcracker rehearsal videos from the Joffrey ballet on their j-Pointe blog. Video 1 and Video 2

- Jolene of Saturday Matinee on her ideal Nutcracker.

- The latest video from Clare Byrne's Weekly Rites.

- Judith Mackrell on The Rolex model for sponsoring artists.

- Matt Gough writes about "«vicki» - virtual improvisational choreographer / kinetic instructor (also known as «choreobot»)" Read about VICKI here. Matt points to other software for choreography here.

- The creator of VICKI, Julie Cruse, is joining Tony Schultz's class at Sarah Lawrence College.

- Wendy Perron writes about Dancers Responding to AIDS (DRA) benefit event this past Monday.

- Amanda Abrams kicks-off extended conversation in response to Daniel Burkholder's post "I'm an elitist, and so are you."

- Chopper offers a history lesson in popping.

- Carl recommends swing dance history books.

- More Washington, DC dancers share their dance-related stories on Bourgeononline.

- Shallom of Moving Space and Time posts video of dance she choreographed and performed in called "Dancing Waters."

- Matt of Ranting Details on musical theater and learning how to really perform.

- Two recent posts from The Winger that I like: "The Origin of an Idea" by Kristin Osler of Staatstheater Kassel Tanztheater and "Wings Rehearsal" by David Blumenfeld of Atlanta Ballet.

- I missed this panel last night that Culturebot wrote about that investigated "the performing arts and the geography of New York City." I would have liked to have heard Aviva Davidson, the artistic Director of Dancing in the Streets.

- This is not blog post. Here is story by Sarah Frater from Wall Street Journal about proliferation of dance styles around the world: "Great Leap Forward: Innovators Expand The World of Dance."

- Network Performance writes about dance performance that takes place today in Second Life. Here are performance/RSVP details. If you attend please write about it/screen capture it - or something along those lines. I'll try to make it.

- New dance therapist blogger Donna Newman-Bluestein links to this video of a dancing medium sulphur crested Eleanora cockatoo -- impressive!

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December 3, 2007

New Social Networking Sites for Different Dance Communities

A number of new private-label social networking sites have launched recently for dancers with diverse interests.

- Kristin Sloan, creator of The Winger, launched The Inter Mission, which caters primarily to the ballet community.

- Marlon Barrios Solano created dance-tech.net for artists and practitioners in the dance/technology/new media field.

- Dancing With the Stars pro dancers Maksim Chmerkovskiy, Tony Dovolani, and Elena Grinenko created the Ballroom Dance Channel social networking site. [via Tonya Plank at Swan Lake Samba Girl]

- And Danciti linked to the not-ready-for-the-public Dancer Universe site from Dancer Publishing Co., Inc.

The first three social networking sites above use the Ning private-label social networking application. Anybody can use Ning to create similar social networking sites. The difference between Ning and MySpace, Facebook and the rest is that with Ning you create a self-contained community site over which you have complete control.

I have not spent enough time on these social networking sites to have an opinion about which ones are good and worthwhile. I'll try to get back to this topic in the near future. If you have thoughts, please share.

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November 9, 2007

Share Your Comments - Conversations From Around Dance Blogosphere

- In comment to "Dancing to Combat Global Warming" in my Dancing into the Future blog, Harriet, a performance studies student at Worthing College in West Sussex, England, wants to learn about dance companies exploring global warming and environmental issues.

- In his post "Challenges in Making Site Work" in Third Rail Projects blog, Tom Pearson asks: "To other artists who have created site work for spaces that they have had only limited access to: what were the greatest challenges for you and what methods were successful in preparing for the unknown?"

- Taylor Gordon on The Winger wants your thoughts and feedback. "For my [thesis] I would like to explore the changes that the internet and new media are bringing to arts journalism, specifically dance criticism."

- In "Tools of the Trade: Rethinking Social Networks" in Misnomer Dance Theater blog, Jaki Levy asks, "How are you using MySpace and Facebook? What other online social networks have yielded good results for you? Why do you have MySpace pages? I'd love to hear your feedback and thoughts!" You can address similar topic in Dance Goes Digital blog.

- Many one-word summaries in the comments section in response to Dance Theater Workshop post that features behind-the-scenes video footage of David Neumann/advanced beginner group at CultureFest. How would you describe this important documentary footage? (Also watch video of David Neumann at Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography (MANCC) at Florida State University - via Danciti.)

- In comment to "Five Strategies for Engaging New Dance Audiences," John Cavenaugh believes that overcoming people's fears is critical and that "Dancing with the Stars is definitely putting dance back on the map for the American mainstream." What do you think?

- In multi-blog conversation, posts address topics about the challenges faced by modern dance and how experimental artists treat their audiences - Lisa Traiger, Amanda Abrams, Daniel Burkholder and Anna Brady Nuse. What's your take?

- In My Kingdom for Your Story, Peter DiMuro invites readers to share their traditional and non-traditional family stories in text, photo and video formats for upcoming performances of Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's Funny Uncles.

- In "Creating Dance Works Specifically for the Internet" in Dance Goes Digital readers share examples of dance videos and Second Life dance performances. Have you created dance performances for the online world? What have you done?

- Wheelchair dancing is a nightmare when the stage slopes - read "It's Official: Panic" from Wheelchair Dancer.

- A number of posts about John Jasperse at BAM - Aynsley Vandenbroucke, Amanda Abrams, and Tonya Plank.

- How should dance-tech list evolve? Matt Gough on "Community." My post from earlier this week. New dance-tech social networking group on Ning. Also visit The(Inter)Mission from The Winger, a general dance social networking site created by Kristin Sloan.

- How would you choreographer a Parkour video? Watch video from Vancouver Film School student Eric Morrison on Da...nce.

- Don Baarns of The Unlikely Salsero on my on-going struggles to master Salsa music. After more reflection, my challenges are not just with the rhythms of Salsa but are actually with many different types of rhythms. How do you help students/dancers connect with music?

- Shallom of Moving Space and Time blog shares dance translation exercise that consists of passing-on choreography from one dancer to the next. "Thoughts? If you want to use this idea, please feel free. If you do, I'd love to see the results or hear some comments about the process.

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November 1, 2007

Uncovered and New Dance Blogs

Here's a round-up of new dance blogs as well as blogs I've recently come across or omitted before. I find increasing diversity of voices and perspectives very enjoyable to follow:

- Critical Correspondence blog - From Movement Research: In their most recent post, you'll find video clips from October 15th performances at Judson Memorial Church. Including this one A Genda, choreography by Barbara Mahler and performed by Mahler and Jeremy Laverdure:

- Dynamic Stillness: Reflections on Dance: Choreographer Aynsley Vandenbroucke writes about Map Me by Charlotte Vanden Eynde and Kurt Vandendriessche in her post, "Is it Dance?" (Roslyn Sulcas review in New York Times):

The movement in Map Me did not come out of a ballet class or a modern dance class. It came out of life. It was sparse and imaginative and wacky and poignant. I cannot strongly enough state how much I believe in this approach to performance making...Any human body that is alive is, however subtly or radically, moving. It follows, then, that a live human body moves even in "stillness." The movement within stillness includes breath and the many subtle ways we communicate deep parts of ourselves.

Movement that is sparse or subtle requires the audience to meet it half way. It's a question of imagination and personal responsibility. As an audience member, do I have the capacity and patience to look closely at what is onstage? Do I give myself the authority to find movement and meaning in any human being onstage?

Map Me (Image from DTW)

- Dance Theater Workshop Blog: And on the topic of DTW, they've recently launched a new blog. Here they capture footage of their large orange banner being carried through streets of Manhattan to reach new dance audiences - plus, you can watch one of their flash performances:

- Seeking System: Writer Anna McDonald shares her experience at ABT premiere:

I carried my copy of Alastair Macauley's ABT recap with me to City Center on Saturday night with the intention of looking it over in my seat before the show began, figuring out which parts of it I had to try and agree or disagree with, but it was too electric in the lobby and in the grandstands to get in any good alone time with the Arts section. For $27, I was seated in the left rear mezzanine, a chilly region so far north of the stage that the dancers are rendered before you as tinily as they look on the cover of your program. Saturday night was my first premiere, and with it came its donors in all of their uptown splendor: bejeweled and upper-easty and cocktail-dressed (and fighting gravity). It didn't feel like old New York (whatever that is), but it did feel energetic and tipsy, and somehow that audience pulse transferred straight through to the dancing (or maybe all along it was the dancers projecting their energy into us).

- En Pointe with Houston Ballet: Principal ballerina Sara Webb wrote post in October "A Nine Month Pas De Deux":

There was a time, not too long ago, when pregnancy meant retirement. It was unheard of for a dancer to have a child and return to the stage. Fortunately, times have changed, and so have our options. Today, many ballerinas take time off to have children, find their "grace" once again, and return to those bright lights and pink tutus. Stanton Welch, born to a ballerina mom, encourages dancers to have children when they are ready. Houston Ballet has had many ballerina moms over the last decade. Some have come back and some have retired, but it's great to know we now have the choice.

Sara Webb - Houston Ballet

- State Street Ballet: Ponders the benefits of ballet blogs and discusses what it takes to create a successful blog:

Of course, just like perfect ballet technique (or feet), this technology is but a tool which can be used well or badly. An interested, knowledgeable, enthusiastic human still has to fill the blog with interesting and relevant information, and they have to do it regularly. Think about the websites you visit often: how many haven't posted any new information in a while?

They also have to do it with a sense of earnestness and authenticity that reflects the company and its place in the community. The last thing anyone wants to read is some sanitized, cookie-cutter template that tries to be everything to everyone. You are an integral part of your community. What is your unique identity in your community?

I couldn't have said it better.

- Carl's Dance Blog: "A critical blog on vernacular jazz dance, lindy hop and tap.": Carl Nelson covers the world of swing dancing with lots of videos. Here's fun clip from the Ultimate Lindy Hop Showdown 2007:

- Boredom: Chase Granoff covers the intersection of art forms. In "Turn on, tune in, ....." Granoff writes about Performa07, the second biennial of new visual art performances taking place through November 20th.

Although PERFORMA features dance performances and dance related happenings, including a number of events surrounding/exploring the influence of Judson Dance Theater, the New York dance scene was largely disregarded by the curatorial team. This is a disappointing move especially considering that PERFORMA director, RoseLee Goldberg, states that PERFORMA is trying "to open the doors and windows between the dance and art world, to find the conceptual underpinnings where there could be a crossover."

- Stay: Nancy Garcia writes about and links to her You've Got Moves Website, a choreographic, movement project that seeks audience participation via the contribution of video "moves" - this is part of an academic assignment that is in alpha testing stage.

- Barefootblogger - thoughts on dance: Minneapolis-based James Sewell Ballet dancer and independent choreographer Penelope Freeh blogs about life and dance. In October 17th entry, she writes about performing at the Joyce
:

The second piece, Schoenberg Serenade, had gotten most of the kinks out in the afternoon. For the most part, we were able to bravely tackle our highly technical requirements with artistry and animation. My solo went pretty well. I was happy with it, though it wasn't perfect. It rarely is, with its extremely technical quirkiness en pointe. I use the shoes in all possible ways, from cocking my feet and turning with bent knees, to balancing doubled-over in a parallel sous-sous and rising to upright, hands flexed above my head.

After intermission came Opera Moves, our final offering. Many sections long, we each get a chance to shine. The opening section, a new, inherited part for me, went the best it's ever gone. J and I finally figured out how to negotiate our arms prior to a tricky turn. We nailed it. I also promenaded in arabesque steadily; this is generally hit-or-miss. I heard the audience breathe a collective sigh as the lights lowered after that section. Satisfying.

James Sewell Ballet at Joyce

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October 18, 2007

From Washington, DC...Dance Classes and New Bloggers

I'm in DC for a few days - packing-up my stuff and getting ready to move everything to NYC. One of the things I'm doing is getting together with DC dance bloggers - especially ones I haven't met - while I'm down here.

I also have a number of dance classes left on my Joy of Motion class card so I'm taking classes while I'm down here. Last night I took Daniel Burkholder's contact improv class - see his blog on Great Dance. I found last night's class fun and challenging. Daniel led us through a series of exercises where we were supposed to let the movement follow its own energy and direction, but I find it very difficult not to play a significant role in trying to force movement when in contact with my partner.

For example, toward the beginning each of us was with a partner. We closed our eyes and pressed our index fingers against each others. We were just supposed to follow the natural flow of any movement generated. But it's hard to let things just happen naturally and I have to constantly stop myself from trying to achieve a specific outcome. We did similar exercises with our heads and also with a single point of contact as we were dancing.

The class was real small - only 4 students. I really don't understand why so few people go to Daniel's contact class. He's an excellent teacher and his classes are always thought-provoking and offer much to reflect on. Most people seem more interested/comfortable going to the regular technique classes.

Tonight I'm going to take Maurice Johnson's jazz class, which opens with one of the more rigorous one-hour warm-ups that I've ever taken in a class. So if I survive all the plies and ab work, I'll know I'm back in shape and pretty much injury free.

More bloggers...

I'd like to welcome three new bloggers to Great Dance that I'll write more about:

- JoAnna Mendl Shaw, the artistic director of The Equus Projects, started blogging earlier this week. JoAnna choreographers works for dancers and horses. I find her work fascinating.

- And Misnomer Dance Theater started blogging last night. I've written a number of times about Chris Elam and Misnomer. They have been in the forefront of using the Internet and video to engage audiences with their work in new and different ways.

- And within the next few days, Tom Pearson of Third Rail Projects will start blogging about an upcoming site-specific work in Hong Kong.

It's great to be working with new and current bloggers!

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October 3, 2007

Introducing Great Dance Bloggers

As I start to expand Great Dance, I'm delighted to be working with fellow dance bloggers who are sharing their insights and experiences about the dance world.

So I figured I'd provide this introduction to the initial bloggers on Great Dance:

Daniel Burkholder

Washington, DC-based dancer, choreographer, improviser and teacher Daniel Burkholder will be blogging on act/re/act. This new blog will be a continuation of his "My ocean is never blue" performance blog. I met Daniel in DC where I've seen performances of his "My ocean..." in both tiny art spaces and on traditional performance stages. While I've only taken Daniel's contact improv class twice, I thought they were excellent - my write-up of one of them here.

Eva Yaa Asantewaa

Since July dance critic and journalist Eva Yaa Asantewaa has been conducting audio interviews with choreographers, dancers and presenters in what is now the Body and Soul blog (previously Great Dance Podcast). Eva is a wealth of knowledge and insight about the dance world here in New York City and she's given me a lot of great recommendations about who to see perform and who to talk with as I expand Great Dance. Eva also writes the InfiniteBody blog.

Peter DiMuro

Over a year ago, I had lunch with Peter DiMuro, producing artistic director of Takoma Park, Maryland-based Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, to discuss a new work of his Funny Uncles, about which he is now blogging. During our initial lunch and in future conversations, we brainstormed about how the community-oriented and interactive nature of the Internet and blogging could be embraced in order to encourage people to share their stories in video and other formats related to the themes of this work that revolve around non-traditional families and the feeling of outsiderness. At first, we set-up a free-standing blog for "Funny Uncles." Now Peter will be blogging about this work on Great Dance.

Anna Brady Nuse

For maybe a year or so, videodancemaker, choreographer and dancer Anna Brady Nuse has been posting excellent and insightful comments on a number of posts I've written, which eventually led us to start discussing setting-up a blog for Anna, which you can access at Move The Frame. Anna has already posted a handful of stories that center around topics relating to the intersection of dance and the camera. I especially enjoyed reading, "Philippine Prisoners Resurrect Busby Berkeley." Even though Anna is here in NYC, we still haven't met, a problem which we will rectify this Friday when we get together to discuss dance, blogging and related topics.

And just so you know, since the entire site is now referred to as Great Dance, my blog's name has been changed to "Dancing into the Future to convey one of the themes of my blog which is the intersection of dance, the Internet and technology.

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September 4, 2007

New York-Trinidad Dancer Makeda Thomas Re-Launches Her Blog

New York-Trinidad choreographer and dancer Makeda Thomas just re-launched her blog, Roots & Wings Movement!. (You can also visit her dance company site.)

The blog redesign makes good use of widgets from Widgetbox. From any page, you can translate this blog into multiple languages, subscribe to the feed with your favorite blog reader and Skype Makeda Thomas when she's online. Plus, she's used a a Flickr widget to embed her latest pictures.

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August 10, 2007

Clare Byrne's Video Dance Blog - Exploring Canada and the US

Starting last year, New York City-based choreographer Clare Byrne created daily dances in her living room. These extended improvisations were eventually incorporated into her "Weekly Rites" video blog, which she started this June.

Each post consists of a short video excerpt from her dances along with her written thoughts and reflections. Clare is just back from an 8,000 mile road trip through Canada and the United States with her companion Stefan and her latest videos are performed in New Mexico, Glacier Park and Lake Superior.

From "Chama Canyon, New Mexico":

Wednesday morning Stefan and I saw a fox from our adobe porch, and stalked it down silently, barefooted, to the river. It eluded us, so we sat in the new sunshine just coming up over the canyon walls. I'd already greeted the developing day three times by that point. I have been doing the hours, the daily office, the rounds, with the monks of Monastery of Christ in the Desert for these two days. It is an entirely different way of using time, slow and careful and filled with many parts. I'm dry of ideas, just a funnel for taking in information; I don't know how it will come back out.

When talking with Clare by phone yesterday, we were wondering what it means for individuals to experience dance alone while watching Internet videos. What types of emotional reactions might viewers have and how are these different than watching live performances?

And what types of dance videos engage viewers in new, meaningful ways? I like the tranquil feeling and beautiful setting of Clare's New Mexico video above as well as the sounds she generates as she plants her feet and turns.

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July 30, 2007

New Dance Video Blog, Troika Ranch on MySpace and ENO's Carmen Micro-Site

Monica Gillette, a dancer from New York City, and now in Vienna, Austria, is a danceWEB scholarship recipient at Impulstanz.

Last month Monica started a dance video blog. I very much like the videos, although it's not technically set-up as a blogging application.

Troika Ranch Blogs Residency at 3LD Art & Technology

Brooklyn-based Troika Ranch just started a two-month residency at 3LD Art & Technology Center in New York City. To document a new work (working title "Loop Diver") they are creating, Mark Coniglio and Dawn Stoppiello have created a MySpace page and blog.

Mark writes in a post to the dace-tech list that they will take a number of approaches to documenting their work:

...through blogs from myself, Dawn, and the dancers; as well as photos and video clips of material as we create it. New material will be added almost daily. We look forward to you adding your comments and thoughts through this virtual forum.

Matt Gough in his quodlibet Tumblr blog wrote a post yesterday, "Shenanigans," that takes issue on a number of points with Mark's post "Abandoning Choreography in Search of the Killer Loop."

I'm glad to see an online discussion about dance and technology performances. Before I comment, I first want to follow-up with Mark to ask him about some of the specifics of his post including the choreographic approach that was used and the nature of a "shifting loop." It would be great to see videos of what Mark is referring to in his post.

ENO's Carmen Blog

A new production of Carmen, directed by Sally Potter and choreographed by Pablo Veron, opens in September at the English National Opera.

A dedicated Carmen site has been created for this production, which features a community blog. In addition, Sally Potter has her own blog, which features videos from auditions, including this dance audition clip (scroll to bottom of this page to read dance audition description):

Click To Play

This ENO Carmen site has promise, it may turn out to be very worthwhile and it's great to see a focus on creating collaborative content to support the performing arts. But I get the feeling that the creators and marketers of this micro-site think that that they are creating something altogether new and are the sole trailblazers along this path.An illustration is the post "Carmen 2.0," which includes a good amount of praise for their "innovative" undertaking and embrace of social media. They are early adopters in the big picture, but they are not the first organization to explore these avenues. I think what irks me is that they don't reference similar blogging/web 2.0 efforts or link to other initiatives to take you behind-the-scenes -- such as in NYC Ballet's Romeo + Juliet.

In closing, here's a clip from the upcoming movie The Tango Lesson, with Pablo Veron and Sally Potter:

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:09 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

July 26, 2007

It's a Draw: Mainstream Dance Media Vs. Dance Bloggers

Since a lot of dance bloggers have written about the Slow Dancing exhibit at Lincoln Center, it's interesting to see what the Google results look like for the following search

slow dancing lincoln center

As of Thursday afternoon, the mainstream media has the edge on the first page of results. But if you take into the equation the first two pages of results, then it's about a draw.

Plus, if you turn to blog search engines such as Google Blog Search, the mainstream media gets trounced.

Is this a watershed moment? If they haven't already, should dance companies, presenters and publicists begin to think about their relationship with dance bloggers?

Posted by Doug Fox at 2:51 PM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

July 23, 2007

Dance Blog Map - Create Your Own Blog Diagram

Here's a first draft I created of a dance blog map. You can click following screen shot to see a larger image:

My goal was to create a visual diagram that highlighted the key characteristics of dance blogs. I used an online application Bubbl.us to create this map.

If you want to modify my dance blog map, you can create a free Bubbl.us account and then import this XML file (click "menu" option on bottom right of screen once you log-in): download xml file to your computer.

Please share your thoughts? What changes/additions would you make?

Posted by Doug Fox at 7:24 AM - Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

July 14, 2007

New Dance Blogs

I just added or recently added the following dance blogs to my blogroll on the left:

- American Dance Festival

- A Time to Dance

- Behind the Scenes @ Summer Stages Dance

- Joffrey Ballet J-Pointe

- Radical Acts of Movement

I also added above blogs to dance blog search engine at the top of Great Dance's home page.

Posted by Doug Fox at 3:06 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

June 22, 2007

"Engaging Art" is Awesome! Live Blogging from American Symphony Orchestra Conference

Check out the "Engaging Art: A Public Conversation" blog that Douglas McLennan of ArtsJournal created and moderated.

Live blogging at yesterday's American Symphony
Orchestra League Conference in Nashville, TN

This very active and thoughtful blog conversation, which focused on the future of the arts with a strong emphasis on concert music, started on June 14th and culminated yesterday with a live blogging event at the 62nd National Conference of the American Symphony Orchestra League in Nashville, Tennessee.

I think that the integration of an extended pre-conference dialog via the "Engaging Art" blog with a face-to-face program that builds upon this initial conversation is a great model to follow. Even better, during the program yesterday, people around the world interested in the future of concert music could post questions, which were answered by speakers and others blogging from the conference.

I would definitely like to create something similar for the dance community as a way to address some of the issues that were discussed in a recent post, "Exploring the Economics of Dance and Creating New Business Models." There are many directions in which such a project could go. It could focus on:

1) The business, strategic, funding and marketing side of dance,

2) The future of the Internet, video and technology for dancers and dance companies,

3) The choreographic and creative side of dance, or

4) A combination of two or more of the above.

It would be great if you shared your thoughts about such a project for the dance community.

Posted by Doug Fox at 11:18 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

June 14, 2007

Short-Term Dance Blogging

There's excellent post on Influential Marketing Blog about success strategies for short-term blogging.

Why I didn't think about this idea for dance bloggers before is beyond me - it makes a lot of sense.

Here it is:

Full-time dance blogging is not for everybody. Many dancers and dance companies move from one project to the next, and for time and other reasons maintaining a single blog over a long period of time just doesn't make sense.

So why not create a blog that is intended to be a short-term initiative with a clear beginning, middle and end. This way your audience has a clear expectation of what to expect from your blog, and you and collaborators have a more manageable project of a set duration for which you can prepare.

Another advantage is that short-term blogging, unlike full-time blogs that cover many topics, offers a good opportunity for dancers and presenters to work together to promote this blogging endeavor to their respective audiences.

How-to Guidelines

Building on and modifying recommendations from Influential Marketing Blog post:

1) Plan you blog endeavor well before the actual launch of your blog. For example, if you plan to blog a dance work (rehearsal through performances and aftermath), prepare 3 to 6 months before. Timing depends largely on when the marketing and publicity materials will be prepared. You want to add to all online and offline marketing collateral that you'll be blogging about your performance. You'll also want to describe the nature of your blogging in this promotional literature - video, text, pictures? Behind-the-scenes look at the creation of? Or whatever else you plan to blog about. Whatever you decide, your blogging will probably be devoted to a single topic/project.

2) Register domain name if necessary at sites such as GoDaddy.

3) Set-up your blog. If you're doing it on your own without technical help, the easiest way to get started is with sites such as Blogger, TypePad and WordPress.

4) If you plan to take pictures and videos and upload to Internet and you have no idea how to do this, make sure you have time to experiment, learn how to use equipment and spend time with photo and video software. Feel free to post questions here if you'd like.

5) Think about community. Will visitors be encouraged to post comments? And who will respond in a timely way to these comments? This is really critical. If you're working with team of bloggers, this is much easier to manage.

6) Map-out your time commitment to blogging up-front. Dancing can be all consuming. If you don't set aside specific times during the day and week to blog, it probably won't get done. Another reason why it's good to blog with other people.

7) Market you blog from the beginning. Contact me and other bloggers so you can get your blog listed on as many sites as possible. Within your blog configuration panel, you can automatically have your blog "ping" blog indexing sites that help increase profile for your blog on search engines.

8) Post your multimedia content to popular video and photo sharing sites. This will get you more traffic. Plus, bloggers and others can embed your content into their sites.

9) Prepare people for the end of your blogging. Make sure blog followers know when you're blog will end. And let everybody know what you'll be doing next in terms of dancing. This way your fans can follow you to your current or new website or blog.

10) Try not to make promises that you can't keep when it comes to blogging. I've made this mistake many times and I try to keep this in mind when I'm blogging.

If you know of project/performance-specific dance blogs or you have upcoming plans, please let me know.

Posted by Doug Fox at 9:44 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

June 12, 2007

Comprehensive List of Dance Blog RSS Feeds

Here's monthly list of feeds for dance blogs. The file is in OPML format, which can be used to quickly upload all of the feeds into your favorite feed reader.

To the above list, I've started to add dance blogs in French, Italian and Spanish - if you know of more, please let me know.

To learn about OPML files, you can read this earlier post.

Also, Mashable has a post from yesterday "The Ultimate RSS Toolbox - 120+ RSS Resources.." In this listing, you'll find an excellent round-up of feed readers for different operating systems as well as web-based feedreaders.

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:28 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

June 8, 2007

Update for Dance Blogs, Feeds and Search Engine

I'm updating dance blogroll, RSS feeds and dance blog search engine (top of my home page).

Do you know of new dance blogs I should include? Please email: doug@greatdance.com.

Thanks!

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:26 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

May 23, 2007

Dance Blog Update

If you have dance blog, please let me know about it.

I do three things with dance blogs:

1) I add them to left column dance blogroll.

2) I add them to my list of RSS feeds so that it is easy to track all dance blogs. See this post for more details.

3) I add them to dance blog search engine so that you can search the contents of all dance blogs through a single location. This search engine is at top of Great Dance home page.

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:52 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

May 3, 2007

Add YouTube Videos to Your WordPress Blogs

I've received a number of questions about how to add YouTube videos to your WordPress blogs.

The reason why this is a problem is because when WordPress users try to embed a video, the video does not display properly and the pages that blog visitors see are all messed-up.

How to solve problem:

- Log-on to your WordPress blog.

- Click "Users" in top horizontal bar.

- Go to your user profile and scroll down to bottom of page.

- The box next to "Use the visual editor" is almost definitely checked. So remove the check.

- Save your updated user profile.

- Now create a new post - you may notice that you are no longer using a visual editor but a plain html editor.

- Go to any YouTube video page.

- To the right of video, you'll see a box after the word "Embed". Copy the code in this box.

- Go back to your new post in WordPress and paste the "Embed" code.

- Save and publish your post. Your video will now be visible to your blog visitors.

Actually, to back-up a bit:

Once you paste video code in to your post, you can enter text before and after the video. But what you might want to do is paste the video code and save your post. Then, follow instructions above to go back to your user profile and add a check mark back to the box before "Use the visual editor." You will now be able to edit your posts as you did before - in visual mode.

Hope this helps.

Posted by Doug Fox at 12:54 PM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Comprehensive List of Dance Blog RSS Feeds

Here's an updated list of of all the dance blogs I subscribe to in OPML format. You'll find English, French and Spanish dance blogs categorized by language.

To learn how you can use this OPML file to subscribe to dance feeds, you can read this March post about the process.

To access dance blogs, you can also view a comprehensive list in the left-hand column of this page. And in addition, I created a customized search engine for over 70 dance blogs at the top of my home page.

If you have a new dance blog, please let me know.

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:40 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

May 1, 2007

We Need More University Dance Bloggers!!!

The Ohio State Department of Dance's "Dance Downtown Rocks" performance starts this Thursday in Columbus, Ohio. For both "The Vernon Reid Project" and "Set and Reset/Reset," you can watch four video clips of rehearsals and interviews with choreographers. Here's the video page.

I thought the brief interview sections in the videos offer some good insights into the creative process of the participating choreographers.

The OSU Department of Dance has a blog if you haven't visited it before. Mostly it just lists upcoming events and programs but sometimes you'll find some interesting nuggets like videos above.

The Maggie Allessee Department of Dance at Wayne State University also has a blog.

I'd like to encourage dance students at colleges and universities to blog more - about the projects you're currently working on, dance in general, how you're using video and other technologies, what you think is the future of dance, how you use the Internet for research and collaboration, and any other related topics you can come up with. I'm sure it would be interesting and helpful to dancers around the globe.

If you want more specific ideas about what you might blog about let me know and I'll come up with many possibilities. Also, isn't it possible to get course credit for specific types of blog projects?

Posted by Doug Fox at 2:18 PM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

April 2, 2007

Comprehensive List of Dance Blogs Feeds

Here's an updated OPML file with a huge number of dance feeds. You can download this file and import it into feed readers to automatically subscribe to all English-language dance blogs that I know of.

If the above doesn't make sense, you can read my post from early March, "Quickly Subscribe to Dance Blog Feeds" from early March - hopefully that one makes sense.

Posted by Doug Fox at 3:21 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Dance Bloggers in DC

Washington DC dance bloggers are on the verge of by-passing New York dance bloggers in size, scope, insight and wisdom!!!

I'm just having fun. Here's a list of dance bloggers in DC:

- DC Dance Blog

- Diverse Variations

- My ocean is never blue

- And me: Great Dance

The main website for Daniel Burkholder of "My Ocean is never blue" above is Improv Arts, Inc. "My Ocean..." is a performance of his contact improvisation group, which I saw in a super-small gallery on Friday - it was probably about 9' x 15'. It was fun to watch and be so close to the dancers. Here's Daniel's write-up of his Friday performance.

Once I get healthy - I hope soon - I'd like to take one of Daniel's contact improvisation classes.

Posted by Doug Fox at 2:36 PM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

March 19, 2007

New Blog for Dance Videos

There are so many online videos of performances and topics related to dance that I needed a place to put all of the interesting videos I came across.

So I created a new blog: Great Dance Videos.

Saying that these videos are all supposed to be "great" is a bit of hyperbole on my part - but that's the name of my blog. But I really should just say that I link to videos that I like and find interesting.

I'll probably add a handful of videos a week. So far I've embedded five. Here's the first one I added of a recent interview with Twyla Tharp discussing the importance of video to dance - it seemed like a good place to start:

Posted by Doug Fox at 9:04 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 15, 2007

Dance Blogger Round-Up

I started this round-up last Thursday. I might keep doing it. I'll see how it goes. Please let me know what you think.

- Early dance blogger Rachel Feinerman returns after a long hiatus. Rachel talks about life, marriage and the challenges of a dancer's life.

- French bloggeurs (Images de Danse, Un Soir ou un Autre, Le Tadorne and Clochettes) have joined together to review and rate contemporary dance and theatrical performances. I'm actually a bit confused by what this project entails - my French is pretty bad and Google translator is even worse. You can access their new initiative named Scenes 2.0 and read an overview here.

- Second Life Modern Dance Theatre was founded by architecture students from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden in collaboration with The Stockholm Modern Dance Theatre. The dance performance with eight avatars is a hybrid event that takes place in Second Life as well as in the real world in Stockholm - video clips available. I definitely plan to learn more about SL Life Modern Dance Theatre and their performances.

- Chimene in A Life Less Examined writes in "Before and After Photos" that "I totally love my abdominal area."

- Kristin Sloan at The Winger has been working on a secret project - soon to be announced. And continues to work at physical therapy. I don't really understand what the "torture device" she has a picture of from her physical PT is for.

- In "Shared Transcriptions" Anais Janacek writes that improvisational responses to technological partners are not really different from the physical ones (humans).

- Miss Tango in Her Eyes asks Mr. Norway if he's taken classes with milonguero Carlos Gavito.

- In "Who/What is a Disabled Dancer?" and "More on Dance and Disability," Wheelchair Dance grapples with defining the nature and scope of physically integrated dance. To paraphrase: How do you dance your disability without making your disability the subject of your dance?

- Ariel of The Stranger in Seat Twelve thinks the article and video story by New York Times writer Harry Hurt III about his efforts to become an instant dancer at the New York Ballet is "hilarious." I'd like it too if it wasn't one of the only dance-focused videos on the NY Times site. This is a story from a writer in the business section who writes an "Executive Pursuits" column. Earlier this month in the theater and dance section there is a video piece entitled "Praise Dancing Hits Manhattan" - but that's about all I've seen.

- Shan Monster was not thrilled with a recent tribal and fusion bellydance workshop she attended. She published a letter in her blog that she sent to the event organizer and sought feedback from her readers - lots of comments. Her main complaint was the indifference shown toward her when she explained that the smoke machine could aggravate her asthma.

- Leigh Witchel is busy writing dance reviews. But in the meantime links to video of Broadway singer and cruise ship performer singing "Femininity."

- Tonya Plank of Swan Lake Samba Girl works on her lifts and did her "first fish." (I don't know what that is). She includes picture of herself from her last showcase and is now watching video of her choreography to memorize it.

- Patty Rose talks about the right way to breath and provides excerpt from book "Conditioning for Dance" by Eric Franklin.

- Judith Mackrell writes in her Guardian Unlimited blog that many dance performances are too long and are just wasting time. "Wouldn't it be better to have a shapely, well-crafted 45 minutes of dance rather than a flatulent hour and a half, whose length has been determined by the financial and political agendas of programmers?"

- Natalia of Bellydance: Experiences posts next blog carnival topic for March. The theme is "Dancing on a budget." You can post story about this topic on your blog and then email link to Natalia by end of this month.

- Marcy Mendelson of Root Magazine posts article from essay contest winner Jalila A. Bell about her 2006 participation in the 74th Annual Jacobs Pillow Dance Festival. Bell performed three works with Vissi Dance Theater that dealt with the "themes of slavery, fear, oppression, transcendence and freedom." Bell writes:

Performing these pieces in this venue was overwhelming for me, both physically and emotionally. For most of the bumpy-curvy three-hour ride home, I huddled in my seat of the caravan, sobbing uncontrollably. As a dancer, I felt wholly unsatisfied by my failure to achieve the unobtainable perfection, the precision of technique, the liminality to overcome my numerous costume malfunctions. As a woman of color and a descendant of slaves, I was humbled and overcome by a profound bone-deep sadness.

- Joe Grohens in Topic is Tango links to two tango videos on YouTube with Homer and Christina Ladas.

- Art Williams of Wandering Salsero recommends linking to this Salsa rhythm tool that allows you to turn on and off different instruments such as the clave to develop a better understanding of Salsa music. I have to say that I don't think it's a very helpful tool. It lasts for only 8 beats and it features only one possible rhythm.

- Matt writes in the The Ranting Details of a Life Uncharted: ABT dancers burn off steam with some dirty dancing after performance in Miami - a good way to ensure the arrival of "dead swans" the next morning.

- Tina in Seguendo Il Mio Cuore from Buenos Aires channels her inner Sophia Loren on the dance floor and brushes aside undesired invites to dane.

Posted by Doug Fox at 7:00 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

March 8, 2007

Dance Blog Round-Up

- More on appointment of Alastair Macaulay to be new chief dance critic at New York Times: Rachel Howard writes about Apollinaire's "overheated reaction" and also writes about my post on this topic. Judith Flanders in Guardian Unlimited is amused by the "stirred tempers" in the US. Brendan McCarthy discusses "otherwordly discussion." And Apollinaire Scherr responds to Flanders.

- Natalia in Bellydance: Experiences wraps-up February blog carnival with the theme of "Through a dancer's eye" where dance bloggers write posts about this topic.

- Wheelchair Dancer writes two-part overview of recent symposium on dance and disability: Post about conference, Part I and Part II.

- Tony Schultz describes creation of a "choreographic interface" for generating different variations of Twyla Tharp’s "The Fugue," which was recently performed by students at Sarah Lawrence College. Screen shot of software interface included.

- Tonya Plank in Swan Lake Samba Girl writes post "You Made Me a Monster" about bringing a non-dancing friend to an "audience participation" dance event.

- La Planchadora shares her favorite Argentine Tango video of the week from YouTube.

- ShanMonster attends her first pole dancing class and includes pole dancing video that she can't quite do yet.

- Lorna of BellyLorna provides a multi-part history of belly dancing starting with Part 1.

- Flailbox links to preview of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, a half opera, half dance performance that is partly submerged in big fish tank at Sadler's Wells. Watch video clip.

- A Life Less Examined is thrilled that American Ballet Theatre is coming to Chicago.

- Miguelito in his DC Flamenco photo diary writes about his Tuesday evening experience seeing a Flamenco performance at Strathmore Music Center.

- Terpsichore Musings has a photo shoot - details in "Close-up."

- Soleilisme is in the zone during contemporary dance class.

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:02 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

March 4, 2007

Quickly Subscribe to Dance Blog Feeds

If you'd like an easy and fast way to track a large numbers of dance blogs, here are some suggestions.

First, I created a document that is formatted as an OPML file. This file includes a list of 78 dance feeds (RSS feeds). Click on this link to see how this file is formatted and then download it to your computer. Once you save this file, you can then import it into online applications that let you track blogs.

So for example, Google offers a blog reader application. Once you log-in, you can then use this application to subscribe to, track and categorize blogs. You'll see toward the top right of the reader home page a link for "Settings." And then you can click on the "Import/Export" link. Now you can upload the OPML file I liked to above. Once you upload this file, you can automatically track the 78 included dance blogs. Actually, some of the dance blogs in the list are old and haven't been updated for awhile. But it doesn't really matter because you simply won't to see any new posts from these blogs.

I'm new to the Google Reader but so far I like the interface and the way it tracks blogs.

Here's a screen shot I just took of Google Reader with the blogs listed on the left and a blog post in the middle. Click image for larger picture:

Another way to track blogs is with Ajax home pages such as NetVibes. Ajax home pages can be completely customized to track whatever information you wish. One of the things you can do is, once again, upload an OPML file such as the one above. Once you upload these dance blogs, this is what your list of blogs will look like - the list is on the left and you can click the following screen shot for a larger image:

As you'll see, my NetVibes page isn't customized at all. I'm intrigued by these Ajax pages, but I just haven't spent much time experimenting with them.

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:05 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

March 2, 2007

More Than 50 Dance Blogs

I just updated my blogroll in left column. Thanks for the suggestions of blogs to add.

It wasn't that long ago that it was difficult to find more than a handful of dance bloggers. The odds are that the dance blogosphere will continue to grow.

I still have to update the non-English dance blogs - if you have more suggestions for these blogs, please let me know.

I'm probably going to remove the MySpace links and just add the MySpace pages that include dance blogs that are updated on a regular basis.

I updated the list of dance publications. I would include links to more newspapers, but it is often difficult to link directly to dance articles. For example, there is no way to link just to the dance articles in the Washington Post.

I'm soon going to expand the "Community" links section. There are a lot of very active online communities for many different types of dance. Please share your suggestions.

These are the dance blogs I just added to my blogroll. Some of them were listed before but for some reason - maybe they stopped posting - I had removed them:

- Art's Place

- Diverse Variations

- Flailbox

- Leigh Witchel

- Oberon's Grove

- Orientål Dancer

- The Right and Kind Reverend

- The ShanMonster

- Tap Dance Made Easy

- Uncoy.com - La Vie Viennoise

- Unstable Landscape

These are the newspapers with dance coverage I just added:

- Guardian Unlimited

- New York Sun

- Times Online

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:12 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

February 19, 2007

Updating Blogroll

I'm going to add following dance blogs to my blogroll on left. Do you know of others I should add? Also I'm going to delete inactive ones.

Thanks!

- A Life Less Examined

- BellyLorna

- Friends of Brockport Dance

- Tap Dance Man

- Terpsichore Musings

- Wheelchair Dancer

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:55 AM - Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

January 22, 2007

Dance Blogger Gathering in NYC

Update: Posts about NYC blogger gathering from Tony and Tonya.

In addition to attending the APAP conference while in New York, I also got together with four other dance bloggers last night at a restaurant across the street from Lincoln Center.

It was great to finally meet fellow bloggers face-to-face after communicating online for awhile.

Since we arranged everything at the last moment, there are other bloggers who couldn’t join us - and I'm sure others we didn't contact. But we’ll have another gathering in near future – more about that below.

Here’s a picture from last night:

Left to right: Tonya, me, SalomeJustitia, Tony and Kristin

We’re thinking of having the next get-together in the East Village. So if you’re a dance blogger, planning to blog about dance or just want to join us, drop me an email and I’ll add you to a distribution list.

Posted by Doug Fox at 2:59 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

January 2, 2007

Dance Goals for 2007

Natalia of Bellydance: Experiences blog has put together an excellent "Dance Carnival" in which she invites dance bloggers to share their goals for 2007.

Participants post their goals to their own blogs and then Natalia adds links to these entries. I'll add an entry this week for my dance goals for the year.

Posted by Doug Fox at 5:00 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

December 7, 2006

Open Thread: Write About Your Dance Blog

It's been over a year since my last post that asked dance bloggers to write about their blogs.

So I thought since there are more dance bloggers and we've been talking about dance, blogging and community, it was a good time to create an updated thread where dance bloggers could write about their blogs.

If you have a dance blog (or touch upon dance topics in your blog), I encourage you to post a comment below. In your comment, please write about the focus of your blog, what topics you cover, what your connection is to dance and any other related subjects you'd like to discuss.

Thanks!!!

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:13 AM - Permalink | Comments (24) | TrackBacks (0)

December 4, 2006

Search All Dance Blogs

In my blogroll to the left, there are now 45 dance blogs listed. It's great to see a community of dance bloggers emerging.

Since there are now a good number of dance blogs, I thought I'd use the Google Co-Op search engine to create an easy way to search all 45 of these dance blogs. Give it a spin:

The search results generated are just from these dance blogs. If there are other dance blogs that I should add to the search engine or my blogroll, please let me know.

As you can tell, so far I've only listed English language blogs. I'll soon add a new section to my blogroll for non-English language blogs. I'm not sure what to do in terms of the Google search engine. Maybe I should add all blogs (English and non-English) to the Google search engine - what do you think?

Posted by Doug Fox at 5:13 AM - Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

November 26, 2006

Pilobolus Embraces Social Media Sites

In a Thanksgiving post on the Bank of America Celebrity Series Blog, I came across some video clips and pictures of dance company Pilobolus on popular social media sites.

It's nice to see that Pilobolus is using MySpace and YouTube to provide fans with additional information about themselves, but, in the case of the video clips, I think it would be helpful if they would provide some more context and background about who the dancers are and what Pilobolus is all about.

For example, Pilobolus has posted three video podcasts on YouTube - they're all informal and light-hearted, which is enjoyable, but it would also be nice to hear the dancers talk about dancing and show some movement as well - but maybe they are prohibited from videotaping each other dancing?? For viewers who don't know anything about Pilobolus, these videos really won't serve much of a purpose. (video one, video two, video three).

In their MySpace blog, they just posted some fun pictures from their Thanksgiving celebration in Belo Horizonte, Brazil where they are performing tomorrow:

Finally, you can watch a TV commercial that Pilobolus did for Hyundai Santa Fe. Whether it's in a commercial or on stage, it's always fun to watch them dance:

Posted by Doug Fox at 4:00 PM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

November 8, 2006

Introducing "Funny Uncles" Dance Blog

I'm delighted to announce the launch of the Funny Uncles blog. "Funny Uncles" is an upcoming performance of Takoma Park, Maryland-based Liz Lerman Dance Exchange.

What's great about collaborating with Dance Exchange on this project is that their approach to dance is and has always been very participatory and community oriented. (You can read my account of participating last week in their "Still Crossing" performance at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center at the University of Maryland.)

Liz Lerman is the company's founding artistic director and for thirty years Dance Exchange has been creating multi-generational programs that integrate movement, music, imagery and the spoken word. You can visit the "Who We Are" page on Dance Exchange to learn more.

I've been working with Producing Artistic Director Peter DiMuro to develop a participatory blog that provides audiences new ways to engage with this upcoming work. Peter is the artistic director for Funny Uncles and if you visit this blog you can listen to a number of audio podcasts to learn about the origins of this piece. I'd recommend that you start with this audio program. I also found it especially interesting to hear how Peter described the Dance Exchange approach to generating a movement vocabulary for each work. (You can also register for free access to the Dance Exchange Toolbox, which covers this creative process in-depth.)

Soon dancers who will be performing in Funny Uncles will also be posting to this blog. For a list of dancers, you can visit the Bios page. (This is not a complete list. I still have to add a few more names and their bios.)

There are a number of ways that we will be using this new blog and a number of ideas we plan to explore. Here's an overview:

- First, we want to provide transparent access to how Peter DiMuro and the participating dancers work together to create the choreography for the vignettes that will comprise Funny Uncles -- in other words, we want to provide access to the process of creation. If you visit the post, "Rehearsal Video 'Trio Duet Overlay' with Artistic Director's Commentary," you can see an example of the Dance Exchange approach to choreography. In the first video, you can watch the "generative" phase of movement creation with music. And in the next video, you can watch the same movement but instead of music you can now listen to Peter's audio commentary.

- Next, we want to provide future audiences with on-going opportunities to share their thoughts and feedback about this work-in-progress. As with any blog, you can post your comments at the end of each post. Plus, if you have your own blog you can use the trackback feature to notify us of posts you've written about Funny Uncles. In upcoming posts, we'll share specific questions about the types of feedback we'd appreciate receiving from blog visitors. In the end, our goal is to explore new ways that audiences can have a real say in the evolution of a dance piece.

- One of the things I'll be writing more about in Great Dance and on Funny Uncles is the software and technology we'll be using to develop the Funny Uncles blog and to produce on-going content. That way if you want to explore similar projects for your dance company, you'll have an idea about some of the tools we've used.

- As we look down the road a bit, one of the great opportunities of blogs, video-sharing sites and the emerging participatory culture of the Internet, is that everybody can be actively involved in creating and contributing content. So we will soon be uploading video interviews and stories that relate to the themes of Funny Uncles, which revolve around being an outsider and non-traditional families. We'll then be opening a video library to which you can contribute. Your video contributions could be in the form of movement, spoken word programs or a combination of the two - we'll be providing a lot more information about this topic. Also, we'll be adding a mashup component so that you can create your own video mixes of, say, video clips of the Funny Uncles' dancers with user-generated content submitted by the public.

- Finally, we want to explore the potential synergies between a more collaborative Internet (often referred to as Web 2.0) and live performances. For example, how do you go about creating a hybrid dance performance that integrates company dancers on stage with video submitted (or mashups) in an online library?

We look forward to your thoughts about this project and we encourage you to share your comments.

Posted by Doug Fox at 12:40 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

November 3, 2006

"How Do You Enjoy Dance" Continued

In October 18th post, "How do you enjoy dance?" I asked and answered questions about the types of performances I like to see and whether I prefer taking classes or being an audience member.

In a post yesterday, on Bellydance: Experiences blog, Natalia offers her answers to these questions.

Posted by Doug Fox at 10:51 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

November 2, 2006

Dance Blogs I'm Reading

I've added many new dance blogs to my blogroll in left column.

Here are some recent posts that I've enjoyed:

- "Brazilian Motion: Mauricio Campos on Capoeira" by Nancy Wozny in Dancehunter.

- “This is not your civilized self” by Gray Miller Fame or Famine.

- "A choreographer responds: No, writers aren't the enemy" from Apollinaire Scherr's Foot In Mouth.

- "Beyond the Metaphors of Mirrors" by David Hallberg in The Winger.

- "Slow Dancer: Moving In The Material World" by Robyn Campbell in Terminal City Dance Research.

- "Dancing in Mali to the Djembe" in Root.

- "NextFest 2006" (Dancing with Robots) in Raphael Pungin's Blog.

- "Le Sacre du Printemps" by Jo-Anne Green in Networked_Performance.

- "Cubano's" in Miguelito's Photo Diary.

- "Tuesday's Vals Class" by TangoSpeak in Learning The Argentine Tango.

- "Week Six - Jorge Dispari and Samantha Dispari" in La Planchadora.

- "Home Run" Brendan McCarthy in Dancerdance.

- "The Book is Finished and on the Shelves!" by Rob Kunkle in Goodlux Photography.

Posted by Doug Fox at 7:05 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

October 24, 2006

Digitizing Dance Community from the Bottom Up

Tony Schultz, a physicist studying applications in human movement analysis and a contributor to The Winger blog, has a post from last month, "The Winger is a Dance Technology," in which he writes about the impact of the online world on dance:

The democratization of space for showing and talking about dance, through the internet, is transforming the way it is seen and practiced. Communication technologies such as blogs and message boards facilitate relationships between artists and opens discussion with viewers. Free video over IP services provided by sites such as blip.tv or YouTube provide an open trading ground for anyone to share dance media with the world.

He then recounts a personal story of how he used the Internet to connect with breakdancers in Paris before traveling to France:

This experience fundamentally transformed the way I think about culture making and dancing. Finding real people dancing, not on stage but in the world, made me shift my perspective on where art comes from, where it belongs and what function it serves. Those who are compelled to create and advance these forms are often not professional dancers. They train hard and sacrifice simply because they know this work is important.

Tony's post led me to think about who will lead the charge (or who is leading the charge) in terms of motivating the dance community at-large to experiment with Internet applications and related technologies in order to enhance communications and collaborations among dancers and the public. Tony pretty much answered the question. It often will be done in an informal manner by individuals who may or may not be professional dancers. And, from my experience, those who experiment with the latest Internet developments - the early adapters - will usually not be the established dance companies, presenters and other institutions and organizations connected to the dance world.

Here's one example of a dancer who puts a number of online tools to work to share her passion for Middle Eastern dancing:

ShanMonster created a blog, Because Nudity is Only Skin-Deep, on LiveJournal. She writes in her profile:

I teach Middle Eastern and tribal fusion dance, am a tribal fusion, North American cabaret, and experimental dancer, and I also sell my self-published dance costuming books. To top it all off, I maintain canadaraqs and am a co-moderator at bellydancing.

In a post "My Drill Routine," she gives a breakdown of her exercise regimen with a link to the music she listens to on Pandora.

And, in her "Warning: Contains Dance" post, ShanMonster links to a Google video of her performing a belly dance.

There are thousands upon thousands of Internet-addicted dancers like ShanMonster who are using the Internet every day to make new connections, share their passion for dance and give the public a multimedia glimpse into their daily lives. I just think it takes time for these everyday occurrences to bubble-up to the institutional level.

Posted by Doug Fox at 9:51 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

July 31, 2006

Video Comments for Online Dance Feedback

One of the newest features added to online video sites is the ability to leave video comments. On the Grouper video service, you can watch a video and then follow-up with a video of yourself commenting on what you just watched.

I came across this story in a post in Techcrunch.

I couldn't find a good example of video comments on Grouper itself - maybe the feature is too new. But Techcrunch points to a good example on the Grouper Networks Blog that illustrates how embedded video comments works.

You'll see on the bottom left side of the video screen (image right below) that there is an image of a webcam with the number of video comments. If you click on this link, you can watch the comments.

I think that this type of embedded video comment capability would be a great tool when dancers begin to put video from their on-going rehearsals on the web - preferably in the form of blogs. Visitors to such a dance blog could watch clips of a work in progress, and then leave their video commentary. And if viewers are inspired, their video comments can be in the form of movement recommendations as well.

Posted by Doug Fox at 11:12 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

July 18, 2006

The Winger Dance Blog

Kristin Sloan is doing an excellent job expanding her dance blog, The Winger - both in terms of content and contributors.

Kristin and I Skyped last week and she gave me an update about her blog.

From the time she started her blog, Kristin made extensive use of pictures that she posted via her cell phone. To post digital snapshots with a mobile phone, you need 1) a blog, of course, 2) a cell phone that has a built-in camera and 3) an account with photo-hosting site Flickr (or another online application that will automatically send pictures to your blog.)

So, once you take pictures with your phone, you send any pictures that you want to post to your blog to a Flickr email address. Then you can configure Flickr to automatically send the picture as a post to your blog. Flickr supports most blog software programs - Kristin uses Movabletype.

Samsung just gave Kristin a video camera. So soon Kristin will be uploading video clips to her blog.

I didn't realize that The Winger also has a message board, The Winger Board, an online community where users can post their questions and thoughts about different aspects of dance.

In terms of contributors, you'll see on the left-hand navigation bar that The Winger now features a number of dance bloggers who dance with the New York City Ballet, The American Ballet Theater, Amy Mashall Dance Company and Pacific Northwest Ballet.

It would be nice to see more dancers blogging as well as adding multimedia content to their blogs. Most cell phones sold today have built-in cameras and there's really no additional cost to posting pictures to your website. And in the case of video, camcorders are fairly inexpensive and there's easy to use software to edit and upload your videos.

Posted by Doug Fox at 3:40 PM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

March 21, 2006

1,000 Dance Bloggers in 2006

I think it would be great if more dancers, choreographers, dance companies, educators and others involved in dance would create blogs and start participating in the growing dance blogosphere.

It's not difficult to create a blog and the benefits make it more than worthwhile.

If dance companies or dancers create blogs that talk about their work in engaging, accessible ways, I'm certain that every dance blogger will support and promote their efforts. As things stand now, there are very, very few dance blogs from established dancers and dance companies that write about their work in a direct, meaningful way for their online audiences.

All I'm really saying you need to do is write short blog posts as if you are having a conversation with somebody about on-going projects or upcoming performances. Add some good pictures to the mix and you'll be on your way to creating engaging blogs. You simply want to stay away from adding boring boiler-plate marketing copy or using tedious press releases. Just write in your own voice and let dance enthusiasts know what you're up to and thinking.

And the best part is you can start a blog for no money - it's free!

To get started:

Visit TypePad or Blogger to create a free blog. Just answer the questions and check off boxes to create your blog's basic design and structure. Here's a screen shot from TypePad where you pick the layout of your pages - as you can tell (click on image for larger view), you click on a circle next to the layout you like and move on to the next section.

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Creating a Blog in TypePad

Blogger is just as straightforward. Here's a screen shot of the Blogger home page - you follow a few steps and your blog is ready to go live:

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Blogger Home Page

Once your blog is up, you can then add pictures, videos and audio messages. Both TypePad and Blogger have tools for adding pictures. Or you can upload your pictures to services such as Flickr. If you have dance videos, you can post them to YouTube, Google or other services. To add audio messages and podcasts, go to Odeo.

All of the above services are free. Some of these services do have professional level offerings for which you have to pay. But you can get started now and it doesn't cost anything. You can have a blog, pictures, videos and audio messages all without a grant, funding, donations, sponsors, writing lengthy applications, getting on your knees and begging for money, without having to consult a board of directors and without extracting a cent from your bank account.

OK - I'm going over the deep end today with my hype. But it's not really hype if something does not cost you any money and you can instantly reach out to a supportive community of dance bloggers (and a world-wide audience of Internet users) who will help promote and talk about your upcoming performances. Is it??

Posted by Doug Fox at 3:44 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 20, 2006

Making the Web Dance Friendly

I would like to work with others in the dance community to improve both the way we use the web and benefit from the web.

I'd like to start by encouraging dance bloggers to experiment with a service called Rojo.

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Screen Shot of Rojo
Dance Blogs Listed on Left
Most Recent Posts in Middle

Rojo is what is called a blog feed aggregator. Instead of visiting every blog you want to read, you can track all of the blogs you like in a single web-based application.

If you visit the Great Dance Blog's home page, you'll notice in the right-hand column that I've listed over 20+ dance blogs. One of the buttons for each blog reads, "Rojo." By clicking on this icon, you can automatically subscribe to the selected feed. You do first have to sign-up for a free account, which you'll be invited to do once you click on an icon.

But you can actually save time. Once you finish the sign-up process for an account, add me to your "Contacts." (I'm "dougfox" or "doug@greatdance.com"). Then, you can automatically subscribe to the same dance feeds I subscribe too - both dance and others. I would recommend against signing-up for all my feeds during the initial sign-up process. If you do this, you may end-up with a lot of feeds that you don't want.

In addition to subscribing to blog feeds with Rojo, you can also categorize and rate blog posts so that others can quickly learn what is interesting.

To categorize a blog post, you "tag" it. Tagging means that you add keywords that help you organize posts that you want to save for later reference. Tagging is very helpful because you can go back to Rojo at any time and quickly pull-up all posts that you have tagged, say, "dancevideo." And very importantly, every time you tag a post, you make it easier for other people to find stories that are of interest to them.

To rate a post, you simply click on the "Mojo" button to the right of every post. So when you are reviewing posts, you can see at a glance which ones have the most mojo - the most votes in other words.

But one of the best features is the ability to access the blog feeds, tags and favorites of other Rojo users. As I mentioned above, you can automatically access all of the dance feeds that I subscribe to by adding me to your contacts.

So even though I think that Rojo has some weaknesses - the main one is that the interface and navigation tools could be improved to some extent - I think that Rojo's combination of features can be a good first step in improving how dance bloggers and dancers in general use the Web.

For instance, if all dance bloggers and say hundreds of dancers signed-up for Rojo, then there would be a great community of dancers who would be contributing to evaluating, organizing and sharing dance resources. Plus a very likely outcome would be that many more dancers would be encouraged to create their own blogs. When I say dancers, I mean everybody involved in dance: professional dancers, students, choreographers, dance companies, educators, writers/critics, new media artists, technologists and others.

Rojo is one of the many web-based applications that are part of what is called the Web 2.0. The Web 2.0 usually refers to social networking services that enable groups of users to upload/save, share, categorize, collaborate, communicate and rate items with each other.

By starting with a service such as Rojo, we are categorizing just one type of content in the dance world - that is dance blogs and postings. But there are many other types of content that can be organized such as pictures, websites, and video. And there are many Web 2.0 applications for these types of content as well. I've been using Flickr for pictures, YouTube for videos and Del.icio.us for bookmarking websites. In terms of the categorization of dance content, I'd say Flickr is the farthest along.

Posted by Doug Fox at 4:36 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Video Introduction to Contact Improvisation

Here's a 2003 video clip, "Contact Improvisation with Karl Frost," directed by David Olivari. His david-o.net blog (French) covers his multimedia dance work.

This clip features an interview with dance instructor Karl Frost about contact improvisation interspersed with video from a class he teaches. It's a perfect way to get introduced to this form of dance:

Here are David's photo sets from Flickr. You'll notice that there are a number of sets that cover dance and especially contact improvisation.

Posted by Doug Fox at 11:57 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

January 9, 2006

More Dance Bloggers

A number of dance bloggers and dance writers have added descriptions about their dance coverage and links to their blogs and sites this year on the Open Thread: Dance and Blogging.

Posted by Doug Fox at 8:28 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

December 1, 2005

A Paucity of Dance Blogs

I'd like to know why certain art forms attract a lot of bloggers and others don't.

I went to Technorati, a site that tracks over 22 million blogs, to find out how many blogs there were for different art forms. (When you get to Technorati, click on link for "Blog Finder" and search for keywords such as "dance".)

Here are the numbers for blogs by art category:

6,054 - music
1,445 - photography
1,007 - art
132 - illustration
111 - painting
89 - theatre
88 - dance
67 - drama
52 - theater
47 - opera
35 - classical music
20 - drawing
10 - plays

Technorati is not comprehensive and bloggers categorize their own blogs, but I think the above numbers still shed light on how blogs are used in the art world.

The conclusion I reach from the above numbers is that performing art blogs are almost non-existent.

Even the 47 blogs listed under "opera" are misleading because most people who classify their blogs as "opera" related are referring to the Opera web browser and not opera music or productions. There is not a single blog from an opera company or an opera singer (professional or amateur). The number of classical music blogs is very small, but you will find blogs by composers and musicians. (I'm ignoring the massive "music" (6,054 blogs) category here because this term is so general and if these bloggers were covering music as a performance art, they would have probably tagged their blogs with a more specific term such as classical music, opera, etc.)

In theater or theatre, I didn't find any theater companies that have blogs. I did find one blog I liked "AnActorsJourney" by Trevor Kimball. Trevor writes about his auditions and acting and provides helpful insights about how the acting world works. I like this type of blog that stays focused on its topic and provides a good balance between personal stories and educational guidance.

Among dance blogs, there is not a single dance company that has a blog - although there are individual dancers, teachers and critics who have blogs. Some of the 88 dance blogs are related to dance music and not really to dance itself.

If you compare the numbers for performing arts blogs to visual arts blogs, you'll notice a huge disparity. There are significantly more visual arts blogs. Leaving Technorati for a moment, in the Greater DC area, for example, there are many visual artist blogs, but not a single dancer or dance company has a blog.

So why are there so few dance, theater and music (classic, opera and related) blogs? Why is a painter more likely than a dancer to create a blog? Why is an illustrator more likely to create a blog than a stage actor? Because dancers and stage actors are smarter and don't want to waste their time with this medium?? :)

Nope. The real reason is two-fold:

1) Visual artists (and musicians who play popular music) are more entrepreneurial than performance artists

2) Visual artists (and musicians who play popular music) are into reproduction and performance artists are not

If you think about painters and sculptures, you think about artists who have always had to sell their work directly to their patrons and/or end consumers. If you think about members of a band, you think about musicicians who have to promote themselves to get gigs. On the other hand, dancers and actors go to auditions where their work is judged by casting directors. Once a dancer/actor is in a performance, he or she does not then play any part in ensuring that money is coming in.

So what happens is that visual artists apply their more entrepreneurially mindset to the Internet and blogs while performing artists don't.

Then the second issue has to do with reproducing artwork. Visual artists are very accustomed to making and selling multiple copies of a single artwork. Stage performers, however, are very very reluctant to reproduce their performances in any medium. So for a painter, making digital reproductions of their art for online distribution and sale is no big deal. But dancers and actors are terrified if somebody brings a camera or video camera to a performance.

I'm not making light of the concern that performance groups have of illegal copies being made of their performances. But I believe that the historical distaste that performance groups have for allowing their works to be filmed is posing a problem as the Internet and blogs play a more important role in all aspects of our economy.

Overall, these two issues - entrepreneurship and reproduction - should be addressed both individually and collectively by dancers and the dance community. As the Internet grows as a distribution and revenue-generating medium for all forms of art, it is important that dancers do not lose out on these emerging opportunities.

Posted by Doug Fox at 7:00 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

November 16, 2005

Open Thread: Dance and Blogging

This is open thread for feedback on the topic of blogging in the dance world.

If you have a blog related to dance, please add a comment or trackback describing your blog and, possibly, your upcoming plans for your blog.

If you don't have dance blog, please feel free to add your comments and trackbacks about the best way that blogs can be used in the dance world.

I review comments and trackbacks before posting - I usually do this pretty quickly.

Thanks and I look forward to your comments.

Posted by Doug Fox at 4:23 PM - Permalink | Comments (19) | TrackBacks (1)

Continuing the Conversation about the Dance Blogosphere

Leigh Witchel offers his thoughts about my white paper, "Embracing Blogs: A New Blueprint for Promoting Dance on the Internet."

A blog may be inexpensive but it is labor-intensive. The things Doug mentions - cultivation of a voice and consistency especially – are not to be taken lightly. Writing is a skill. It takes me a good hour to do a decent blog entry.

As Leigh points out writing a blog can be time-consuming - I often spend more time than I realize writing and editing a single blog entry. In my white paper I did not explicitly deal with topic of how much effort would have to be spent by a dancer or dance company to update their blogs. My guess and hope is that over time, a number of dance companies will turn to blogs as one of their primary marketing/communication mediums for reaching their audiences (dance audiences, sponsors, press and others). And, in the process, less time and resources will be spent on other, more traditional forms of communication such as creating direct mailing pieces and writing press releases. Since blogs, as I explain in my white paper, offer a better way to communicate and interact with audiences, the extra time spent sustaining quality blogs will be justifiable.

Yes, writing is a skill, but at the same time, successful blogs can be written and presented in many different ways by people who share their stories and insights in different manners. A photoblog, for example, that consists of pictures from performances or rehearsals with brief text annotations may prove to be very engaging.

Good blogging isn’t just a diary or an advertisement. It’s the careful cultivation of a public persona...My suggestion would be that if you enter into the blogosphere because you want to contribute to the discussion, you will do something of value. If you enter it to promote your dance concert people will, and should, smell it a mile off.

The issue of how dancers and dance companies use their blogs is critical. I agree 100% with Leigh that anybody who is serious about building a successful blog should carefully consider the "public persona" they wish to create. It will take time and energy. Using the example of promoting an upcoming performance, the question is how does a dance company write about it in their blog? I think the goal is to provide value to readers. Maybe you educate them, maybe you discuss the intentions of the choreographer or maybe you seek feedback and suggestions. But you definitely don't post a blatant promo piece and leave it at that - although you should highlight upcoming performances that is the goal in the end. For the most part, I avoid blogs that just list upcoming classes and performances - to me the people/organizations publishing this marketing material are using blogs, but they are not blogging in any meaningful manner.

Amateur voices in the blogosphere are essential. The blogosphere thrives on having a large number of voices. I’d also like to self-interestedly say something for recognizing the value of the pros...

...One reason I love writing for Danceview Times is that it adds the value of new media (immediacy, access and SPACE!) while preserving a level of quality associated with print. But there's plenty of dross on the Internet because of the low barrier to startup. I started writing because I thought too many people were looking at the dancers and too few at the dance. I find it disheartening when I see "You too can be a critic" articles. Writing on dance isn’t about voicing your opinions – I mean, who really cares what I think of Christopher Wheeldon or Ashley Bouder? I love her and you loathe her and that’s that. Why do I love her and what can I show you about her? Can I show you a different way of looking at a blackbird? The dance writers I admire are champions of an aesthetic. I skip the ones who write a self-centered and self-aggrandizing litany of opinions.

I want to stress that I'm not questioning the value of professional dance critics. The purpose of my white paper and recent blog post is to explore how the audience for dance can be expanded. One of my answers is that by having more bloggers writing about dance online, both professionals and amateurs, more people will learn about and experience dance for themselves. Clearly some blogs will be horrendous and others will be wonderful; some blogs will cover topics that may seem trivial to experienced dance-goers and others will feature posts that provide more "meaningful" commentary. In the end, I think it's all good if it grabs the attention of dance newcomers and helps dance companies be more successful.

I hope that Rachel, Doug and I aren't setting up an echo chamber of links and trackbacks. Rachel Howard wrote hopefully yesterday about the blossoming of the dance blogosphere. I think we need a few more people to join in before we can savor the bloom on the rose - so make a comment or post your own entry!

As things stand now the small number of dance bloggers does represent a type of echo chamber. But I think it is important that we are starting to build upon, react to and critique each other's ideas, and learn from each other in the process. More and more people within the dance world will visit our blogs and will see the comments and trackbacks - they'll see that we are in the early stages of building a dance-focused blogosphere. So the existence of our interactions are bound to give others ideas of how they can contribute and create their own vehicles for growing the conversation about dance.

Posted by Doug Fox at 9:53 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

October 21, 2005

New Blog for Dance and Art in NYC

Rachel Feinerman of Downtown Dancer points to new blog by Tom Pearson, NY Dance Journal.

Posted by Doug Fox at 7:48 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

October 18, 2005

The Expanding Dance Blogosphere

Leigh Witchel writes:

In a tangential remark in the comments on the dance blogosphere and its comparative quiet, Rachel of downtowndancer mentions something I’ve been thinking about for a while. Compared to other special interest blogging, dance blogging is relatively rare and at times, barely blogging.

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Some of this could be because of the strength of the dance discussion boards and news sites. Dance blogs will have to find the niche not filled by places like Ballet Talk, DanceView Times, Ballet.co, Critical Dance or Dance Insider. One thing blogs could be is a bridge between dance communities. Few of the sites above are collegial with one another, unfortunately often for justifiable reasons.

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I’m with Rachel in hoping that the dance blogosphere starts getting the critical mass in conversation to get some real discussions going.

I hope so too!!

Posted by Doug Fox at 5:28 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

October 11, 2005

Photo Blogging with Kristin Sloan of NYC Ballet

Kristin Sloan, a member of the New York City Ballet, maintains a picture blog of her dancing and travels. Using her Sony Ericsson S710a, Kristen takes shots of dancers, rehearsals, venues and more.

Kristin's caption for above picture - June 20, 2005: "The fairies in "A Midsummer Nights Dream" all wear super-long fake braids that get attached to our normal hair-do's. The ends then get safety-pinned to our costumes, so the heavy whip-like things don't take us out when we do a big jump or turn. It must have been pretty painful before that cool little trick was implemented."

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:25 AM - Permalink | Comments (0)

Jon Morris and Daniel Burkholder at JOM Anniversary Dance

I saw Joy of Motion's 29th Anniversary Concert Sunday night. It was excellent. Jonathan Morris performed improvised electric guitar piece with dancer Daniel Burkholder.

Jon posted this to his blog following performance - they rocked the house:

More Duo Shows with Daniel Burkholder

This past weekend, Daniel and I performed our short duo improvisation as part of Joy of Motion’s 29th Anniversary Concert. This was the first time we’ve done it since I bought a wireless system for the guitar. Now I have no excuse for staying in the corner of the stage while Daniel is dancing all over the place… scary.

From what I can tell, we kinda rocked the house. Now that I’m moving around on stage, I can’t always see what Daniel’s doing, so I don’t really have a clear sense of what the performance looked like to the audience, but it felt good, and we got lots of positive feedback. Read entire post...

These dance companies also performed:

CrossCurrents Dance Company, Dana Tai Soon Burgess & Company, Silk Road Dance Company, Daniel Burkholder/The Playground, Artemis, Expansion Dance Project, Edgeworks Dance Theatre, Furia Flamenca, Tappening, Tommy Parlon Dance Projects, and Joy of Motion Youth Dance Ensemble (Senior Company).

Posted by Doug Fox at 6:02 AM - Permalink | Comments (0)

September 23, 2005

The Wandering Salsero

Art Williams of the WanderingSalsero blog keeps busy experimenting with digital video and pictures. Go take a look.

Posted by Doug Fox at 11:40 AM - Permalink | Comments (0)