January 24, 2008Why Don't Site-Specific Performers Embrace Flash Mobs?I've been curious for awhile about why I've never seen a hybrid event that was part site-specific performance and part flash mob. It always seemed a good, fun way to not just build an audience but also to get people involved in a Web 2.0-ish, participatory manner. The end result would incorporate a dance flash mob such as this one that took place at the Tate Modern last October. The idea of a Flash mob is very simple. A group of people, usually organized via the Internet, agree to get together at a specific location at a designated time and do something. In the case of a dance flash mob, people obviously dance. But what would happen if there was a performance component during a flash mob? Here's aerial dancing, choreographed by Noemie Lafrance, with Frank Gehry Architecture: Upcoming Flash Dance Mob in Boston Banditos Misteriosos is hosting a dance flash mob on February 23rd called the "Boston Silent Dance Experiment!" Before the event, everyone is invited to download an MP3 track for their music player that includes music as well as instructions. So audiences who don't know what they are witnessing, will see a group of people moving as well as carrying out highly synchronized group exercises without any apparent direction. There's a Facebook page for this upcoming flash mob. Banditos Misteriosos link to a similar use of MP3 audio recordings for flash mobs that was hosted last summer by Improv Everywhere in Battery Park in Manhattan. Here's a video of this performance that shows you how it worked: Overall, I think there are two particularly interesting elements of such a hybrid event. First, flash mobs simply work from a marketing perspective. They are fun and people like to participate. Second, there are many different approaches that dancers and dance companies can take to teaching their choreography to audiences both online and in-person. So you could end-up with a large flash mob doing your moves! In April 2006, I wrote about the same topic in "Crossing Flash Mobs and Site-Specific Performances." Posted by Doug Fox at 6:11 AM - Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBacks (0) November 15, 2007New Great Dance Blog Devoted to Reviews of Dance in NYC Now in BetaYesterday, I wrote about an upcoming blog on Great Dance that would include excerpts of reviews of dance performances in New York City. You can visit this new blog, which is in beta, and you can submit dance reviews by filling-out this form. I'm saying it's in beta because there are a number of things that still have to be figured out. One of them is how performances, festivals, film showings, installations, site-specific works and other types of dance will be categorized. If you visit this new blog and scroll down the page a bit, you'll see the "Categories" section in the right-hand column. I'm going to keep adjusting these categories over the next couple of weeks - if you have thoughts about what makes the most sense, please share your thoughts. Also, I want to come-up with a title and sub-title for this blog that makes it clear that readers can find reviews for all types of dance in NYC not just concert performances. But I definitely encourage writers to submit their reviews now. The blog is fully functional and I'll be linking to it from the Great Dance home page. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:14 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) September 24, 2007Ballet Nouveau Colorado "Launches 21st Century Choreography Competition"Ballet Nouveau Colorado (BNC) launched the 21st Century Choreography Competition at the beginning of September. 
This competition consists of contemporary ballet choreographers submitting a sample of their work to YouTube - here's the BNC channel - viewers then have an opportunity to vote for their favorite works, 3 finalists are selected to create their work for BNC during residencies next year with the company, a behind-the-scenes making of a dance video and blog are produced, and performances take place of the 3 works with panelists of guest judges selecting their favorites. In essence, Ballet Nouveau Colorado is embracing popular formats from reality-based TV shows, popular TV dance programs and web-based participatory contests. The Denver Post has an article about this new competition, "Ballet Nouveau will let viewers vote" [via ArtsJournal] in which John Wenzel writes that this competition is a ...YouTube-driven, "American Idol"-style contest that has the potential to make modern dance relevant to vast new audiences...it's about making dance appealing to the Web 2.0 generation. Wenzel quotes Dawn Fay, the BNC's new associate artistic director: We definitely think of this as a national program, because it's on YouTube and the entire population can log in...You can vote and have some real input. Why not become as intrigued by dance as you are by Paris Hilton videos? And Executive Director Lissy Garrison is quoted as well: We want to change the way the world feels about ballet and keep it alive in the 21st century. On Second Thought... I've written extensively about the emerging participatory culture of the Internet, the benefits of giving viewers an opportunity to cast their votes and have a real voice, and other such praise for the wonders of empowering the masses. Well, on second thought, I went somewhat overboard in my enthusiasm for the collaborative, interactive, level-the-playing-field possibilities of the digital realm. Realistically, how on earth can I play a worthwhile role in helping select which choreographers have the best work? Bring originality and talent to their creations? And I've seen contemporary ballet. But now we have a competition from BNC where the goal is to reach new audiences for contemporary ballet and all of a sudden these new fans with no knowledge of concert dance are going to start voting for their favorite choreographers? They're going to start playing an important role in the curatorial process? This does not make sense. On top of that, the quality of the videos uploaded to YouTube - there are 3 currently - aren't very good. Why not at least use a service like Blip.tv where you can upload higher quality videos that you can actually enjoy watching? But most important, if the goal is to spread the wonders of ballet to new audiences, isn't some education needed? Shouldn't the BNC website provide some context and insight about the nature of contemporary ballet? How should one react to it? How should new viewers think about performances? Music? Dancers? and Structure? The idea here seems to be to make ballet relevant to "web 2.0" audiences by using the tools of the trade (e.g., voting, posting videos, MySpace pages) instead of asking some fundamental questions about the art itself and how new audiences might experience it. I'm not writing-off such a participatory program. But I don't believe that you can just embrace the YouTube/reality-TV formats and instantly bring great art to wider audiences. It just doesn't work that way. Posted by Doug Fox at 8:13 AM - Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0) September 10, 2007Cultivating a Visceral Connection to Troika Ranch's "Loop Diver"I've been following Mark Coniglio and Dawn Stoppiello's MySpace blog for their new work under development "Loop Diver." Troika Ranch is now at the beginning of a two-year exploration of loops - the repetitions that are imposed on us on a daily basis both from external and internal sources. 
So far I've been focused on understanding the technology (my earlier post) - specifically how Mark has been using his Isadora software program to impose arbitrary repeating patterns on the improvised movement generated by Dawn and the dancers. But after seeing last night's performance of "Loop Diver" at 3LD Art & Technology Center in Lower Manhattan, I'm now thinking more about the exhausting experience of the dancers learning highly repetitive, challenging patterns from a computer that doesn't appreciate how humans actually move. And even more I'm thinking about the more general themes of the work separate from the software programs that were used to shape the movement. What I didn't really think about too much while reading the "Loop Diver" blog is that this work focuses on basic issues of how we get trapped or find solace in a wide-range of repetitive patterns that may be psychological or physical in nature. And how we then go about breaking out of the harmful ruts we're stuck in, if we're able to. In terms of the dance performance, the software imposed the repeating patterns on the dancers. Here's an example of a shifting loop pattern in a video that Mark made during rehearsals: In the above video the dancers are slowly removing their shirts. But the pattern is continually repeating itself except that the repetitions start at a point shortly after the beginning point of the previous repetition - thus a shifting loop. And then the individual dancers had to be their own "loop divers" and find a way to escape from the mind-numbing repetitions in which they were trapped. Actually, during the performance, I couldn't really tell when dancers were able to break-out of their forced loops or if that was what they were doing. What strikes me is how universal the themes of physical and emotionally-imposed repeating patterns can be . Which leads me to wonder why a performance that deals with these issues did not attract a larger crowd last night. There were about 12 or so audience members. Mark and Dawn are in the beginning stages of this project and the real premiere is not until next year. So in part, they're happy to get the feedback. But at the same time, it seems strange to me that so few people would come to a performance that even got a good-sized blurb in the dance listings section of last Friday's New York Times. The audiences will probably grow over time. But I am curious what would happen if the blog for "Loop Diver" took a different approach, a non-technical one, that was more likely to connect with larger audiences. Why not start by asking some basic questions tied to the themes of this work and ask readers to comment by name or anonymously. For example, - What are the repeating patterns you find yourself in on a daily or weekly basis? - How did you end-up in these patterns? - Are these patterns painful and prison-like and/or do they give you comfort? - How have you broken out of repeating patterns in the past? How have you failed to break out of patterns in the past? Where I'm going with these questions is to find a way for people to find an emotional gateway into "Loop Diver." How can they connect their own personal experiences with the movement, text, sound track and visuals of the performance? I didn't come to this performance with such a mind-set, but it might have been a significantly different experience for me if I had. I did enjoy the performance, but more on an analytical level than a visceral one. Obviously, Mark, Dawn and the dancers may not be interested in pursuing my suggestion. But I'd personally find it interesting as a different way to relate to the stream of repetitions, the arbitrary impositions of the software and the efforts to extract oneself from the loops. Posted by Doug Fox at 11:30 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) September 9, 2007Last Two Days of Dancenow/NYCThe Dancenow/NYC festival is wrapping-up today and tomorrow. I went on Wednesday night and was treated to performances by: • Battleworks | Robert Battle I thoroughly enjoyed the evening, although it's overwhelming for me to process so many performances at one sitting. Danciti has review of Wednesday night performance. And New York Times has review of Tuesday's opening night performances. I'm also going to go this afternoon and see: • ad hoc Ballet | Deborah Lohse Posted by Doug Fox at 8:14 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) September 8, 2007Eva Yaa Asantewaa Review of Last Night's This Woman's Work: Part 3I went to a very enjoyable performance last night of This Woman's Work at Harlem Stage at Aaron Davis Hall at City College. Eva Yaa Asantewaa wrote a review this morning. I've been working with Eva on the Great Dance Podcast interviews she's been doing with local dance-makers. There's another performance tonight. Here's map: View Larger Map Posted by Doug Fox at 2:31 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) September 5, 2007Dance Performances, Classes and More in NYCI guess it goes without saying that there's a lot of dance happening in New York City. Last night I went to an Argentine tango class at Sandra Cameron Dance Studio - I had never heard of this studio before. I just wanted to take a class and they had intro. to Argentine Tango. I forgot how much I like this dance form. There were three guys and about eight women in the class - very lopsided for social dancing, but I got to dance non-stop. The instructor Karina Romero is also general director of New Generation Dance Company and she was promoting their November 24th performance at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center. Here's Google map of the location of this dance studio in SoHo (the blue marker) - actually, I'm plotting all the places I'm going on this map, so you can click this link to see all locations I mention below and on an on-going basis. View Larger Map I always like introductory classes with the repetition and the focus on the fundamentals. And I'm happy practicing endlessly brushing my feet forwards and backwards and left to right in a tango class. Amanda Abrams has a post, "Dance for Non-Dancers," in which she talks about the need for dance classes, in the performing arts world, that focus on helping students to move and don't intimidate students by requiring that they learn complicated routines. That's the type of movement and improvisation classes I'd like to find in NYC and I'm currently exploring this. Amanda also writes that guys in particular "don't seem to enjoy all the small details that go into a technique class and all the things they have to keep in mind." By the small number of guys in ballet, modern and jazz dance classes, maybe that's the case. But personally, I like the details and the repetition as I just mentioned. I wrote this post earlier this year "In Search of Really Boring Ballet Classes." The problem from a dance studio perspective is that most students would get bored out of their minds if they don't progress quickly on to new movements and exercises and probably wouldn't come back to class. Dance Performances I'm already lining-up a number of dance performances to see in NYC. Tonight and Sunday I'm going to the dancenowNYC festival at Dance Theater Workshop. (DTW just re-launched their website. Danciti likes it: "WAY better than their old site and totally clean." By the way, there's only one video on DTW home page. I like clear, simple, appealing look and it is much improved over previous site. But I have trouble reading white text against the different light colored backgrounds).
This Friday I'm going to see This Woman's Work at Aaron Davis Hall/The City College of New York. Last year I did audio interviews with Princess Mhoon Cooper and Ursula Payne about this project before a performance of theirs at Howard University, which I didn't manage to make - so it will be good to see them now. Plus this weekend, you can see work by Makeda Thomas, whose dance blog I wrote about yesterday.
And then next Tuesday, I'm going to see Martha Graham Dance Company at the Joyce Theater. 
Posted by Doug Fox at 8:54 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) August 17, 2007Live PBS Broadcast of Mark Morris' "Mozart Dances" is a TV Viewing NightmareLast night's live TV broadcast on PBS from Lincoln Center of Mark Morris' "Mozart Dances" featured more cut-off body parts than a meat packing plant. I was so annoyed by how this performance was produced for home viewing that I was never able to get around to enjoying the dancing. From the opening seconds, the camera views, zooming, panning and cuts were disjointed, awkward and bothersome. Mark Morris may have been too prescient when he wrote via email to dance writer Apollinaire Scherr prior to this broadcast: ...with the cuts from camera to camera breaking up the flow of choreography, TV can "drain dance of tension, gravity and dynamics..." TV does not by definition have to sap dance of all its energy, but in this case the production unfortunately accomplished this result. For starters, there was no establishing shot to set the scene. There were also way too many close-ups of heads, torsos and small gestures. There were even 3/4 body shots which makes no sense at all when it comes to dance. Most of the 3/4 shots were from head to knees. But one of the 3/4 shots, I believe, was actually from toes to neck--pretty amusing to see headless dancers. What happened was that a switch was made to a camera that was about to zoom-out but the camera change was made too early and the shot ended-up being of the headless dancers. Did anybody else see this? But when it comes to cutting-off body parts, I am dumbfounded. How is it possible for Lincoln Center to broadcast a dance program where legs, arms and entire sides of bodies are not in the frame? Was I watching a wide-screen broadcast on a regular TV? And how can a TV broadcast of a dance program be made where there is no basic appreciation for the most basic elements of dance: movement through space, development of choreography over time, perception of depth, and overall use of the performance area? This is just dance filming 101. A video camera cannot constantly pan at the same rate that a dancer or dancers move across the stage. The dancer will be centered in the frame and you can't get a feel for movement in space. There were so many jumps from one camera to the next that it was impossible to get a sense for what was happening. I felt that I was just watching a disconnected series of movement phrases by different sets of dancers who happened to be on the stage at the same time. Even worse, much worse, is that the producers felt this uncontrollable urge to cut back and forth to the the piano soloists Emanuel Ax and Yoko Nozaki. I realize that is a Mostly Mozart Festival with world-famous musicians but does this really justify taking the camera off of the dancers while a performance was in progress? Personally, I think it's a terrible mistake. Then there were problems with the camera angles and timing. Often for a fraction of a long second before dancers came in from the wings a switch would be made to the orchestra-level camera on the same side of the stage where the dancers were about to enter (for example, camera audience right filming entrance from stage left). In addition to switching too early to these side cameras, this is a very ineffective way to video entering dancers - the image is flat and the entrances end-up being too separate from the rest of the dance. Why not use a center camera or a camera on the far side so you have a diagonal shot of entrances and then can zoom out to capture the choreography developing on stage? Overall, my guess is that the producers were too preoccupied with the idea of controlling and mapping out the viewing experience for an audience not experienced with dance. And, in the process, they removed everything that had anything to do with dance. Also in Apollinaire's article, she quotes the director of PBS' "Live From Lincoln Center" series. Kirk Browning makes what I think is an overstated case for the need for lots of close-ups and cuts: ...the viewer will go to sleep if you don't give him something specific. The camera has to deal in specifics and continually break up the space...The camera needs to direct our gaze. The odd thing is that Browning's instincts are to "stick a camera out front and let it roll." Leaning toward this simpler production approach would have been a big improvement. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:18 AM - Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBacks (0) July 13, 2007Video of Opening Night of "Slow Dancing" at Lincoln CenterHere's video of opening minutes of "Slow Dancing" exhibit at Lincoln Center last night. My hand was very shaky as you'll see. The background music and noise was from an outdoor event that wasn't related to this exhibit. Video in Microsoft Windows Media format - 15 MB. Tonya sent this photo to her blog from her cell phone during opening seconds:  Posted by Doug Fox at 9:43 AM - Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0) July 11, 2007Multimedia Preview of Japan Society's Fall Performing Arts SeasonWe just posted audio interview with Yoko Shioya, artistic director, Japan Society, and multimedia preview of their upcoming Fall performing arts season. Posted by Doug Fox at 2:11 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) June 22, 2007Contradiction Dance This Weekend in DCI'm going to see Contradiction Dance this weekend. Kelly Mayfield is the founder and artistic director of this new Washington, DC-based dance company (2006). Among the dancers is dance blogger Boris Willis who shot this video of dancers hanging out after a long rehearsal. The performance is at The Jack Guidone Theater at Joy of Motion. The studio in above video I know very well. They are at Liz Lerman Dance Exchange where I'll be participating in their week-long institute "Generating and Crafting Dances." Posted by Doug Fox at 8:22 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) June 15, 2007Dance Benefit Concert for deeAnn Nelson at DTW in NYCDANCE/ BENEFIT CONCERT On May 20th, 2007, Tisch MFA Graduate in Dance deeAnn Nelson suffered a tragic fall in a performance and fractured her spine. She has since come through surgery with flying colors, and a full recovery is expected, though the rehabilitation is going to be long and arduous. And the dance community has turned out in droves asking: "How can I help?" What better way than through a dance concert to bring us together? An evening of Established and Emerging Artists coming out to help raise funds for an amazing performer. "Dances for deeAnn: A Benefit for a Broken Back." Monday July 2nd, 7:30pm FEATURING BRILLIANT WORK BY: Gus Solomons Raffle Prizes! Visit http://www.deeAnnNelson.com for further info and updates. DTW graciously donated the Theater for the performance. Posted by Doug Fox at 11:51 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0) June 4, 2007Martha Graham Goes Where Google Maps Won'tThe Martha Graham Dance Company performed outside on Wall Street last Friday afternoon. You can read a story and watch a clip from this performance on NY1. (Here's link to event information.)  Martha Graham explores the American Frontier in Appalachian Spring - Encyclopedia Britannica. I was curious what the view from Wall Street and Broad Street, where the performance took place, looked like from Google's street-level maps. But Google must have been told that parts of downtown are off limits. I couldn't get past a barrier on Pine and Nassau.  Posted by Doug Fox at 7:34 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) May 30, 2007Step Afrika Opens Tonight at Atlas in Washington, DC.Washington, DC-based Step Afrika opens tonight at Atlas Performing Arts Center.  Tickets and info here for performances through June 3rd.. Tonight, "one-night only appearance by Grammy award winning ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock." Step Afrika: Step Afrika celebrates stepping, an art form born at African American fraternities and based in African traditions. As the first professional company dedicated to stepping, Step Afrika’s intricate kicks, stomps and rhythms mixed with spoken word pound the floor and fill the air. Posted by Doug Fox at 6:38 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) May 29, 2007Suzanne Farrell at Kennedy Center Next WeekThe Suzanne Farrell Ballet will be performing at the Kennedy Center on June 6-10th. (Ballet company website and program/ticket details). The company will perform two mixed repertory programs: Program A (Wed., June 6, Thu., June 7, & Sat., June 9 at 7:30 p.m.; Sun., June 10 at 1:30 p.m.): In preparation for both performances, I've been giving myself a crash course on Balanchine and Farrell. Over the weekend, I rented two wonderful and moving DVDs from NetFlix. (The links below are for Amazon.com): - A documentary about Balanchine (1984).  - A documentary about Suzanne Farrell - Elusive Muse (1990).  As you'll see from the comments on Amazon, reviewers mostly had nothing but high praise for both of these documentaries. Over the next week, I'm going to try to read: - Suzanne Farrell's "Holding on to the Air: An Autobiography," and - "George Balanchine: The Ballet Maker" by Robert Gottlieb. Here's a video interview with author Gottlieb about his Balanchine book from the Charlie Rose show - go to the 19:35 minute mark in video to watch: Posted by Doug Fox at 6:56 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) May 25, 2007David Michalek Video Interview about "Slow Dancing" at Lincoln CenterIn "Jaw-Dropping "Slow Dancing" Videos by David Michalek," I wrote about Guggenheim Museum "Works & Process" program featuring discussion of upcoming hi-def videos of dancers that will be projected on to the facade of New York State Theater at Lincoln Center starting July 10th.  Now you can watch video interview with photographer David Michalek and learn about this upcoming program at Lincoln Center. [via DCDanceBlog and Danciti] Posted by Doug Fox at 9:38 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0) May 21, 2007A Whirlwind of Performances and Upcoming VideosLots of dance this past week in Washington, DC. - Friday night I saw a performance by contemporary ballet company Dance Smith at Atlas. And on Saturday afternoon, I did a video interview with Artistic Director Natalie Moffett Smith. I'll try to edit and upload video within the next couple of days. - Saturday night I saw Tappers with Attitude Youth Ensemble at Dance Place. - Sunday morning - back at Dance Place - I saw performance of "Acts of Faith" from Deborah Riley Dance Projects, which was part of a fund raising campaign for The Brem Foundation to Defeat Breast Cancer. I had a great conversation with Sue Apple of Brem Foundation about ways that the Internet can be used to help raise money for her foundation with the help of local dancers, online video and charity badges - I'm sure we will continue conversation and I'll provide updates. - Then for a big change in scenery, I went to the Building Museum in downtown DC to see dancers from Liz Lerman Dance Exchange and Bowen McCauley Dance perform with construction equipment in Pas de Dirt. A unique performance. I did a video interview with Peter DiMuro and Lucy Bowen McCauley after their performance. - And I wrapped-up my weekend dance tour with a program by the Youth Dance Ensemble at The Jack Guidone Theater at Joy of Motion. I'm interviewing JOM's Executive Director/Artistic Director Doug Yeuell and Helen Hayes, director of the Youth Dance Ensemble program, later this morning - I've taken many jazz classes with Doug and modern classes with Helen. I don't think I've ever seen that many dance performances in such a short time-frame. It's especially fun to see teens and young kids perform, which I got to do twice this weekend with Tappers with Attitude and the JOM Youth Dance Ensemble. It's impressive the amount of time, energy and commitment they put into their very polished performances. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:57 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) May 17, 2007Dana Tai Soon Burgess & Co. and Upcoming Video InterviewI saw Dana Tai Soon Burgess & Co. perform last night at Atlas as part of the Washington Performing Arts Society's "In the Works" program. To put it simply: they were wonderful and if you can see them, I highly recommend that you do. They'll be back in DC to kick-off the 2007/2008 modern dance season at the Kennedy Center in October. After the performance and discussion session, which was moderated by local dance writer, George Jackson, I conducted a video interview with Dana. I'll try to edit this video by tonight and upload it tomorrow. This video is the first in a series of audio and video interviews I'll be conducting with dancers here in DC and around the world. Posted by Doug Fox at 8:14 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) May 14, 2007Weekend of Dance Performances in NYI just got back from New York City. I saw three performances over the weekend. - On Friday night I saw a dress rehearsal of “Dancing-On-View” choreographed by Sara Rudner at Baryshnikov Arts Center. I saw it with Tonya Plank who wrote a post about the performance. And Tony Schultz also has a write-up. - Saturday night, I saw The Ad Hoc Ballet's "The Lucy Poems" at the Rose Building at Lincoln Center. Deborah Lohse is the artistic director and I'm going to follow-up with her this week to see if I can do an audio interview with her about this moving and compelling work. - And on Sunday I saw Minneapolis, Minnesota-based Ragamala Music and Dance Theater at The New Victory Theater on 42nd street. Ragamala is "rooted in Bharatanatyam, a classical dance form from southern India." I didn't enjoy this performance that much. I thought the movement vocabulary was very limited and repetitive, although the music was fun to listen to. (But I don't have much exposure to Indian dance forms - so it could be that I simply don't have enough of a background to appreciate it.) What I was hoping for was something more along the lines of the performance I saw by Preeti Vasudevan at Dance New Amsterdam in NY a few weeks ago. Vasudevan is the artistic director of Thresh, a contemporary dance company that fuses classical Indian dance (Bharatanatyam) with modern dance forms. As part of the OB.ject ob.JECT program at DNA, Vasudevan choreographed and performed "Waiting for the Fifth Arrow" danced to Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 7 played live by Isabelle O'Connell. This was definitely my favorite performance of the program and I especially enjoyed the fusion of traditional Indian and contemporary dance forms. Posted by Doug Fox at 2:52 PM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) May 7, 2007Weekend Dance Performances in Washington, DCI saw four performances over the weekend: - The Washington Ballet's wonderful "7x7: Shakespeare," which I've already written about. [Map Location] - "In the Works" from Washington Reflections Dance Company at the Dance Institute of Washington. Two young choreographers, Lauren Putty and Derrick Speak, showcased works and then discussed them in conversation moderated by Andrea Snyder of Dance/USA. I should really videotape Putty and Speak - the way they talk about their creative process and their enthusiasm is infectious. I particularly like these programs where you get to hear directly from the choreographers and dancers. [Map Location] - I went back to George Mason University to see the GMU Dance Company May 2007 Concert, which featured works by current and recently graduated students. All of the performances were fun to watch. I especially liked "Falling From Grace" choreographed by Jenn Ruhl Kubilus who will be graduating this year with a BFA in Dance. (I still have to get back to "Susan Shields Ballet Cocktail, an Evening of Contemporary Dance" which I saw last weekend at GMU. [Map Location] - And yesterday I saw "Fieldwork for Mixed Disciplines Works-in-Progress Showing," a combination of dance, theatrical and multimedia performances at Dance Place. I hadn't heard about Fieldwork before, you can learn about their work and approach to feedback on the website for Laura Schandelmeier & Stephen Clapp. I liked the first dance piece, "Excerpt from Portals," in particular, which was choreographed and danced by Schandelmeier and Clapp. [Map Location] Posted by Doug Fox at 10:15 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) May 4, 2007I Love Contemporary Ballet - And the Rest of the World Should Too!Update II: DC-based dance writer Lisa Traiger wrote a review of "7x7: Shakespeare" in Danceview Times. Update: Reviews of The Washington Ballet's "7x7: Shakespeare" program in Washington Post and Washington Times. No more modern, jazz, contact improvisation, tap, hip hop or anything else - I'm sticking with contemporary ballet! Last night I saw The Washington Ballet's "7x7: Shakespeare" program at their Wisconsin Ave. location. And last Saturday I went to "Susan Shields Ballet Cocktail" at George Mason University Center for the Arts.  I enjoy contemporary ballet so much more than the traditional, story-telling ballet programs with their corny plot lines, elaborate sets and ornate costumes. I just want to watch captivating, engaging dance from a diverse range of choreographers with great music and with minimal or no sets. And I like visually appealing costumes - as long as they represent a more modern take on fashion. I'm not really writing-off traditional ballet or their contemporary updates - I was wondering what the New York City Ballet's Romeo + Juliet would be like after watching Kristin Sloan's excellent behind-the-scenes video series about this Peter Martin's production. In her review of opening night and the performance, dance blogger Tonya Plank shares her initial impressions: It was pretty and sweet and cute and overall a lovely little ballet. It didn’t take my breath away, it didn’t make me cry, it didn’t move me, it got long in parts, I got bored, with the exception of one scene I was nowhere near the edge of my seat, and with the exception of two dancers...my heart didn’t stutter. I recommend reading Tonya's entire post about opening night - the dialogue she captured about the difference between ABT and NYCB fans is hysterical. Plus there are a huge number of comments. Back to The Washington Ballet: Another reason I loved last night's program was that it took place in a small studio setting, the England Studio Theater. I was sitting in the front row just a few feet away from the dancers at times - nothing beats that. And I even liked that the piano sounds from nearby classes occasionally seeped into this performance space. This annual program is called "7x7: Shakespeare" because seven different choreographers worked with the members of The Washington Ballet to create seven-minute pieces based on Shakespeare's plays. The choreographers included Stephen Petronio, Karole Armitage, Cathy Marston, Brian Reeder, Trey McIntyre, Matjash Mrozewski and Matt Neenan - as you can see, I didn't find good links for all of the choreographers. And here's a link to the dancers of The Washington Ballet. I wish I could do a competent job of describing each work, the dancers and the choreography - but I really don't have the ability to do this - at least yet. More and more I'm appreciating the underappreciated talents of dance critics who can magically make sense of the most ephemeral of arts forms and produce a review while having just about no time for reflection. (Dance writer Lisa Traiger, who wrote about Susan Shields in the Washington Post, told me last night she'll probably have a review in next week's Danceview Times). What I can say is that I was completely captivated during the entire performance and I encourage dance fans - or non-dance fans, for that matter - in the DC area to see this program. Tickets are $60 each, which seems on the high side for a studio performance, but there are relatively few seats, you get to see The Washington Ballet dancers up-close (very up-close), and the program features works by excellent choreographers. The Washington Ballet was kind enough to give me press seats - great ones at that, which I appreciate. Actually most local companies/venues give me tickets at this point - I'm obviously not a traditional dance critic and I've only been dancing for a couple of years, but I get a lot of traffic for my blog and maybe since I'm trying to learn about dance and sharing my experiences, I might reach out to new dance fans. Promoting Contemporary Ballet On the topic of reaching new and larger audiences, something has to be done about promoting contemporary ballet online. I can imagine if excerpts from last night's performance or from "Susan Shields Ballet Cocktail," were posted on the web in full-screen, high-definition format. (For now, I'm putting aside copyright, licensing and a host of other issues). This dancing is compelling and if people can see high-quality clips online, I think that they will be blown away and turn off the NBA play-offs. More importantly, I think that more people will buy tickets for live performances. In addition, this "7x7: Shakespeare" program is unintentionally very well suited for the web. A single piece is just 7 minutes in length - so not too long for Internet distribution. It's worth considering, with the soon-to-launch Joost video service, which is lining-up top advertisers, whether there are ways to monetize these videos for the benefit of The Washington Ballet. Or, how could major ballet companies work with their leading corporate sponsors to distribute hi-def videos online? In return corporate supporters would receive invaluable, classy video exposure while supporting the diffusion of the performing arts. The Internet especially represents an important way to reach younger viewers who may know next to nothing about traditional or contemporary ballet. My hunch is that the young fans for traditional ballet programs are already going to performances. The real growth will be in more contemporary ballets. And to capture new, younger audiences, it's not enough just to get video clips out there for Internet users to watch; the websites and Internet marketing campaigns of choreographers and dance companies have to be upgraded. The bottom-line is that none of the choreographer websites I link to above is any good. Here you have these great choreographers and nobody outside a relatively small circle has a clue what they're doing - it doesn't have to be this way. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:46 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) May 3, 2007DCDanceBlog Continues Conversation about "My Ocean is Never Blue"Lotta Lundgren in DCDanceBlog continues conversation about "My Ocean is Never Blue," which I wrote about yesterday. A number of comments follow Lotta's post. Posted by Doug Fox at 8:08 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) May 2, 2007Daniel Burkholder/The PlayGround at Dance PlaceLast Friday I saw performances by the contact improvisation company Daniel Burkholder/The PlayGround at Dance Place. I very much enjoyed the first two pieces of the night - the choreography/improvisation, the music and costumes. "Together/Apart (we go each our way)" with Stefanie Quinones Bass and Daniel was the first performance. And the charming "Duet for 3" featured Daniel and his very pregnant wife Andrea Burkholder. The third piece "Unmapped" with Daniel and Jonathan Matis featured annoying electric guitar sounds and, for me, uninspiring choreography - I just wanted the piece to end as quickly as possible. Barbara Allen in her Washington Post review offers a different perspective about "Unmapped": "...an oddly funny duet about male energy, featuring Burkholder and Jonathan Matis -- whose guitar strains guide the improvisation, ending with a power struggle over the musical instrument as if it were a remote control." "My Ocean is Never Blue" Following intermission there was a performance of "My Ocean is Never Blue," a contact improv piece featuring 18 dancers. Daniel has been blogging about this work since the beginning of January. And I enjoyed seeing Amanda Abrams and Lotta Lundgren of DCDanceBlog perform in this work as well. I enjoyed this large-scale contact improv piece but at the same time I felt overwhelmed by the scope of this work and I'm not really sure how to process everything. Daniel addresses this complexity in an April 25th post: My biggest concern about the work itself is if it is too dense - too much happening at once with dancing, live music, text and video. I mean, that was kind of my intention, but then you get worried it is too much for anyone to connect or react. If they are overwhelmed than they just want to leave. On the other hand, this topic (water) is so huge that any complexity that we are bringing only touches the surface of its actual complexity. My hope is that all this layering will serve to create a collage of information that each person will be able to piece together for themselves - what is their relationship to water? How do they care for this precious resource? I'm glad Daniel wrote the above - but for the record, I didn't want to leave - I was just grappling with how to make sense of "My Ocean." Dance Place Verses Transformer Gallery I'd say that I was more connected to the streamlined version of "My Ocean" with just a handful of dancers at the small Transformer Gallery than the large-scale piece at Dance Place. (Daniel's post about the Transformer Gallery performance). With just a handful of dancers, I could focus on the dancers, their movements and interactions without ever being distracted. Here's a clip of this gallery performance: But in fairness to the dancers Friday night, I didn't bring to the larger work much of a background in contact improv so I have a lot to learn about this style of dancing before I can appreciate all of its elements. Actually, as soon as some pulled muscles heal and my back somehow recovers, I'm going to take Daniel's contact improvisation class. "My Ocean is Never Blue" Blog I really should have read the entire "My Ocean" blog before going to the performance Friday night. I think that Daniel provides some important and helpful insights about what inspired him to create this work, his divergent and conflicting thoughts about his relationship with water and the improvisational structures in which the dance unfolded. At the root of the inspiration for this piece is the juxtaposition between calm and tranquil reflections about being connected with water - swimming in Michigan during childhood and a later trip to the invigorating cold streams of the Grand Tetons in Wyoming - to the increasingly terrible water challenges and scarcities faced around the globe best illustrated by this commenter: I grew up in a squalid lower middle class neighborhood in Bombay where there was no running water and we had to share a bathroom and toilet with 15 other families. The water used to be turned on for 2 hours a day from 4-6 pm and that too in the community bathroom which had 2 taps. It was a community gathering everyday from 4-6 pm to stock buckets, utensils and various other items that could hold water. All kids and their moms used to line up with empty utensils and regular altercations were not uncommon due to limited supply of water...It was always an adventure to live in a “water-centric” community. We referred to the more privileged people living in upscale communities where they had all day long water as “those with 24 hour water people. Improvisational Structures Explained What I especially liked about Daniel's blog posts is that they explain the choreographic structures that unfold on stage within the context of the work's themes. Here we have the contrast between the calmness of the "waterline" shielding us - maybe - from the chaotic energy of the improvised hurricane dance. Daniel's explanation of this video follows below: [This Video] combines two ideas that we’ve been working with recently. The line in front developed from thinking about who has water and who doesn’t. They are passing a cup down the line, with each person taking a sip from the cup. The cup can only go as far as it has water - ie. it depends on how much water is in the cup at the beginning and how much each person drinks. In some ways it is kind of a simple rendition of what happens on a grander, more complicated scope in the world - some people have water, choose how much they drink and this effects if other people get water. The Art of "Bulking" And in this video, Daniel illustrates "bulking": The structure in the above video is Christine doing her “earth” solo while the rest of the dancers are doing “Bulking” - I learned Bulking from Chris Aiken and Angie Hauser last August and was curious on incorporating into a more formal setting. Bulking basically consists of duplicating a shape made by a dancer (in this case, Christine). The power of the practice is to duplicate it exactly - all the limbs, facing, focus, etc… In this video the dancers are copying Christine’s shapes and then choosing to enter, stay or leave every time she comes to stillness. This establishes an overlapping environment for her to move in that was created by shapes from different points along her solo. I find it very interesting to see how her “world” changes as people enter and leave. I find the videos and explanations for the waterline/hurricane dances and "bulking" especially helpful. As a relative newcomer to dance, I almost never get a chance to see and understand the actual specifics of the creative process at work. By seeing these videos, I get a very specific understanding of the tools and approaches that were used to develop "My Ocean." Posted by Doug Fox at 9:56 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) April 30, 2007A Whirlwind of Dance PerformancesI managed to see four dance performances this weekend here in DC - a wonderful experience. In addition to the three I mentioned in my Thursday post, I also saw, "Jazz Now" at Joy of Motion last night. I'll write more about the contact improvisation, ballet, modern and jazz performances I saw over the next few days - I need to think about them. It's always especially enjoyable to watch your dance teachers and fellow students perform. In the last performance of last night's "Jazz Now" program, I've been taught by or taken classes with 4 of the 5 dancers at Joy of Motion. I've taken jazz with Doug Yeuell and modern with Helen Hayes and Sarah Stoodley, and I've attended jazz classes with Felicia Skowronek. And Loren Amdursky, who I've taken jazz and modern classes with, danced in two different performances with JazzeMotion. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:54 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) More from The Nothing FestivalTo follow-up my post "Reflections on 'The Nothing Festival' at DTW," you can read Eva Yaa Asantewaa's "More Ado about A Lot." In her excellent post, Eva was kind enough to expand upon her thoughts about "States and Resemblance," a work-in-progress created and performed by Dean Moss, Ryutaro Mishima and Restu Kusumaningrum: States and Resemblance gripped me and had me on the edge of my seat largely because something tangible--a quiet, refined something--emerged from whatever nothing these collaborators took as their starting point. Moss--who sat at one far end of O'Connor's panel and, for some reason, spoke very seldom--said that "We are meaning machines: Put something out and we will make a story of it." As I watched Moss's subtle, slyly casual interaction with Mishima in States and Resemblance, I found myself forming and releasing a round of stories and meanings, happily birthing but not clinging to any, and this experience was brought to me by two artists in exquisite command of their physical and expressive powers. This work welcomed me in and made me a participant in a way that the other three simply did not. I say it again: Seeing this one dance again is all I want to do right now. I wanted to say hello to Eva at The Nothing Festival but she had to take off right at the end of the panel discussion so I didn't get a chance to introduce myself in person. Other articles about The Nothing Festival: - "A Little Something for Nothing: Choreographers start from scratch; no cheating allowed," by Deborah Jowitt in The Village Voice - "There’s Something Here, Emanating From Nothing," by Jennifer Dunning in The New York Times Posted by Doug Fox at 7:41 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 26, 2007Weekend Dance Performances in DCI'm attending the following dance performances this weekend in Washington, DC: - Friday, April 27 - Daniel Burkholder/The PlayGround performs "MyOcean is Never Blue" at Dance Place [Schedule and ticket link] - Saturday, April 28 - Susan Shields Ballet Cocktail: An Evening of Contemporary Dance at George Mason University Center for the Arts [Schedule and ticket link] - Sunday, April 29 - Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's "Ferocious Beauty: Genome" at Atlas Performing Arts Center [Schedule and ticket link] Posted by Doug Fox at 11:45 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 24, 2007Jaw-Dropping "Slow Dancing" Videos by David MichalekAs I mentioned yesterday, I attended the "Slow Dancing" program at the Guggenheim Museum in New York on Sunday night. This program was part of the museum's "Works & Process" series that gives you a behind-the-scenes look at many different art forms. The Sunday night program was superb. At this year's Lincoln Center Festival, starting in June, there will be an outdoor installation featuring 50-foot tall, high-definition dance videos projected on to the New York State Theater. What is special about these dance videos taken by photographer David Michalek - who is married to Wendy Whelan of the NYC Ballet - is how they were made and how they will be projected. Michalek invited 45 top dancers from around the world, representing many different dance styles, to a studio in NYC created for this project. He shot each dancer for just five seconds using a high-speed, high-definition camera that shot at a rate of 3,000 frames per second. So for each 5-second shoot, he captured 20 gigs of data. Then he turned the series of captured images into a slow playing movie to jaw-dropping effect. Consider this: He shoots a dancer for just 5 seconds but the resulting video is 10 minutes in length. That means that we get to watch extraordinary dancers move in slow motion so we can experience and analyze movement in ways that were never previously possible. It sort of is a modern take on the question that Eadweard Muybridge asked in the 1880's when he took pictures in quick succession of trotter horses to see if all four legs simultaneously left the ground - they do. But in this modern take, we get to ponder what really happens to a dancer's muscles and body position as they perform a series of movements. Sunday Night's Program At the Works & Process program Sunday night, we were treated to performances that viewers outside the New York State Theater will not get to see. We were shown three larger than life slow-motion videos that were created by Michalek. But before each video, the dancer came on stage - a small one at the Guggenheim theater - and performed their 5-second routine. Then we watched the high-definition video of the dancer immediately afterwards. The three dancers we got to see were Wendy Whelan, Herman Cornejo from ABT and Desmond Richardson. As Tonya Plank wrote in her excellent post about this event: Michalek joked that this was the only time we’d ever see dancers of this stature dance on a stage for a mere five seconds! In addition to watching the super-short performances and the slow-motion video, there was a panel discussion led by arts presenter and producer Nigel Redden featuring Michalek, Richardson and Whelan. Michalek did an excellent job of explaining how he researched and created this project. And Richardson and Whelan provided engaging insight from the dancers' perspective. As Whelan shared, a dancer is really exposing the most minute elements of her movement for the world to view and assess. The Work of Photographer Lois Greenfield In February, I wrote about "Held," a dance performance featuring Australian Dance Theatre's (ADT) and dance photographer Lois Greenfield. In a nutshell, Greenfield was on stage during the performance taking pictures of the high-flying moves of ADT dancers. These images were then projected in real-time on to two projection screens. This way the audience could see larger-than-life shots of the dancers that had been taken just moments before. I did not see this ADT performance, but my impression is that the "Slow Dancing" photos/videos (I don't know what to call them) of Michalek are more interesting to me. In "Held," Greenfield is making choices for the audience. The projected images we see are the ones she decided to shoot. But with "Slow Dancing," Michalek is not making choices for us in the same way. The entire 5-second movement phrase is available for use to watch, analyze and examine. On top of that, taking traditional pictures of dancers is an art form, but it is not dance in the sense of movement through space and time. A picture is just capturing a moment in time disconnected from all other moments. But the "Slow Dancing" project is directly about dance because we get to see movement unfold in front of our eyes in time and space. And we see what was previously unseen in stunning minute detail, which to me makes it a jaw-dropping experience. Posted by Doug Fox at 9:12 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) April 23, 2007"Slow Dancing" at the Guggenheim MuseumLast night I saw a wonderful program at the Guggenheim Museum in New York called "Slow Dancing." The discussion and presentation showcased the work of photographer David Michalek and dancers Desmond Richardson, Wendy Whelan and Herman Cornejo. The high-definition photos - taken at 3,000 images per second - of the dancers were projected in slow motion to highlight the the smallest increment of movement possible. I thought the program was wonderful and I'll write more about it when I get back to DC. Tonya Plank has an excellent write-up about this event. Posted by Doug Fox at 6:31 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 3, 2007Hi-Def Holographic Video Projections Added to PerformancesThere's a fascinating article by Steven McElroy in yesterday's New York Times, "Illusory Characters With Startling Stage Presence." In a new theatrical production, "Losing Something," directed by Kevin Cunningham of 3-Legged Dog, a high-definition video projection system is being used to project life-like 3D holographic images of actors onto the stage. You can watch an excellent audio slide show on the NY Times site where Cunningham gives an overview of the technology used for the production of "Losing Something."  This production relies on two main technologies. The first is the Musion Eyeliner Holographic Projection System, which projects hi-def 3D images onto the stage. On the Musion site, you can watch a number of examples of this technology at work including a video from the 2006 Grammy Awards that shows Madonna dancing with the animated Gorillaz.  The second technology is the Isadora Software from TroikaTronix, which is developed by Mark Coniglio. Isadora, available for Macs and PCs, is a graphic programming environment that allows users to have real-time control over multimedia elements during a performance. It is frequently used by dancers.  In February of last year I videotaped a demonstration by Mark and dancer Dawn Stoppiello that shows how the Isadora software works. You can access the video from my post "Troika Ranch Demonstration" video. For an additional example of holographic projections, you can read a post from last year, "Virtual Kate Moss on the Runway." The post includes a link to a video from the 2006 Ready-to-Wear fashion show in Paris which includes a pre-recorded holographic-like image of Kate Moss projected on to the runway - you have to go to end of video to see it.  Posted by Doug Fox at 11:56 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) March 9, 2007Adding Upcoming Event Badge to Your Blog or SiteFollowing-up on my post this morning about Upcoming.org and Eventful: Below I've included an Upcoming.org badge that displays the next 5 events that I'm tracking in Upcoming.org. I'm using this as example of how the DC dance community can promote its upcoming performances. If all dance companies and venues in the area listed their performances on Upcoming, then I'd add your performances to myevents and then they would be added to this badge below. Anybody can create this type of badge. One of the main benefits is that it's very viral and many people might place this badge on their own blogs and websites. Posted by Doug Fox at 1:02 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) March 5, 2007Dance Performances in DCSaturday night at Dance Place, I saw "Destiny" an enjoyable performance by Coyaba Dance Theater, a local dance company that presents traditional and contemporary West African dance and music. "Destiny" explores the personal journey of company director Sylvia Soumah.  And last weekend I saw "Temporal Interference" from Arlington, Virginia-based modern dance company Jane Franklin. The performance was in downtown DC at the Warehouse Theater. You can read a write-up about "Temporal Interference" on Anais Janacek's new dance blog. View a picture gallery of this performance/installation on the website of new media artist Bryan Leister. And read a short write-up in the Washington Post.  As you'll see from the write-ups and pictures, "Temporal Interference" features three dancers who interact with a sound-generating theremin device at the center of the performance. I'll write more about this work soon - I'll probably do an audio interview with Jane Franklin and Bryan Leister this week. Posted by Doug Fox at 6:40 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) February 22, 2007Building a Derivative Dance CultureOn the Creative Commons blog, I came across a post about an "Open Art" show that is taking place now at the University of Florida. A student group, Florida Free Culture, is hosting this show in which the art work on display is made available under what is called a Creative Commons "Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0" license. What this means is that anybody can download the images of the artwork, which are in a Flickr photo pool, and then modify or remix these images to create altered or augmented versions of the original. For example, one of these images could be edited and modified in a photo editing software program to create a more abstract version of the initial photograph. In essence, users who download these digital images from the show are given permission under this Creative Commons license to create derivative works. From a copyright standpoint, a "derivative work" is a complicated concept that I don't fully understand. But I take the general premise behind this term as being a new work (book, artwork, choreography, etc.) that is built upon an existing work. One of the things I realized about the Flickr pool is that all the photos are uploaded by the same person. I would have thought that an "Open Art" show organized by a group of students would have included work from a number of different contributors. But, in the end, it doesn't really matter since I just wanted to use this Creative Commons art show as a possible model for dance. Creating a Derivative Dance Festival An understandable tendency for choreographers and dancers is to protect their work from a legal standpoint, or, at least, ensure that choreography is not replicated without the express written consent of the artist or dance company. But why don't we just turn these standard rules upside down and see what happens? Why not host a dance festival in your town or city where all the dance performances are licensed under Creative Commons so that anybody can create and distribute derivative versions of the works in digital and/or live formats? And one of the stipulations would be that derivative works would properly recognize the original creator. It would be up to the festival organizer and dance companies whether derivative works could be created just for non-commercial purposes or also for commercial purposes. (Here's a link to the different types of CC licenses). From a Practical Standpoint, What Does this CC-Licensed Event Mean? Here's a rundown: - All dance performances at the festival are recorded and the video is uploaded to a video sharing site. If there's a two camera shoot, the raw footage from each camera might be uploaded. The music tracks can be uploaded as well as separate audio files. Obviously a deal has to be arranged with the owners of the music - maybe under a CC license as well. - Internet users are now free to do what they want with the video and audio files. They can edit the videos, insert their own dance footage and make any other creative changes and additions that they want. Then they can upload and share their finished works. (There happens to be an excellent overview in yesterday's TechCrunch of online video editing applications. So it's easier than ever for dance fans to edit video footage.) - Derivative works can be created in the offline world as well. A dance teacher might incorporate part of a performance in whole or part into a dance routine that is taught during a class. Or a dance company might use one of the festival dance works as the basis for one of their new pieces. In either the class or performance setting, the original artist would have to be recognized under the terms of the CC license. What Are the Advantages of this Licensing Approach? - Dancers and dance fans will be able to use your work as the basis for further exploration and creativity. They are no longer just passive observers of your work (I think this is my mantra after saying this a hundred times in previous posts). They can create their own dance videos and/or work in a very direct, physical manner with your choreography. - All participants in the dance festival will get a lot of exposure and recognition at a very low cost. This CC licensing approach is very viral in nature. In other words, since users - dancers and non-dancers - can experiment with your creations and create new works, they will be highly inclined to share what they've done with others. They might embed their new video on their blog or social networking profile, or they might upload their video to a video sharing site. - The likely result is that you will get more exposure for your dance company and increase the likelihood that you will get more bookings in the future and larger audiences as well. Plus, since the Internet is an important part of this proposed CC licensing approach, there is also the possibility that you can sell or monetize your work through online channels. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:02 AM - Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0) February 21, 2007ADT and Greenfield: Photography-Enabled Participatory Dance PerformancesEarlier this week I wrote about Australian Dance Theatre's (ADT) "Devolution" performance and linked to videos so you could watch robotic dancers in action. In this post I would like to discuss ADT's new tour of "Held," which kicked off yesterday at Sadler's Wells in London. "Held," first performed in 2004, combines the very athletic dancing of ADT with the real-time photography of Lois Greenfield. (You've probably seen the dance photography of Greenfield. On her website, you'll find many of her pictures.) In the first part of this post, I provide links to performance clips, video interviews and other resources so you can learn about this work and hear directly from Greenfield and ADT's Artistic Director Garry Stewart. Then I discuss why I find this work fascinating in terms of what it might mean for creating participatory, Internet-enabled dance pieces. I found this 24-second video of "Held" on YouTube, which gives a good idea of the general structure of this work. In a nutshell Greenfield takes pictures of the dancers throughout the performance and her images are projected almost in real-time on two large screens on stage behind the dancers. So audience members can watch what is usually an ephemeral art form while simultaneously viewing freeze frames of the action - usually images of the dancers in flight. Resources and Background - The tour of "Held" started yesterday at Sadler's Wells in London. Here are the rest of the tour dates in the UK through the end of March. - Toward the bottom of the Sadler's Wells "Held" performance page, you'll find a good, extended video of this performance. - On WorldWideDance UK, there are three excellent video interviews with Artistic Director Stewart and photographer Greenfield - I highly recommend that you watch these videos to better understand this performance and the creative process. The video trailer on this page is the same as the one on the Saddler's Wells site, but has a smaller image size. - On Greenfield's site, you can read a description of "Held" and watch an animated video that gives you a general flavor of this work.  - Preview article of "Held" in this week's Telegraph. I found what looks more like a posed studio shot than a real action shot included with the article interesting. Why is this the only picture that shows Greenfield taking a picture of dancers with the image projected on a large screen? In the publicity pictures on the Sandler's Wells site, you only find high-resolution pictures of dancers not an image that captures the process.  "Held" as Participatory Art If I were in the audience, I'm wondering what I'd be thinking as Greenfield takes pictures? Would I watch the dance through her eyes and wonder what shots I would take if I had her camera? Would I sit back and marvel at the projected images and realize that my eyes have a very limited capacity to capture the real-time movements of dancers? When I was reading articles and watching video clips about "Held", I came across a reference or two to photo pioneer Eadweard Muybridge who took a famous photo series of a moving horse to determine once and for all if a horse lifts all four legs simultaneously when galloping. The answer is "yes," but before Muybridge developed the technology to take pictures in rapid succession, it simply was not possible to answer this question. (Last year I read a good biography "River of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West" by Rebecca Solnit.)  Before the 1880s or so, nobody had ever seen a non-blurry stop-action photo of objects moving at high-speed. "Held" harkens back to these pioneering days of photography by giving audience members the same type of vivid freeze-frames of live action - still images that provide insight that is otherwise not knowable to the unassisted human eye. It's not, however, the photography by itself that's intriguing, it's being able to contrast the live action with the freeze-frames. Plus, we get to watch a photographer, who usually plays the role of observer, as an integral part of the performance. But just as photographic equipment is now used by just about everybody, how can "Held" also become more democratized? Why, in other words, is Greenfield the only one who gets to take the pictures? Is there another way to stage "Held" so that audience members don't have to just be vicarious photographers? I want to be on-stage taking shots so I can see the images I take projected on the large screens. Or, if staging this dance performance for the emerging participatory art culture doesn't work, how can this photographer-as-performer set-up be ported to the Internet? Here's my idea: - Post a video of the "Held" performance to the Internet. The video quality has to be good enough so that it can be comfortably viewed in full screen mode. The video would only include the dancers and not the photographer Greenfield. The shots would be as tight as possible while still showing the full bodies of the dancers. - Visitors would be encouraged to open-up this video clip in an online or offline video editing software program. Then, users would create 30 freeze-frames from this video performance. - Then, users would drop their screen captures into a special template that included the video performance on one side and the screen captures on the other side. The user would determine where to insert their screen captures and how long each screen capture should be displayed. - Finally, the video would be uploaded to a shared video library along with the split-screen videos of other users. - Now anybody can go to this library and watch one or more of these videos. To me, this is what "Held" is about. I'd enjoy watching the performance, the dancing and Greenfield's choice of shots - "choice" might not be the perfect word. "Held" is choreographed specifically for Greenfield. So she must have a fairly good idea of which posses she intends to capture at each point of the performance - even thought the actual images have to vary a bit from one performance to the next. But what I'd find just as interesting is to see what freeze-frames others find intriguing. And by creating the user-generated media project I describe above, it's possible to see what hundreds of other users find captivating about the "unseen" movements of the dancers. Maybe this online participatory project should be called "What I missed." And users are encouraged to create screen grabs of those movements that they don't think they would have seen or recorded in their mind without the aid of an augmentation device - the camera. Posted by Doug Fox at 5:45 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) February 19, 2007Videos of "Devolution" from Australian Dance TheatreLast March I wrote in "Devolution - Robots and Humans Share the Stage" that I wanted to find a video clip of "Devolution" a work from Australian Dance Theatre that features robotic and human dancers. This piece is choreographed and directed by Garry Stewart and Louis-Philippe Demers created the robots. Here's a short introductory clip from YouTube. But links to longer video clips are below. You can visit this page to watch three additional video clips. The first two are of a "Devolution" performance and the third is a commercial for this piece. And here is more background about Louis-Philippe Demers and this robotic-inspired dance work.  Reviews, Articles and Posts about "Devolution" - Interview with choreographer Garry Stewart - Brief review in The Adelaide Review - scroll down page to "Devolution" - Preview of "Devolution" in The Age Posted by Doug Fox at 5:08 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) December 11, 2006Rachel Howard's Video Preview of Tango Con*FusionIn Saturday's San Francisco Chronicle, dance writer and blogger Rachel Howard has a story about Tango Con*Fusion, an all-female Argentine Tango dance troupe, that will be performing starting this Wednesday at the Herbst Theatre in San Francisco. [Via Root Magazine] What I found especially interesting is that Rachel created and narrated a video story that accompanies the article about Tango Con*Fusion.   Most reviews, previews and stories about dance are still in text-only format - maybe with one or two pictures. But, I've seen virtually no online dance stories in major newspapers that include a video segment. I think that the move toward video coverage along the lines of what Rachel has done is an important development for dance companies that never get enough coverage. More and more newspapers now incorporate video clips into their online publications. So if dance companies begin to include links to online video of their dancing, I think that it's likely that an increasing number of publications will embed these clips into their stories. Or, alternatively, writers will watch these videos and be inspired to create their own video stories for their publications. I'm going to write much more about the topic of dance publicity and multimedia content soon. Dance is obviously a visual art form that takes place in both time and space. So the optimal medium for capturing dance is video. Yet, 99.9% of the coverage of dance is done with words - not a very worthwhile way to get people excited about upcoming dance performances. By asking the following question, I don't mean to take anything away from the reviews written by Rachel and many other dance critics, but I think it's an important one to consider: What is more likely to motivate somebody to attend an upcoming dance performance? 1) A written preview or review, or 2) A video story or short documentary. From my perspective, the question is very easy to answer: It's the video! Posted by Doug Fox at 9:05 AM - Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0) November 21, 2006AudienceBuzz - Social Networking Site for Performing ArtsMaryann Devine, in her smArts & Culture blog, writes post about launch of new social networking site for the performing arts.  On AudienceBuzz.com, you can write reviews about theater, dance and other performances that you've recently seen. Maryann says that at this point there is not a lot of activity. I've only explored AudienceBuzz for a few seconds. I'm going to go back to this site and spend some time exploring this new offering. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:16 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) November 8, 2006Introducing "Funny Uncles" Dance BlogI'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 5, 2006Participating in Liz Lerman Dance Exchange Community PerformanceI spent the last week rehearsing and performing in Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's community performance portion of "Still Crossing" at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center at the University of Maryland. "Still Crossing," choreographed by Liz Lerman and the company, was one of three works that were performed as part of The Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's 30th Anniversary Introspective. The other works were "Man/ Chair Dances" and "Small Dances About Big Ideas." (In the reviews I link to below, you can learn more about these pieces.)  "Still Crossing - Company and Community Members Photo Credit: By Rich Lipski -- The Washington Post (I'm not in above picture :( -- The shot is of stage right to center. I was on stage left.) It was a lot of fun to be part of this dance performance and meet the about 50 community participants. The Dance Exchange company members who worked with the community dancers, Martha Wittman, Elizabeth Johnson and Peter DiMuro, brought a tremendous amount of enthusiasm, commitment and patience to teaching us the dance phrase and staging our entrances and movements. Sarah Kaufman writes in "Liz Lerman, Still Keeping The Audience On Its Toes" in Washington Post: Many of the revolutionary ideas that Lerman embraced back in the 1970s don't seem so far out now. But she has long been considered a pioneer -- for creating works in which the dancers speak as well as move, for casting elderly dancers alongside those in their 20s and for making art from everyday, ordinary movements and gestures. Her notions about what dance is and who gets to do it have become ever broader as she has welcomed nondancers into her works, something she did in "Still Crossing," which closed Thursday's program. Jean Battey Lewis concludes in her review in "Lerman steps forth with ideas" in The Washington Times: The evening concluded with "Still Crossing," commissioned for the celebration of the centennial of the Statue of Liberty. It brought together onstage Dance Exchange members and about 50 people from the Washington area, who looked almost as disparate as Dance Exchange itself. It was a fitting finale to a grand evening. LEARNING THE DANCE PHRASE The community portion of "Still Crossing" comprises the last few minutes of this dance piece. The first two thirds or so are danced by company members. Then the community dancers enter the stage from each of the wings in staggered fashion and perform a three minute dance phrase in conjunction with company members. A community dancer is essentially a volunteer who wants to participate. No dance background is required to participate. We started learning this dance movement a week ago on Saturday and Sunday at Dance Exchage's studios. Then, our rehearsals moved to the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center last Monday and Wednesday. And then we performed Thursday and Friday night. When I started to learn the phrase, it felt a little overwhelming, but by Monday I pretty much had the movements down and it ended-up being easier than I thought. In Thursday night's performance I think I was out of synch a couple of times and in Friday's performance I felt that I did a better job - that was good since I was further downstage during the second performance. I really enjoyed watching the company members perform and rehearse the first sections of "Still Crossing" from the wings. It's fascinating to see how the choreography unfolds and how the dancers include bits and pieces of the movement phrase we were taught. Company dancers included Robbie Cook, Thomas Dwyer, Elizabeth Johnson, Cassie Meador, Peg Schaefer, Shula Strassfeld, Vincent Thomas and Martha Wittman. Looking back at the past week, I can't believe that I was hesitant about participating in this community dance program. It was a great experience and I'm definitely looking forward to participating in the next one. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:29 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) October 30, 2006"Still Crossing" RehearsalsI mentioned last week that I'm participating in the community dance portion of Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's "Still Crossing." We had rehearsals Saturday and Sunday at the Takoma Park, Maryland studios of Dance Exchange. Then tonight and Wednesday we will be rehearsing at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center where the performance will take place this coming Thursday and Friday. "Still Crossing" is primarily performed by company dancers. Then, the last six minutes of this work are performed by community participants in conjunction with the dance company members. During the weekend's rehearsals, we learned the movement phrase that we will be performing. It was a lot of fun learning the movements and meeting the over 50 or so participants in this program. I feel pretty comfortable with the movement phrase although I don't have it completely synchronized with the music. But the company members will be performing on stage as well so it really won't be difficult to get the timing down. Martha Wittman and Elizabeth Johnson of Dance Exchange conducted the rehearsals over the weekend. They both bring a tremendous amount of commitment and enthusiasm to teaching non-dancers how to do the movements. Posted by Doug Fox at 12:00 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) October 27, 2006A Scientific Approach to Reducing Pointe Shoe NoiseI like this post from Gwyneth at The Winger:  This hallway Gretchen is standing against was located just behind the stage of the Harris Theater, and it quickly became the designated place for all of us to “bang” our pointe shoes. Sound weird? Let me explain… Posted by Doug Fox at 7:19 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) October 22, 2006My First Participation in Community Dance PerformanceI'm looking forward to participating in a Liz Lerman Dance Exchange community performance of "Still Crossing" at The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center (at University of Maryland) on November 2nd and 3rd (Thursday and Friday).  "Still Crossing" will be performed as part of the Dance Exchange's 30th Anniversary Retrospective, which will also include two works by company dancers: "Small Dances About Big Ideas," which honors the 60th anniversary of the Nuremberg Trials, and "Man/Chair Dances," based on John Adams’ The Chairman Dances from Nixon in China, which puts dancers in the midst of the UM Symphony Orchestra. As you can tell from this description of the upcoming "Still Crossing" community performance, no dancing experience is needed to participate: The guest artist section (that's you!) lasts about 6 minutes, most of which is stately walking/entering. There is about a minute and a half of upper body and hand gestural work and, for those so inclined, a section of ground rolling. You will always be accompanied by Dance Exchange company members doing the same movements; older participants will have a buddy. You DO NOT need dance skills or a flexible body to participate. Participants will wear their own blue clothes. This is my first dance performance!! Posted by Doug Fox at 8:38 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) October 17, 2006Merce Cunningham Puts Music Selection in Audience HandsMerce Cunningham Dance Company performed eyeSpace last week at The Joyce Theater. Randomness in music selection was taken to new heights by the master of randomness. Audience members were encouraged to bring their own iPods loaded with Mikel Rouse’s eyeSpace score (freely available via the Merce Cunningham website for ticket buyers) or those without iPods were provided with one when arriving at The Joyce theater.  Apollinaire Scherr wrote in Newsday before opening of eyeSpace: Up until "eyeSpace," audience members at least were listening to the same music, whatever they each made of it. Now, they may be watching the same dance, "but they're having a private experience with the sound," Rouse explains. "What happens when you ask people to have both a shared and a private experience at the same time? I don't think that's exactly happened before. The question is, what is a theatrical experience?" I just did Google news search to see what the reviewers had to say about eyeSpace and its iPod innovation: Tobi Tobias for Bloomber writes in "Merce Cunningham's IPod Tricks Fall Flat": Now, with ``eyeSpace,'' Cunningham is inviting his audience to be interactive, a tactic that presumably engages the art-resistant. This from an artist who stuck to his esoteric aesthetic for decades, often with glorious results. Deborah Jowitt in The Village Voice opens her review: Merce Cunningham and John Cage were using chance procedures to shuffle music and dance sequences before Steve Jobs was born. With Cunningham's new eyeSpace, the audience gets to play. We hear half of Mikel Rouse's score, variously shuffled, on iPods. Text sung and spoken by the dancers (sample: "I almost lost my foot, but I didn't lose my foot") emerges from a murmur of instruments and other sounds. Rouse and Stephan Moore also generate noise on the theater's speakers—mostly street and subway clamor. Sitting there in our headphones we might be on the subway, except that no musical favorites cocoon us from commotion. John Rockwell for the New York Times writes in "You'll Take the Dance You're Given, but You Can Call the Tune": ...“eyeSpace,” accompanied by a Mikel Rouse score set to shuffle mode on individual iPods, was [a] novelty, and an appealing one. Click here for more reviews on Google. Posted by Doug Fox at 6:20 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) June 5, 2006Integrating Dance into Our Contemporary DiscourseDance and movement can offer important insights into the pressing issues of our time. Dance can also serve as a powerful springboard for encouraging conversation, building community, fostering understanding and inspiring action. Yet while performances often encourage audiences to see contemporary topics from different perspectives and address issues that do not receive sufficient coverage in the media, dance is not in any meaningful way an integral element in how our society thinks about, reflects and reacts to the world in which we live. Imagine an alternative reality where every time a newspaper, a TV show, a community group, a cultural organization, a governmental department, a non-governmental organization (NGO), a website, a blog, a trade association or any other entity addressed an important societal or political issue that they turned to dance for the answers. Take some of the important and sometimes controversial topics and issues of the day: immigration, race, genocide, gender, gay marriage, gay lesbian bisexual and transgender (GLBT), environment, bio-ethics, poverty, war, education, disabilities, healthcare, natural disaster, AIDS/HIV, physical abuse, incarceration and many others. How often do the people and organizations that are devoted to addressing these topics actually turn to dance for answers and insights? The answer is not very often. But it doesn't have to be this way. Dance can be integrated into the overall fabric of how we contemplate challenging issues and think about taking action. Two of the main challenges to achieving this goal, I believe, are 1) that most people don't know about the many dance programs that already exist for addressing contemporary topics and 2) there are no online resources that aggregate these dance programs (performances, workshops, educational programs and outreach initiatives) by theme and subject matter. One of the things I'm thinking about doing is creating such an online resource in the form of a blog that groups the politically, socially, economically and culturally-focused efforts of dance companies on a thematic basis. So a user could visit this weblog and find dance-related content for any of the topics I listed above (plus other issues). So, say, a person from an organization that addresses race and poverty issues is seeking dance resources regarding this topic. Through such a blog, they could quickly learn about dance companies that do performances, workshops, and community outreach programs that deal with race and poverty. Even more helpful, in some cases they could find video clips, audio programs, pictures and other multimedia resources that were already online and immediately available for use. And, in the future, there may be a way to license this digital dance content and add it directly to an organization's website. This way this hypothetical community group that addresses race and poverty issues could integrate directly into their own website dance programs that encourage their website visitors to think about these issues in new ways and, hopefully, inspire action. I'll write more about this new dance resource soon. But for now, I thought I'd do some initial research and explore how dancers have been or are currently addressing some of these topics. Here's an list of eight annotated resources that explore what dancers are doing on a number of fronts - I came across a lot more, I just didn't have time to include them all. I think it would be great to conduct audio interviews for my podcast with the dancers below to learn more about their dance programs and how they hope to inspire their audiences to learn, contemplate and take action. - Saturday night I saw a wonderful community performance of Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's "We Are Still Crossing," an updated version of an 1986 commission that celebrated the one-hundredth anniversary of the gift of the Statue of Liberty from the French to the US. The current version incorporates themes, stories and movement that reflect upon the current debate over immigration and the building of a wall between the US and Mexico. "We are Still Crossing" integrates both the company's professional dancers with community participants. - Jennifer Monson's "Flight of Mind" dance performance is based on her multi-year study of the migration paths of birds and whales. This project includes the "Bird Brain Educational Resource Guide" for grades 3-6. (Download PDF classroom guide.) - Anne Bluthenthal and Dancers performance of "Unsing the Song" deals with the nature of genocide. Part of a multi-arts exhibit that addresses Rwandan genocide, rape and deliberate attempts to spread HIV. You can learn more about this grassroots oral history project. - Pat Graney Company's "Keeping the Faith - The Prison Project" is "designed to enable incarcerated women and girls to discover a sense of identity within themselves and to develop that identity within the context of community - through the vehicles of performance, video documentation and a published anthology of their writings. . .Each year, the program culminates in performance where the participating women perform their own movement and writing, and display their own visual art for 200 members of the general public, 500 of their incarcerated peers, and the prison administration." - David Popalisky, director of Santa Clara University Dance Program, created and performed "Barred from Life" which explores issues of wrongful conviction "...through a combination of media including dance movement, video imagery, [and] excerpts from interviews with exonerees..." - Urban Bush Women (UBW), founded in 1984, "is a performance ensemble dedicated to exploring the use of cultural expression as a catalyst for social change. Programs such as "Batty Moves," in the Caribbean "batty" means buttocks, "directly challenges the audience to question their own notions of physical attractiveness and appropriate movement. Now Urban Bush Women hosts "Batty Parties" to expand its civic dialogue practice to discuss positive body images." - Dream Dance Company "brings innovative urban folk art and culture to the stage to tell personal and collective stories of struggle, transformation and inspiration. Their electrifying pieces fuse an incredible breadth of African diasporic movement (including Hip-Hop, House, Break, Funk and Afro-Caribbean dance) with theater, rap, beatbox and live music." [quote link] Their full-length production, "Dig Us Now," "shows how these rich cultural forms have flipped the script on the ugliness of poverty and racism to reflect the beauty and wonder of everyday life." - Jena Marie Griswold has always been inspired by dance and "its capacity to facilitate cross-cultural understanding." As one of 50 graduating seniors this year who was honored with a Thomas J. Watson fellowship, Griswold will spend the next year traveling four continents pursuing a project she calls "Salsa: Spicing Up the International Dance Scene." Griswold who is motivated by her passion for social justice, will be researching how Salsa and Hip-Hop are both physically and socially reinterpreted as she moves from one destination to the next. (Her journey and exploration of dance would make for a wonderful on-going blog project as well. I'm going to email her to see if she plans to do this.) Posted by Doug Fox at 7:54 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) June 1, 2006Reclaiming the Relevancy of DanceOne of the ways for dancers to reach a larger global audience - especially an online audience - is by choreographing dance works that address pressing social, political, cultural and economic issues. Last week I wrote about dance pieces that address global warming. Wouldn't it be great if there were hundreds of dancers from around the world that were actively creating and performing dances that dealt with this important topic? It would be even better if videos of these works were made available online. With a large number of dance videos to watch about global warming, the millions of people who are concerned about the health of our planet would have a new lens through which to reflect and learn about this important issue. One of my questions is what are some of the ways that movement can help people - with or without a dance background - think about and relate to global warming? Can it bring people together in new ways and give them a stronger sense of community? I think that dance videos can inspire more of an emotional way of relating to global warming and thus serve as a powerful springboard for building communities around this topic. This is especially true if some of the videos also strive to help Internet users create their own environmentally-inspired dance pieces and routines and share them with others. The end result of such a project, I think, is that dance would have more relevancy because it would be integrated into the overall fabric of how people learn about and share their thoughts on important topics. Imagine, for example, that on hundreds or thousands of websites that cover environmental issues there were direct links to dance videos that dealt with eco-issues. Dance would instantly be transformed from an enjoyable art form that is often disconnected from our daily concerns to a key piece of the puzzle that helps us understand the world in which we live. In my next post, I'm going to describe some thoughts I have about encouraging large numbers of dancers to address global warming and other important contemporary topics. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:03 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) May 25, 2006Dancing to Combat Global WarmingWith the upcoming US debut of Al Gore's movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," that highlights the catastrophic effects of global warming, I thought I'd revisit the topic of dance performances that address environmental issues. You can visit the official website for this film:  You can also watch the trailer on Google:  In April I wrote about and did an audio interview with Emily Johnson of Catalyst Dance about her "Heat and Life" production that addresses global warming through movement, video and sound:  And this morning I came across an excellent interview (Part I and Part II) with Brenda Way the artistic and executive director of ODC/Dance. Last year, Way choreographed "On a Train Heading South," a work that "focuses on social denial and complacency in the face of environmental degradation." In this interview in Grist Magazine, Way talks about this dance work, the role of artists and the challenges that dancers face. When describing the role of artists she says: A key part of our purpose is to promote perception and awareness, to incite reflection and reactions. I see us as strong allies with environmental groups in the struggle for enlightened social consciousness in our shared desire for a greater humanity. I'd like to know if other dance companies have created works that have addressed environmental issues or plan to do so in the future? I'd also like to know if any of these environmentally-focused dance pieces will be ported to the web so that Internet users can watch video of these performances online. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:40 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0) May 1, 2006The Dwindling Market for Professional CriticsMedia critic Jeff Jarvis has a good post, "Who killed the critics," in his Buzz Machine blog. He writes about the diminished importance of pop culture critics and how the rise of rating websites and consumer generated content are supplanting the need for authoritative voices. Today, in essence, everybody is a critic. What I find odd about the dance world is that dancers and dance companies still haven't expanded beyond or completely bypassed dance critics. Dance companies and performing arts centers are still wedded to the notion that dance critics play a pivotal role in spreading the word about dance performances. This notion is increasingly outdated. I'm not saying that a good review does not help -- it obviously does. What I am saying is that if too much focus is put on getting press coverage, which is increasingly difficult, less time will be spent pursuing other very worthwhile channels for generating large-scale exposure. Dance companies have it within their power to expand beyond dance critics and reach a much larger online audience. But, as of today, a very large percentage of dance companies have simply not taken advantage of opportunities to distribute video promotions that could potentially reach tens of thousands of fans. The irony is that while dance companies value dance critics, newspapers and magazines certainly don't. Take a look at the conference agenda for the upcoming New York meeting of the Dance Critics Association. The first session is devoted to training dance critics on how to write feature stories since papers are running fewer reviews. So if I were a dance company, I would create compelling dance performance video previews and distribute them as widely as possible. I'd actively encourage audiences of social media sites and bloggers to review, rank and dissect these video previews. This is the best approach to building buzz and getting people to talk about your upcoming performances. And if I were a dance critic, I'd be pondering a number of topics: - Why is it that newspapers and magazines keep cutting back on reviews of dance performances? Is it possible that the way critics write about dance is simply not that appealing so fewer people read the reviews? Should critics consider new approaches to writing about dance? - How come dance critics have not created audio podcasts so that dance fans can listen to dance reviews? What would be the best approach to creating compelling audio commentary? - As more dance videos are distributed online, how does the job of a dance critic change? Before the Internet and digital video, dance critics had to write word paintings to help readers visualize movement. But if audiences can see video clips, what exactly should a dance critic describe? - And, overall, are dance critics open to changing how they view the role of criticism? Just about all dance critics are in product review mode. That is they believe they are supposed to review a work as it is presented on stage without taking into consideration the creative process or the intent of the choreographer and performers. (Read my March 24th post, "Dance Critics Don't Get It"). If choreographers and dancers, through blogs and other online platforms, start sharing their creative insights and challenges as they are developing dance pieces, the nature of dancer-audience interaction will change considerably. How will critics deal with this new type of interaction and sharing? Will they ignore it or will they begin to incorporate this exchange of ideas in their reviews? From my perspective, the Dance Critics Association's conference agenda admits defeat (smaller market for dance criticism), but there seems to be no counterbalancing effort to address the fundamental issues that led to this downsizing and there is no effort to experiment with new approaches. Technorati Tags: blog, critic, dance, media, performance, reviews, video Posted by Doug Fox at 12:46 PM - Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0) April 27, 2006Monetizing Your Dance VideosBrightcove, a commercial platform for distributing video content over the Internet, launches its public beta program today. After watching the video tour and reading an overview of their service, Brightcove looks like an intriguing way for video content owners of any size to generate revenue through ads, sales and affiliate network distribution.  While popular sites like YouTube are a great way to get exposure for your dance videos, you end-up reaching a lot of eyeballs but you don't generate any revenue. The concept behind Brightcove is to provide video publishers with a system that allows you to organize your videos into channels, determine how you will generate revenue and choose who will have access to your video content. You could, for instance, create three video channels: 1) Dance performance previews 2) Performance videos for the web 3) Dance instruction videos The first category you could distribute for free. The performance videos you might distribute as part of the Brightcove advertising network and video ads would be inserted each time your video plays. You would get a cut of this advertising revenue. And the third category - dance instruction videos - you might offer on a pay-per-view basis. I think it's time to experiment with services such as Brightcove because there is clearly money to be made - the main question comes down to what the optimal business model is. Will Internet users pay for dance content? How much will they pay for different types of videos? Or is the advertising model the best approach for dance video distribution? Technorati Tags: brightcove, dance, instruction, performance, ppv, tv, video Posted by Doug Fox at 9:56 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 26, 2006Altarholics Spread the Word About Altar BoyzAltar Boyz, the Off-Broadway musical comedy that spoofs boy bands along the lines of "Spinal Tap," launched what I think is a fascinating community website for its intensely loyal fans - the "Altarholics." (Read New York Times article to learn more about show's passionate fans.)  The Altarholics site, designed by word of mouth marketing company Affinitive, is by far the most engaging community-focused promotional platform I've ever come across in the performing arts world. I strongly encourage you to sign-up for free access so that you can explore the sites many interactive capabilities.  At heart, the Altarholics site is about encouraging fans to become active participants of the Altar Boyz community so that they will share their enthusiasm with their friends. If you write a testimonial, you earn "Communion Wafers" that let you win prizes - often involving interaction with cast members. Users are encouraged to email and IM (instant message) their friends as well as add banners to websites and post promotional copy to message boards - in all cases graphic banners, icons and complete code are provided to simplify this process. And the site has so far featured 23 different competitions that engage fans in countless ways - from designing an Altar Boyz decal for T-shirts worn by Altarholics at an upcoming AIDS Walk to encouraging fans who attended an Altarholics appreciation party to write reviews of the event in their own blogs. There is also a message board and chat room so that fans can interact. And you can view a list of top members based upon the number of "Wafers" that they've earned. There's a lot of good food for thought here and I'm sure a lot of these ideas can be transferred to promoting dance performances. Technorati Tags: broadway, marketing, theater, word of mouth Posted by Doug Fox at 8:00 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 25, 2006Take a Friend to a Dance PerformanceMusic blogger Drew McManus started a wonderful program last year that encourages classical music fans to take their uninitiated friends to the orchestra. The 2006 Take a Friend to Orchestra (TAFTO) month is just wrapping-up now and is a great example of how bloggers, musicians, classical music enthusiasts and administrators can join together through the Internet to spread their love of concert music. Drew McManus, a musician, administrator and consultant, writes the Adaptistration blog, which is devoted to orchestra management. You can read his "All About TAFTO 2006" post to learn about this audience-building initiative. Then, you can read his post from yesterday, "TAFTO 2006 After Action Report," to read posts from bloggers and others who share their experiences of taking their friends to see an orchestra. As I wrote in my comment to Drew's post, I think the TAFTO program is wonderful for two reasons. First, it's simply a fun way to get people who don't usually go to live musical performances to attend a classical music program. Second, I enjoyed reading the posts from the many music bloggers who participated in TAFTO. In the dance world, unfortunately, there simply are not that many bloggers writing about dance. And just about nobody is having blog conversations about the challenges facing the dance community. Edward McPherson in his Onward and Upward blog writes about some of the economic challenges facing dance and I cover similar topics, but that's about it. It would be great to see a more vibrant blogging community covering both dance performances as well as the business of dance. I'm not really sure what it would take to expand the dance blogosphere, but it would be great if it does happen. Getting back to TAFTO. Drew emailed me a nice message after I posted my comment last night and expressed my interest in pursuing a similar program for dance. One of his suggestions was that the dance community could create such a program that could take place the month before or after his April 2007 TAFTO program. That way both a Take a Friend to the Orchestra and a Take a Friend to a Dance Performance could be marketed together. I think that would be an excellent idea and plan to explore it. If you have thoughts on a such a program to build audiences for dance, I'd be delighted to hear them. Technorati Tags: dance, performance, marketing, word of mouth Posted by Doug Fox at 11:19 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 24, 2006Crossing Flash Mobs and Site-Specific PerformancesWhat would happen if you crossed a site-specific dance performance with a flash mob? I'm not sure, but you'd probably generate a large, engaged audience. A flash mob is when a group of people -- who may or may not know each other -- use the Internet to arrange a public gathering to perform a specific act that takes place at a specific time and location. A dance flash mob would be when a group of dancers agree to meet at a designated location to dance for a few minutes and then disappear into the crowd. Here's an example of an Argentine Tango flash dance mob in Vancouver:  Or a more recent example of a flash mob took place at the University of Florida earlier this month to recreate a banned Xbox TV commercial that never aired. Here's the bizarre video of this recreation on YouTube:  The above flash mob is based upon a commercial that Microsoft never ran probably because of the excessive simulated violence -- just about everybody in the video is pointing their fingers at others as if they are going to blow each other's heads off. You can watch the original commercial:  What I find interesting is that within 12 days almost 50,000 people watched this University of Florida flash mob, which gives you an idea of what types of videos are most popular on YouTube -- ones that are inane, silly and meaningless. But I still think that there is some value that can be taken from this video and its success. What is it about flash mobs that intrigue people? Why do people participate in flash mobs? Why do others want to watch videos flash mobs? I think it has to do with the compelling nature of spontaneous collective action. It's also an intriguing premise to consider how digital communication tools can be leveraged to bring strangers together within a very short time-frame to act in unison. I was thinking about flash mobs when I came across a write-up on the Networked Performance blog for the upcoming Sitelines 2006 series of site-specific performances that is organized by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. You can view a map mashup that shows the locations for all of the performances:  The program kicks-off in Early May with a performance by Benoit Maubrey's Audio Ballerinas, which features dancers that wear "electro-acoustic clothes and dresses that make sounds by interacting with their environment."  I haven't figured out the answer to my opening question about the end result of crossing site-specific dance performances and flash mobs. But there must be something fun and intriguing that can be created - especially when you start with an outside performance by a technology clad dance troupe. So I ask you: how would you add a flash mob component to this performance to get more people involved and build greater levels of excitement and interest around this event? Technorati Tags: dance, flashmob, performance, xbox, youtube Posted by Doug Fox at 9:02 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) April 21, 2006Build Buzz with Dance Event Photo ContestI was just exploring the community-oriented events calendar Upcoming and I came across an event listing for the Bay Area National Dance Week, which starts today (link to National Dance Week website).  The Upcoming event tracking website, owned by Yahoo, is part of the Web 2.0 trend in that it allows users to tag events of interest and network with others who are tracking the same events. If you visit the profile page for Bay Area National Dance Week on Upcoming, you'll see a list of who's attending this event and whose watching this event (just a handful of people so far). At this point, nobody has added any tags for this event. Bay Area National Dance Week On the Bay Area National Dance Week site, you can explore all of the performances, demonstrations and classes that are taking place over the next 10 days. Sounds like a lot of fun.  As part of this dance event, the organizer is promoting an amateur photo contest. Participants/attendees can take pictures and submit them with the opportunity to win plane tickets and other prizes. I like the idea of a photo contest, but the way this contest is structured does not help promote this week's dance event or future Bay Area dance programs. Essentially, this is an old-school photo contest. You actually have to submit pictures by snail mail. If I were organizing this photo contest, this is what I'd do: 1) I'd offer a competition for both videos and pictures. 2) Encourage all performers/instructors/lecturers to provide a blanket waiver that allows pictures and videos to be shot during any of their programs - no flash photography. 3) I'd include on the dance event website a listing all of performers who have signed the blanket waiver and who have not signed the blanket waiver. This way people who want to participate in the photo and video contest would know when they are allowed to take pictures and video. 4) I'd encourage everybody who participates to post their pictures and videos on high-traffic multimedia hosting websites. 5) I'd create an online submission form so that anybody who took pictures and video could submit their entries for the competition along with a URL for the location of their files. For starters, my approach would get more people involved in the competition. It is too time-consuming to print pictures and submit them by mail. If participants can upload their pictures and video to any website(s) they wish, thousands of people can look at them and learn about this dance event while it's taking place, which is likely to build a much larger dance audience as this 10-day event progresses. My approach instantly builds large-scale world-of-mouth marketing with zero investment on the part of the dance event organizer. The dancers get more exposure and more people get excited about dance. Technorati Tags: calendar, dance, performance, upcoming, web2.0 Posted by Doug Fox at 10:55 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 19, 2006Dancing to the Sounds of the EarthOn April 4th, Principal Dancer Muriel Maffre of the San Francisco Ballet performed an eight-minute work to commemorate the centennial of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.  "Ballet Mori," performed at the War Memorial Opera House, is an improvised solo work danced to natural sounds generated from real-time seismic data. Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, led by artist and engineer Ken Goldberg, measured the low-level seismic activity of the Hayward Fault and transmitted these recordings to the Opera House. Based upon this live streaming data, earthlike musical sounds were generated to which Maffre danced. Resources - Video clip of Ballet Mori [via networked performance]. - Weekend America audio interview with Muriel Maffre and Ken Goldberg. - "Shaking Up the Ballet" article in Wired by Jonathon Keats. Technorati Tags: ballet, dance, earthquake, performance, technology Posted by Doug Fox at 10:19 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 5, 2006A New Business Model for Dance CompaniesSince starting my blog in September of last year, I've come across many depressing stories about the economic perils faced by dance companies. Some dance companies simply can't survive or their economic health remains tenuous. In an article in today's New York Times [via Downtown Dancer], choreographer Bill T. Jones is quoted: "You don't make a damn cent in dance." That succinctly sums up the problem. The question for dance-makers is the following: Given the constant financial challenges, what new approaches can be taken to improve the economic conditions of dancers and dance companies? Or, better yet, how can more dance companies ensure that they have a healthy and secure financial future? I have a two-part answer: 1) Dance companies should broaden the sources from which they seek financial support, and 2) Dance companies should seek commissions for dance works that have both a live and online component. Science and Dance - A New Partnership Before providing an explanation of my two-part solution, I need to highlight a trend that has potentially wonderful ramifications for dance. Over the past half year, I've noticed that a number of dance companies have been exploring scientific and technological themes in their works. Here are just a few examples: - Rambert Dance Company: "Constant Speed" (Physics) - Australian Dance Theatre: "Devolution" (Robotics) - Liz Lerman Dance Exchange: "Ferocious Beauty: Genome" (Genetics/DNA) - San Francisco Ballet: "Ballet Mori" (Earth Science) These dance works are very intriguing because they offer examples of how human movement can serve to give audiences a different and enhanced way of reflecting on science and technological developments. There is also an economic component to the fusion of dance and science. Focusing on scientific themes makes good business sense for dancers. There happen to be thousands upon thousands of scientific, technological, medical and related companies that need to market and promote their products and services. And the art form of dance is already showing itself to be a compelling means of explaining, exploring and grappling with scientific and technological developments and changes. So what better partnership could there be than for dance companies to seek commissions or other forms of financial support from private companies in the scientific and technological arena? Plus, there is one more element that I want to point out about companies in the technology/scientific realm: They appreciate the importance of leveraging the Internet to reach their customers - I'll elaborate on this point in just a moment. Back to My Two-Part Solution As I just explained, dance is a wonderful way to explore and make vivid a huge range of scientific topics. So the first component of my plan is straightforward: Seek commissions/funding/sponsorship from companies in the scientific, technological, medical and related fields - or funding from associations, foundations and related entities that represent these companies. The second component of my plan is a little trickier because it has not been done yet - but it represents a huge growth area for dance. The economics of dance companies, which, as Bill T. Jones explained, is miserable, is not going to significantly change until dancers find financially profitable ways to exploit the Internet. The logic is simple. Even in the best of circumstances, you can have only so many people who are going to buy a ticket to watch a performance. The Internet, on the other hand, allows you to reach an audience of potentially unlimited size. So in addition to seeking commissions from scientific and technological companies, you'll want to propose dance works to these corporations that are designed for the theater as well as the online world. This dual-track approach to performance will be much more compelling to potential sponsors. Not only will they receive the traditional benefits of sponsoring a dance performance, but they will receive the many benefits that come with helping to underwrite the Internet-based version of your dance piece as well. From your perspective, you'll be able to raise more money, there will be good synergies between your live performances and their online component, and you will be able to generate additional revenue from online sales. But I'm leaving out one critical component: What is the structure and nature of the online component of your dance performance and how specifically will you make money from it? To be continued... Technorati Tags: business, dance, marketing, performance, technology Posted by Doug Fox at 2:54 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) Review of "InterPlay" - Another Language's Multi-Site, Internet2-Enabled PerformanceThis past weekend was the performance of "InterPlay," a multi-site dance and arts event that linked performers at different locations together in real-time via the high-speed Internet2. I recently conducted an audio interview with Beth Miklavcic and Jimmy Miklavcic of Another Language who created this program.  You can read a review of this weekend's performance in The Salt Lake Tribune. Technorati Tags: dance, iternet2, performance, video Posted by Doug Fox at 10:33 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) April 4, 2006Dance Audition Links - Part IThis is my first post about how to use the Internet to find dance auditions. In this post I provide my initial impressions of websites with dance audition listings that do not charge you a fee. In upcoming post I'll write about fee-based dance audition listing sites. Please email me or post comment with your thoughts, additions or corrections. To get started, I posted messages on three dance message boards saying that I was about to write about how dancers can use the Internet to find auditions. Here are my messages and the responses - Voice of Dance had the largest number of responses: Free Audition Listing Sites (The below listings are not in any particular order - I just listed them as I wrote about each site.) - Answers4Dancers: A few dance auditions for US East and West Coasts are listed on home page as well as in their free email newsletter. To access the large majority, you'll need to sign-up for their fee-based service. I'll write more about Answers4Dancers in my next post about audition listing sites and services. - Article19: Page with up-to-date auditions in UK and other European countries. - Dance Europe: Page of dance auditions in Europe - mostly updated. But some listings are for past events. - Craiglist: random, scattered, limited number of dance auditions in different cities around the world. Here are sample listings from New York City. - Pointe Magazine: Message board with audition section. But from my brief browsing, it seems like discussion about auditions and not listings of actual auditions. - DanceArt.com: Select "Audition Notices" from drop-down list at top of message board. There are posts for auditions but the audition dates appear to have already past for the listings. So not very helpful. - Dance Magazine: There is no listing of dance auditions - just wanted to include them since their magazine includes extensive audition listings. - Voice of Dance: Message board with a large number audition listings with primary focus on US West Coast - as with most message board type set-ups, you can't easily figure out when audition dates have passed. - Critical Dance: Auditions/Opportunities: They list a limited number of company auditions in a single thread, which makes it very tough to find relevant information - most auditions have already passed. - Elitedance Broadcast Network: Includes links to a large number of audition websites - I should have written about them at the top of this list - but I'm not sure I agree with their rating system. They give Critical Dance a 9 out of 10. I like the Critical Dance message board, but not their audition listings. - CastingAudition.com: Listings for "dance - live shows" and "dance - filmed/recorded". First searchable database I've come across, but you have to submit your email address and wait for a casting director to get back to you to learn more about a listing that you like - seems like a hassle. - Dance.net: extensive listing of updated dance auditions in US and Canada with a clear indication of deadline dates. Technorati Tags: audition, dance, performance Posted by Doug Fox at 6:30 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) Emily Johnson Interview about "Heat and Life"This morning I interviewed Emily Johnson the director of the Minneapolis, Minnesota-based dance company, Catalyst Dance. She discussed her latest work "Heat and Life" which deals with the subject of global warming. The next performance of this work will be at the Dance Theater Workshop in New York City on June 28th. Click here to listen to audio interview (MP3 format - Stereo - 7.12 MB - 15:32 Minutes)  Emily Johnson - Background Emily Johnson is the director of the Minneapolis, Minnesota-based dance company, Catalyst Dance. Since its founding in 1998, Emily, an Alaskan native, has choreographed dance works for her eight-member company that are both thought-provoking and entertaining. With the contributions of poets, musicians, sculptors and video artists, Catalyst Dance has performed on stage, in parks, at art galleries, storefronts and bars. "Heat and Life," which focuses on the topic of global warming, is Emily Johnson's latest creation and is in the midst of a 50-state tour since its debut in October 2004. Heat and Life combines movement, video and sound into a work this is part dance concert and part installation. Technorati Tags: dance, environment, global warming, performance, podcast Posted by Doug Fox at 1:50 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) March 31, 2006New Strategies for Booking Dance CompaniesPerforming arts booking conferences serve to bring presenters and performers together for business, networking and educational purposes. In the world of dance, this means that presenters (performing arts venues, dance festivals, tour organizers and promoters) have an opportunity to see performances and book dance companies. To explore an example of an upcoming performing arts booking conference, you can visit the site for Performing Arts Exchange, an event that will take place in Baltimore, Maryland from September 27-30, 2006. While these face-to-face encounters and performance showcases, offer excellent opportunities for assessment, interaction and learning, they are just one component of what could be a much larger and richer collaborative endeavor to book performances for an upcoming season. What these booking conferences lack is large-scale, structured input from audiences (or potential audiences) about the types of dance performances that are of greatest interest to them. And until the emergence of what is now referred to as the Web 2.0, there was not really a mechanism whereby dance enthusiasts could contribute in a meaningful way to indicating their preferences for specific dance companies and preferred types of performances.  For a good introduction to the Web 2.0, you can read this week's cover story in Newsweek, "The New Wisdom of the Web." Here is my scenario of how the more collaborative culture of the Web 2.0 can play a role in helping presenters book performances that are appealing to larger, more diverse audiences: - Imagine that all dance companies participating in an upcoming performing arts booking conference created a profile on a social networking site - I'll use MySpace as an example, although the young demographic profile of this site's users is not completely on target for the purpose of dance performances. On their MySpace profile page, dance companies can describe their upcoming performances and include links to performance video clips on YouTube and pictures on Flickr. - In addition to or instead of MySpace, some dance companies may have their own blogs where they write about their dance company and performances. - Now web surfers with an interest in dance start viewing the MySpace profiles and reading blog entries as well as watch dance videos and view pictures. - Dance enthusiasts can respond to this dance company content in many different ways. Maybe a dance fan posts a message to his or her blog about one of the dance company's videos. Another dancer saves the link for a set of dance photos to the collaborative bookmarking site Del.icio.us. Another adds a MySpace profile of a dance company to their friend's list on My Space. Another saves a dance video to their YouTube favorites and posts a comment.  Tag Cloud from Flickr Cloud show more popular tags by size - Even more fruitful is that as dance fans explore, write about, comment on, save and evaluate the online dance content, they are constantly categorizing (tagging) the pictures, videos, links and other resources that they like. A video might be categorized, for example, by tagging it "moderndance" and "environment" - I'm assuming that a modern dance piece happens to deal with an environmental theme. Once this video is tagged, it is then possible to find this clip by using either tag as a search term. So if you enter "moderndance" into the video search engine, you'll see a listing for this environmentally-focused modern dance work. And now to jump way too quickly to the end result: Let's imagine that the above collaborative activity has been taking place for two months preceding a booking conference. What kind of new insights would presenters and dance companies have? - They could explore the social networks created around specific dance companies on sites such as MyFriends. Why are some dance companies very popular and have hundreds or thousands of "friends" while others do not? Is this just a popularity contest or are there meaningful insights that can be gleaned from these explicitly expressed connections? Are certain styles of dance, themes or creative intent more captivating than others? - By accessing the blog search engine and analysis tool Technorati, they can find out what types of conversations have emerged around the blog postings of specific dance companies and dance fans. What are the hot ideas that are being debated? What do people like and dislike? What are the challenging, disruptive questions? - On YouTube, videos can be searched by the number of views and comments can be reviewed to determine how viewers reacted to the dance clips. What are the most popular dance videos and why? Do the top 10 most popular videos share something in common? What key terms have been used to categorize different types of dance videos? - On Flickr, as with YouTube, dance pictures can be considered by popularity and reviews can be scanned to understand viewer reactions. - And on bookmarking sites such as Del.icio.us, saved links can be analyzed by what tags dance fans used to categorize their favorite videos, pictures and other resources. Do the tagging schemes of users indicate that there are specific themes that especially capture their interest? And which of these links have been bookmarked by the largest number of users? Above I'm just scratching the surface in terms of the range of ways that Web 2.0 data and connections can be evaluated and analyzed to gain an understanding of what dance enthusiasts are looking for in terms of dance performances. But hopefully, it offers a glimpse into what some of the possibilities are in terms of the emerging collaborative web. Posted by Doug Fox at 11:50 AM - Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0) March 29, 2006Liz Lerman Audio Interview About "Ferocious Beauty: Genome"This afternoon I interviewed Liz Lerman of Liz Lerman Dance Exchange about her company's latest work "Ferocious Beauty: Genome." I'm fascinated by the intersection of dance and science so it was great to have an opportunity to hear what Liz had to say about her exploration of genetics through dance and movement. Below you'll find a bio of Liz and her dance company as well as links to recent articles about "Ferocious Beauty." Click here to listen to audio interview (MP3 format - Stereo - 10.1 MB - 21:32 Minutes)  Still From "Ferocious Beauty" Credit: George Ruhe for The New York Times Background - Liz Lerman Dance Exchange Liz Lerman is founding artistic director of Liz Lerman Dance Exchange. Her dance company features a multi-generational ensemble that creates, performs, teaches and engages people in making art. Throughout its 30 year history, Dance Exchange has defined dance as a multi-disciplinary art form that encompasses movement, music, imagery, and the spoken word. Dance Exchange, which is based in Takoma Park, Maryland, has created over 50 innovative dance and theater works and has participated in thousands of performances and community encounters in the United States and around the globe. Liz Lerman has received numerous honors, including the American Choreographer Award, the American Jewish Congress “Golda” Award, and Washingtonian magazine’s 1988 Washingtonian of the Year. In 2002 her work was recognized with a MacArthur “Genius Grant” Fellowship, and she was recently designated for the National Foundation for Jewish Culture’s Achievement Award and induction into the University of Maryland’s Hall of Fame. Background - Ferocious Beauty: Genome Liz's latest work is "Ferocious Beauty: Genome," which premiered February 3rd at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. "Ferocious Beauty" is a multimedia performance that explores the latest developments in genetic science and the impact of this research on our own lives. The goal of this endeavor is to foster a long-term partnership among a national group of scientists, bio-ethicists, researchers, clergy and artists who will bring their best thinking to bear on the promise and threat of a new biological age. Links for Ferocious Beauty: Genome - "Liz Lerman Exchange connects science and dance" - The Wesleyan Argus - "Connecting Bodies, Apples and DNA Through Dance" - New York Times - "World Premiere of the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange’s Ferocious Beauty: Genome" - Press Release, Wesleyan University - Center for the Arts Posted by Doug Fox at 3:35 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) How to Offer Your First Dance Video MashupLast night I saw a poster in the DC Metro for the upcoming "Take The Lead" movie with Antonio Banderas. I tried to remember the site's URL but forgot about it until I saw the post about this dance movie in Edward McPherson's blog.  Mashup Music Maker from Take the Lead It's interesting exploring this movie website to see how it compares to promotional sites for recent dance movies - and related online dance promotion efforts in general. I'm getting a little tired of these virtual dance games where you click and drag a series of dance steps into a time line and then record and share your dance creations - that's what you can do on the Take the Lead site. It's time to move on and innovate. What I did find interesting about this movie site is that they also have a Mash Up Maker where you can mix two songs and save the final piece. And you can listen to mashups created by other users as well. So I was trying to figure out how dance companies could create their own dance video mashups on their own websites as a way to build buzz for upcoming performances. This is what I came-up with: Why not take a camcorder and film a dancer or dancers against a bluescreen background. Put this video on your website and encourage visitors to download your video and mix it with an additional video that is relevant to the themes of your dance piece. Once a user finishes creating their mashup, they can upload it to a gallery on your website where all the mashups can be watched. Maybe you can add a competition component to this mashup offering as well where you pick the best mashups of the week.  Still from Heat and Life Here's an example: Take a performance such as "Heat and Life" from Emily Johnson's Catalyst Dance Company that deals with the topic of global warming. You could video tape a 2-minute segment from this work with the dancers performing against a blue screen (or green screen) background. (When you shoot video with a blue or green screen background, it is easy to remove this solid color background and drop the objects your are filming into another video - video editing software programs call this chroma-key.) You post this 2-minute segment on your website and visitors download this video clip. Then site visitors would be encouraged to take the dancers and superimpose them on their own video clip that dealt in some manner with global warming. Maybe the video backdrop shows images of polar ice caps melting or something closer to home such as industrial plants pumping pollutants into the air. The mashup video clip could also include the creator adding videos of themselves dancing into the mix. Many possibilities - even making the entire backdrop completely abstract. After the dance video mashups are submitted, they could be placed in an archive for anybody to watch and either the dance company or website visitors or both could vote on their favorites. I think this idea would be a lot of fun and generate a lot of buzz. So definitely let me know if you decide to do something along these lines. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:15 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) March 27, 2006Take a Tour of Jasmin Vardimon's ParkThe UK-based Jasmin Vardimon Dance Company performs works of physical dance theater that even Article19 likes: If the Lab [Article19] was picking favourites then this company would be one of them for the sheer inventiveness of the choreography and the quality of the performances.  On Article19 you can watch a 7-minute excerpt of "Park," a work of choreographer Jasmin Vardimon that just finished touring in February. There's a dedicated website for "Park" that's worth exploring. It's colorful and engaging and reflects the mood of their dance piece. From a marketing standpoint, visitors are invited to participate in a competition to win an iPod, there's a subscriber update via email, there's a questionnaire to gather feedback and there's a press section with print-quality photos for download.  In terms of other features, you can access a video clip, listen to the eight performers discuss their characters and watch audience testimonials. The only thing that bugs me about their site is that they embed scrollable frames in the middle of their pages, which I always find to be an annoying way to navigate website content. Overall, a fun, engaging site that is far better than most dance websites - and an enjoyable video. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:20 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) Exploring Science Through DanceOne of the trends I've noticed recently is the increase in the number of dance performances that explore scientific topics. I think that it's great that dance is being harnessed to help illuminate developments in technology, biology and earth sciences. Here are some recent and upcoming performances that explore genetics, energy conservation and seismic activity: In "Ferocious Beauty: Genome," Liz Lerman Dance Exchange explores the impact of developments in genetic science on human development. Next performance April 28th in San Francisco. (New York Times article, The Wesleyan Argus)  Credit: Theoretical and Computational Biophysics Group The San Francisco Ballet performs Ballet Mori to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the 1906 earthquake. Principal Dancer Muriel Maffre will dance to live to seismic data on April 4th. (Press release, Guardian Unlimited)  Credit: Prof. Alan Rosiene, FIT Choreographer Emily Johnson of Catalyst Dance presents "Windfarm" in Minneapolis on March 19th. Windfarm explores the intersection of humans, machines and nature and the potential of windfarms to stop the degradation of our environment. (StarTribune.com)  Credit: University of Wisconsin-River Falls Posted by Doug Fox at 8:46 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) March 7, 2006Interview with Another Language About InterPlayToday I interviewed Beth Miklavcic, the artistic director, and Jimmy Miklavcic, the executive director, of Another Language, an interdisciplinary dance company, based in Salt Lake City, Utah, that they started in 1985. Click here to listen to audio interview (MP3 format - Stereo - 9.1 MB - 19:18 Minutes) During this interview Beth and Jimmy discuss their InterPlay series of performances that unite multiple venues in a real-time collaborative program that relies upon high-speed video conferencing over the Internet2 backbone.  Their next program, "Dancing on the Banks of Packet Creek: RealTime Distributed Surrealistic Cinema" will take place March 31st through April 2nd 2006 at multiple locations from the University of Alaska Fairbanks to the University of Maryland where I plan to watch this performance. Posted by Doug Fox at 1:13 PM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (1) March 3, 2006Devolution - Robots and Humans Share the StageAustralian Dance Theatre (ADT) is premiering today its newest work, "Devolution," at the Adelaide Arts Festival in Sydney, Australia. Artistic Director Garry Stewart collaborated with machine designer Louis-Philippe Demers to create a performance that puts dancers and robots on the same stage on an equal footing. I wish I could find some good pictures of what these dancing robots look like. Short of that, here are some articles and interviews about the performance: - Interview in RealTime with Garry Stewart about his thoughts on dance and robotics - "Closing the Gap Between Man and Machine," in The Age - "Danger! Machines in motion," in Thee Advertiser Posted by Doug Fox at 6:45 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) March 2, 2006Yacov Sharir Interview - Wearable Computers and PerformanceToday I interviewed dance and technology pioneer Yacov Sharir about his research in wearable computers and performance. In this post you'll find a profile of Yacov Sharir, pictures from his research, and external links to related articles and performances. Click here to listen to audio interview (MP3 format - Stereo - 8.85 MB - 19:20 Minutes) Profile - Yacov Sharir Yacov Sharir is a choreographer, dancer, technologist and innovator. He is a professor of Theatre/Dance and Virtual Environments at the University of Texas-Austin and artistic director of the Austin-based Sharir Dance Company. He has performed under the direction of Martha Graham, Jerome Robbins, Jose Limon and Anna Sokolow. Sharir is the founder of the American Deaf Dance Company and the Sharir Dance Company. As a multiple recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Choreographic Fellowship, he has choreographed for the Bat-Sheva Dance Company, Hartford Ballet, Dallas Ballet, the Kibbutz Dance Company of Israel, the Utah Repertory Dance Theatre and others. He was a recipient of an "Arts And Virtual Environments" two-year fellowship awarded by the Banff Center for the Arts and is engaged in extensive international lectures and workshops directly related to the issues of virtual environments, cyberspace and computerized choreography. Image Gallery - Wearable Computers During the audio interview Yacov Sharir refers to the below pictures.       Links - Articles, Papers and Research - Yacov Sharir - Associate Professor of Theatre and Dance at the University of Texas-Austin - Explorations in wearable computers - Cyber Human Characters and 3D Worlds - Interfacing Virtual & Physical Spaces through the Body: The cyberPRINT Project by Yacov Sharir and others (PDF) - cyberPRINT project and performance Posted by Doug Fox at 11:16 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (1) February 8, 2006Last Night's Alvin Ailey Performance at Kennedy CenterI saw Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater last night at the Kennedy Center. I got lucky and had front row seats. The dancing was wonderful. Alvin Ailey is performing through Sunday, but tickets are only available for tonight and Thursday - the other shows are sold out. It was great to see Alvin Ailey's classic "Revelations" from 1960 that closed the performance and continued after a standing ovation. Works performed included: "Shining Star" (David Parsons), "Solo" (Hans van Manen), "Reminiscin'" (Judith Jamison) and "Revelations" (Alvin Ailey). Posted by Doug Fox at 8:18 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) January 30, 2006International Ballet Academy Festival at Kennedy CenterOn Friday I attended "Proteges: The International Ballet Academy Festival" at the Kennedy Center here in Washington, DC. The program featured: - Dance Theatre of Harlem School Here are three reviews of performances: - "No Moment Wasted" in Dance View Times by George Jackson - "Proteges': Ballet Steps From the Past Into a Bright Future" in Washington Post by Alexandra Tomalonis - "Showcase for the World's Young Dancers" in New York Times by Jennifer Dunning Posted by Doug Fox at 6:46 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) January 26, 2006Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago Coming to DCAfter taking a lot of jazz classes, I'm looking forward to seeing Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago here in DC on February 25th at the American Dance Institute. 
Posted by Doug Fox at 10:11 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) January 24, 2006Bill T. Jones is My Podcasting HeroThis is awesome. I just found a 10-minute audio discussion with Bill T. Jones about his recent dance piece "Blind Date." I visited the Bill T. Jones website after writing about Rachel Howard's review of this work which she wrote for the San Francisco Chronicle. I found a link to the Hopkins Center for the Arts where you can listen to this post-performance discussion. I know it's just a 10-minute audio piece, but you get to actually listen to the choreographer discuss his work. It makes a huge difference when you can listen to an artistic director or dancer talk about a performance. This shouldn't be a big deal because it is not difficult to put audio and video on the web. The problem is that almost nobody in the dance world does this. So I'm just encouraging the dance community to follow in the footsteps (that's corny) of Bill T. Jones and offer your audiences a deeper understanding of your performances. I'll make it easier. If you have wisdom and insight to share, please contact me and I'll interview you for the Great Dance Audio Podcasts. (Or, if you have Apple's iTunes software, you can access Great Dance Podcasts here.) Posted by Doug Fox at 5:43 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) Rachel Howard's Reviews Bill T. Jone's "Blind Date"Blogger Rachel Howard reviews Bill T. Jones's "Blind Date" in the San Francisco Chronicle: "Blind Date," which premiered in September and stopped at UC Berkeley's Zellerbach Hall on Saturday during its national tour, is typical Jones: smart, confrontational, strangely elegant and sprawling. Its subject is nothing less than the terror of our times, and yet the two-part, two-hour work is not one of Jones' most provocative. It holds a mirror to our age. Perhaps it's a sad commentary on contemporary numbness to say the reflection seems only accurate, and neither revelatory nor startling. Rachel adds to her blog entry about this review: I reviewed Bill T. Jones's new "Blind Date" Saturday. I'm a big Bill T. Jones admirer--I'm constantly in awe of the sophistication of gesture in his choreography, the complexity and clarity of shape--but "Blind Date" was not one of my favorite Jones works. Posted by Doug Fox at 5:29 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) Another Review of Troika Ranch PerformanceAnother review of Troika Ranch's mediated dance piece 16 "[R]evolutions Open Source" in New York - this one written by Deborah Jowitt in The Village Voice. Performances are at the Eyebeam Art & Technology Center through January 28th. I mentioned NY Times review by John Rockwell a few days ago. Posted by Doug Fox at 4:20 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) January 20, 2006Review of Troika Ranch Performance in NYCJohn Rockwell writes review in today's New York Times about Troika Ranch's "16 [R]evolutions" performance at the Eyebeam Arts and Technology Center in Chelsea. While praising the recent work of choreographer Dawn Stoppiello, and "computer wizard" and composer Mark Coniglio, Rockwell is not thrilled with their latest performance: "If visuals alone could guarantee success, this would be a triumph. But the concept and the choreography don't deliver as much as the technology." I've always wanted to see Troika Ranch perform. I thought I might be going up to NYC this week but I didn't make it. So I'll have to catch their next performance. Posted by Doug Fox at 6:31 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) January 12, 2006Double Your Dance AudiencesHere's how to double the size of the audience at your next dance performance: 1) Let's say you have a dance piece that's 15 minutes in duration. Take a camcorder and videotape the entire dance work. 2) Put the entire video on your website or blog. Make two versions available: one with a musical soundtrack and the second with an annotated audio guide. This second version would be the same as listening to an interview with the director or actors as you're watching a movie DVD. But in the case of a dance performance, the artistic director, choreographer and/or dancers would describe the piece as it unfolds. 3) Promote the two video versions of your dance piece like crazy. For instance, list your videos on Google Video, Yahoo Video Search, YouTube and Revver. And also create a podcast channel for your video so you can distribute it through iTunes. Finally, email every dance blogger and tell them what you're doing - you are sure to get a lot of exposure. 4) Make sure that both versions of your dance video include ample promotional information about your next performance so that viewers know where to buy tickets and see the event. 5) In addition, make the audio annotation guide available separately on your website also for free one week before your performance. Encourage your website viewers to transfer this audio guide to their portable music players and take it with them to your performance. 6) At your performance, perform this dance piece twice. The first performance is so that attendees can listen to the annotated audio guide while watching your performance. The second time so that viewers can enjoy the performance that much more because they will have significantly more background about the piece. The notion that you can't give away video of dance performances because your audience will decrease in size is an unproven myth. More people go to musical concerts specifically because they have already listened to the music and/or watched a groups' videos. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:32 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) November 15, 2005Bypassing the Mainstream Media to Promote DanceIn previous post I linked to blogs and online newspapers that have recently featured stories about the decline of dance coverage in local papers. This paucity of dance coverage is one of the major complaints within the dance community. Here's where I stand on this topic: dance companies, presenters and dance critics should accept as fact that any direct effort to encourage newspapers and magazines to increase coverage of dance will not be successful. Letter writing campaigns to newspaper publishers and editors, for example, are a waste of time and energy. I agree with much of Rachel Feinerman's statement: I’m not discouraging the community from fighting for the newspaper space we’re going to lose but one has to wonder whether what we have now is even worth fighting for. How worthwhile are the small paragraphs that barely have enough room to name the show and the choreographer? So if the mainstream press will not cover dance, then how will dance companies, presenters and performance venues build audiences? Here's my four-part game plan for bypassing the traditional media: 1) Build Your Own Multimedia Distribution Channel As I described in my 24-page white paper, "Embracing Blogs: A New Blueprint for Promoting Dance on the Internet," the most important first step that dance companies can take is to build their own multimedia weblog to ensure large-scale promotion for upcoming dance performances. If you can't get the coverage you want and need in the local media, then build a direct communications channel with your own audience. It is not expensive or difficult to create a blog and promote it on the Web. 2) Recognize New Categories and Types of Dance Writers When thinking about getting coverage for your upcoming performances, it's important to think about dance coverage in new ways. There are certain assumptions that we take for granted when we think about published articles written about dance performances: - Assumption One: Only professional dance critics (as opposed to hobbyists) will write about performances - Assumption Two: The written pieces will be reviews (as opposed to, say, a viewer guide on how to watch a dance piece) of dance performances - Assumption Three: Reviews will be delivered almost exclusively through words (as opposed to pictures, audio descriptions and video clips) and will usually be in print format - although more reviews are now appearing online Now, let's think about these underlying assumptions in the context of how dance promotion and criticism can be presented in the online world. Essentially, each of these assumptions is way too limiting when it comes to the web. If you uncritically accept these assumptions, then you will significantly limit the type of promotion you will receive online for your dance performances. Assumption One: Professional Dance Critics Terry Teachout has a piece in the Wall Street Journal, "You, Too, Can Be a Critic," that explores how art journalism is expanding through weblogs. He identifies an emerging type of online arts writing that is done by practitioner bloggers - artists who also offer their own arts criticism. But Terry is not going far enough. Not only can professional critics and practitioner bloggers write about dance and the arts online, but hobbyists and enthusiasts who simply want to share their passion and insights can and do blog as well. Admittedly, Terry is focusing specifically on art criticism; I'm focusing on the larger pool of anybody and everybody who may write about dance. Assumption Two: Just Dance Reviews We are so used to reading dance reviews that we never consider that there are other ways to convey information about dance. Many years ago (about 1984), I read the autobiography of the Spanish-born filmmaker Luis Bunuel (for the life of me I can't find this book on Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble or the web). In addition to recalling that he drank everyday and smoked a daily pack of Ducados into his 80s, I remember that he told an interesting story about the early days of silent movies in Mexico. When silent movies were first shown to audiences, the series of moving images did not present a coherent narrative to viewers. Essentially nobody had any clue what was happening on the screen. So a person called an "explicador" stood up-front by the side of the screen and explained how to understand the storyline and the interactions among the actors. Over time, if I recall correctly, viewers developed an intuitive understanding of how to interpret movies and no longer required the aid of an explicador. At the same time I was reading Luis Bunuel's autobiography I was watching my favorite baseball announcer Tim McCarver (well I've watched Tim McCarver over many years). The reason why I think McCarver is great is because he offers strategic insights into the game that I never thought about. Even though I played baseball growing up, McCarver would offer a way of looking at plays that I had never contemplated. I can't say the same for most football announcers, which frustrates me to death. I've played in pick-up games over the years, but I've never played in an organized football league. So it would be nice if for once a TV football announcer would offer some insight into the strategy and tactics of professional and college football teams, but they almost never do. With Bunuel's silent movie "explicadors" and McCarver's play-by-play insights in mind, I'd like to introduce a new type of dance writer. This is a writer whose focus would be to reach out well beyond devoted, very knowledgeable fans of dance to the much larger audience of people who would be more than happy to become dance enthusiasts if somebody would simply show the way. Current dance criticism is often not very accessible to people who haven't been immersed in dance for years. So dance writing in the form of reviews does not serve the purpose of growing the community of dance fans. Taking myself as an example: I do not always understand the dance reviews that I read. I would like to understand them and I'm sure that over time I will as I attend more dance performances and continue taking dance classes (I'm taking Jazz classes right now at Joy of Motion in DC). What I really could use - and I'm sure many others would benefit as well - is an "explicador" in the form of Tim McCarver. I want knowledgeable dance enthusiasts writing in their blogs about dance in a manner that is more educational than critical. I want to learn how to understand a dance piece, and what I should be looking for and thinking about as I watch a dance piece. Essentially I want a non-academic, dancework-specific dance appreciation course. But I don't want it in the abstract I want these types of insights for dance performances I will see or just saw. When it comes to the web, there is no premium on space as there is with newsprint. So there is no reason that this type of introductory dance writing cannot exist side-by-side with reviews and commentary by professional dance critics and practitioner bloggers. Assumption Three: Text-Based Reviews Words, words and more words are not the only way to cover dance. It is increasingly easy to share pictures, audio clips and videos with audiences. As of today, I don't think that there is a single blog that provides multimedia coverage of upcoming or past dance performances. This lack of use of multimedia content is too bad because there is nothing like engaging video to get people excited about upcoming performances. So to wrap up this section on identifying underlying assumptions, I think that when we consider how the web can be harnessed to cover dance, it's important that we don't allow ourselves to be boxed into the prevailing notions that only professional dance critics can cover dance and that this coverage must be in the form of written reviews - there are many additional ways for us proceed. And if we start with the notion that there are many different types of people who can write about dance (professional critics, practitioner-bloggers and amateurs) and that dance can be written about in different ways (criticism and introductory guides), then we dramatically increase the number of outlets on the web that may write about your upcoming dance performances. 3) Prepare Your Own Multimedia Content As new types of dance coverage take root through blogs and websites, it is very important that dance companies, presenters and venues play a proactive role in providing a wide-range of multimedia content to these new outlets. In other words, dance companies must make good quality digital pictures and video clips available of upcoming and past performances to both professional and non-professional websites/blogs that cover dance. This multimedia content should be placed on a dance company's website and anybody who covers dance should be encouraged to use the videos and pictures on their own sites in order to provide coverage of these dance performances. There seems to be an incredible reluctance on the part of dance companies to share images and videos of dance performances. Maybe dance companies want to protect their creative work - that is clearly understandable. But if the goal is to get as much coverage as possible in order to build audiences, then, I think, it is imperative that dance companies devote the time and effort to creating and distributing this multimedia content to as many websites/blogs as possible. If protecting copyrighted content is important, it is not difficult to add logos and watermarks to video files and digital pictures to ensure proper attribution and recognition. 4) Support Local Bloggers and Networks of Bloggers In many cities and regions, we will soon see an increase in the number of local bloggers who are writing about dance - these bloggers may be professional critics or they may be amateurs. In some cases, local bloggers are likely to join together in formal or informal networks in order to provide greater coverage of the local dance scene. I think that it is very important that dance companies support and encourage these bloggers. Dance blogging is going to start growing exponentially, and, along with your direct blogging efforts, these independent blogs will begin to attract a lot of attention from people who are considering what dance performances to attend. So one of the reasons why you will want to provide ample multimedia content about your dance performances as I described right above is so that these local bloggers are encouraged to feature your dance programs. Something else to keep in mind: The more blogs that cover your upcoming dance performances the higher your own blog will be listed in popular search engines. Search engines often determine how they list results based upon the "authority" of a website. "Authority" means the number of websites that link to your website. So if a lot of blogs link to you, then you will have a high level of "authority" and your website will be displayed higher up in search results. Conclusion The mainstream press cannot be convinced to increase their coverage of dance. Given that coverage will only decrease in these traditional outlets, it is necessary for dance companies to take direct charge of getting as much publicity as possible. To ensure wide-spread coverage, dance companies as well as presenting organizations and venues should: - Create and promote their own multimedia blogs Posted by Doug Fox at 11:15 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (1) November 2, 2005Retail Dance Festival in San FranciscoThe 2005 Retail Dance Festival takes place this weekend at Union Square in San Francisco. Retail Dance, launched in 2001, features the work of local choreographers whose pieces are performed in retail showrooms, store windows, hotels and restaurants. Consumers get to experience dance free of charge, retailers underwrite the brief performances, and dancers and choreographers are compensated and have an opportunity to promote their upcoming performances and classes as well.  This festival is presented by choreographer Kim Shipp who created the concept of Retail Dance in 1998. And this year's festival features the work of eight choreographers whose work will be performed at six different locations over two days. I like this idea of retailer-sponsored dance performances - it definitely benefits all participants. This concept ought to be explored in other cities. The works are based upon the marketing needs of the retailers. The press release reads, "It is [the dance works] an artistic collaboration between a choreographer and a business in which the content of the work is inspired by the retailer’s site, product, or special event." The event producers are happy to embrace the commercial nature of this dance event. Their home page features the following quote from a Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal review of a previous year's festival: "Once witnessed, you might dub it 'product-pitching pirouettes' or 'moshing for merchandise.' How about a little dancing with your shopping experience?"  My complaint is with the website for Retail Dance. It's too somber (just black and white) and not very interesting. Retail Dance just calls out for colorful pictures and videos. Why not charge the retailers a bit more and get them to underwrite a website with video clips of the performances and video interviews with the store owneres/managers? This way the retailers would benefit from both the actual event and from on-going promotion on the web. Posted by Doug Fox at 4:08 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) October 21, 2005Review Bebe Miller's Landing/PlaceTom Pearson reviews Bebe Miller's "Landing/Place" in his new NYC Dance Journal (Performance earlier this month at Dance Theater Workshop in NY): 
Bebe Miller is known for her humanist works, but recently she has been seduced into the world of technology. In her newest, "Landing/Place," seen at Dance Theater Workshop on Wednesday night, she mixed her polished movement with equally adept motion capture, video, live sound and animation. The theme of the work emerged in the form of a pre-recorded monologue midway through. As Miller's voice asked, "is it important to know where you are going when you set out for a place," we began to understand that this work was not going to give answers but ask questions. Read entire review Posted by Doug Fox at 8:55 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) October 20, 2005Tense Dave: A Web DocumentaryChunky Move, a Victoria, British Columbia contemporary dance company founded by Artistic Director Gideon Obarzanek, offers an engaging online Flash-based documentary of its Tense Dave performance, which premiered in 2003.  The concept behind the performance: Tense Dave can be seen as one man's moment of crisis blown apart like an exploded diagram; each of its components are separated and pushed out to their extremes. Dave journeys through strange and fractured versions of a recognisable world distorted by fears, paranoias and unfulfilled fantasies. The Flash documentary offers "a non-linear perspective of the show." Through pictures, text and video, you can explore the characters, scenes, and production tools, and watch video clip interviews with the creators. Posted by Doug Fox at 9:25 AM - Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0) October 19, 2005Interactive Performances With Wireless InputI've always been intrigued by how audiences might contribute to or participate in dance performances by using different types of wireless communication devices. There was a performance last year called Texterritory v.2.3 in England that enabled audience members to use a wireless device in order to direct and inspire the dance performance. In a nutshell, the audience used mobile phones to vote on which outfit the dancer, Grace, should wear for a blind date. Plus, audience members sent short text messages, which were projected on a screen and inspired an improvisational dance piece. On the Texterritory site, you'll find a video clip highlight of the performance.  This is the only dance performance I've come across that leverages wireless devices to encourage real-time participation. But I did come across today, on the network_performance site, a multimedia public performance program called SimpleTEXT that outputs sounds and images based upon real-time feedback from audience members using cell phones and handheld devices.  Here's how the creators of SimpleTEXT describe their mission: SimpleTEXT focuses on mobile devices and the web as a bridge between networked interfaces and public space. As mobile devices become more prolific, they also become separated by increased emphasis on individual use. The SimpleTEXT project looks beyond the screen and isolated usage of mobile devices to encourage collaborative use of input devices to both drive the visuals and audio output, inform each participant of each other's interaction, and allows people to actively participate in the performance while it happens. Our purpose with the performance is to create the possibility of large-scale interaction through anonymous collaboration, with immediate audio and visual feedback. SimpleTEXT encourages users to respond to one another's ideas and build upon the unexpected chains of ideas that may develop from their input. It would be interesting to see how this type of collaborative participation application could be used by dance companies to create audience-directed performances. Posted by Doug Fox at 5:37 PM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0) October 18, 2005Where Are the Pictures of the Dance Performance?There's an August 8th post at uncoy.com, "Dance Publicity Photographs: Promotion of Dance in the Press," by Alec (don't know last name) that caught my attention: I am often disappointed with the dance photos which I am able to present with the pieces at Impulstanz. Unfortunately modern dance companies believe that the audience has no right to see what the show actually looks like. They provide their own publicity stills and do not allow newspapers or anyone else to take photographs of the actual performances. Alec raises good point about the paucity of good quality pictures of modern dance companies. I'm often annoyed when I'm searching online for upcoming dance performances. A huge percentage of the time, I come across a very brief one to two sentence description of a dance performance -- no extended descriptions and no pictures. And the odds of finding a video clip are next to zilch. Yesterday, I wrote about an upcoming dance performance by the San Francisco-based Capacitor. This dance company actually provides high-quality pictures online, a video clip and a detailed press release about this performance. The availability of these resources should be part of the standard promotional campaign for all dance performances. But, sadly, this is not the case. To me the lack of engaging online marketing materials for upcoming dance performances is inexplicable and I have trouble fathoming its causes. Don't dance companies need larger audiences? Aren't most dance companies struggling to increase fund raising efforts? And don't dance companies want more exposure in the press??? Posted by Doug Fox at 9:59 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) October 17, 2005Journey to the Center of the EarthCapacitor, an interdisciplinary dance company, premieres its latest performance piece, "Digging in the Dark" (PDF file), in San Francisco from October 20-30, 2005: Synthesizing dance with new circus, innovative props and interactive media--Capacitor sends you on a journey through the layers of the Earth into the core. Featuring the key talents of Jodi Lomask (artistic director/choreographer); Noah Thorp of Listen Labs (composer); Dan Zox (filmmakers); Monique Kapp (costume design); Glenn Meader (interaction designer) Watch video preview and view picture gallery for this upcoming performance.  Posted by Doug Fox at 8:03 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) October 13, 2005Brain Wave Projections of Dance PerformersAt the September Ingenuity Festival or Art and Technology in Cleveland, Ohio, MorrisonDance performed a work, "Inside," that integrated projections of real-time EEG (electroencephalograph) brainwave readings of the dancers and a pre-recorded video of Sarah Morrison's arthroscopic elbow surgery. For the brain reading component of the performance, Morrison wore a brainwave-reading FlexCap developed by BrainMaster Technologies.  Images of brainwave scans of dancer projected onto screens in real-time during performance.  Dancer wearing FlexCap.  Detail view of FlexCap. Posted by Doug Fox at 8:31 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) October 12, 2005Guerilla Ballet PerformancesTomorrow (October 13th) at 9 PM GMT+1 in an undisclosed location in Belgrade, Serbia, Ballettikka Internettikka (Internet Ballet) will be broadcasting live over the Internet its latest guerrilla dance performance, "BEO Guerrillikka". Tomorrow's performance by Igor Stromajer and Brane Zorman follows in the footsteps of pervious "invasions" of prestigious performance venues such as the Bolshoi Theater and La Scala. In a nutshell, Ballettikka Internettikka enters a venue uninvited and using portable wireless technologies broadcasts a live guerilla dance performances over the Internet of about 10 to 20 minutes in duration.  wireless mobile remote-controlled surveillance system used for Ballettikka Internettikka's La Scala performance Here's how tomorrow's performance will use technology: Artists will use low-tech mobile and wireless equipment for the invasion and live broadcasting (portable computers, mini digital camera, MP3 audio systems, mobile GPRS telephones etc). A laptop and MiniDV cam, together with Webcam32 (version 6.0) software will be used for broadcasting the video signal (running over Intima Virtual Base FTP server). Another laptop and MP3 player with online interface SHOUTcast (version 1.8.3/win32), will be used for live sound broadcasting (running over Beitthron FTP server). A local GSM mobile phone operator will be used for GPRS mobile internet connection. On the BEO Guerrillikka performance page, you can watch the performance live and also read a run-down of the timeline of the logistical steps that will be followed to implement the "invasion." To learn more about how this performance will work, you can visit pages for past performances such as "Illegallikka Robottikka," which was performed last year at La Scala. You'll find pictures, a technology overview and a video, although I can't figure out what the video is all about. You can also read an article, "Claiming the Stage: Ballettikka Internettikka pt 2," that provides backgrounds about the artists and describes their performance at the Bolshoi Theater in 2002. Posted by Doug Fox at 2:20 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) October 11, 2005Jon Morris and Daniel Burkholder at JOM Anniversary DanceI 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 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) October 4, 2005Science and the Dance: The Perfect PartnershipThe Institute of Physics commissioned England's leading modern dance company, Rambert Dance Company, to develop a dance program that celebrated the 100th Anniversary of Albert Einstein's three great scientific papers of 1905. The work, "Constant Speed: Physics in Motion," is a tribute to Einstein's famous work and discoveries about Brownian motion, the special theory of relativity (E=MC2), and the photoelectric effect.  Constant Speed was first performed at Sadler's Wells Theatre in London on May 24th and this dance piece will continue to be performed throughout the rest of 2005 and into 2006. I had a great time visiting the online resources (links above) that provide background and insight about how this work came to fruition and how the choreography and dancing pay tribute to Einstein's discoveries. On the Rambert Dance Company website, there is an excellent video that includes a brief history of Rambert along with footage from Constant Speed rehearsals. Since I enjoy learning about both science and dance it was a thrill to study these write-ups and videos. Now I have to figure out when to go to London to see the performance. Posted by Doug Fox at 10:20 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) October 3, 2005Merce Cunningham at Stanford Interdisciplinary CourseDuring the winter semester earlier this year, Stanford University offered "The Anatomy of Movement: an Interdisciplinary Course" that featured the participation of Merce Cunningham through a one-week residency. This hands-on study of anatomy brought together physicians and surgeons, engineers, animators, and visual and performing artists. There are a number of online resources that you can access to learn more about this fascinating program: - The Anatomy of Movement Course website - "Dancing with data adds to the show", article in March 2005 edition of Stanford Report - "Anything Can Happen: Dance pioneer Merce Cunningham keeps the campus on its toes", article in March/April 2005 edition of Stanford Magazine - MotionAnalysis (manufacturer of motion capture equipment) write-up about the participation of Merce Cunningham in this Stanford educational program with video of Cunningham dancer being tracked via motion tracking sensors.  Posted by Doug Fox at 8:00 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) September 27, 2005Motione Performance at ASUMotione is an interactive, multimedia dance performance that featured Bill T. Jones and Trisha Brown and premiered on April 9, 2005 at Arizona State University. The performance and companion website are a joint project of the Arts, Media and Engineering Program at the Herberger College of Fine Arts and the Fulton School of Engineering at ASU. The motione website is fantastic. I must have spent more than two hours late last week watching the videos, reading research papers, and learning about the participants.  Posted by Doug Fox at 1:13 PM - Permalink | Comments (0) September 22, 2005Tribute To Salsa Choreographers DVDLast night was Eileen Torres' First Annual Tribute To Salsa Choreographers at Zanzibar. A lot of great performances by top Salsa choreographers and dancers in the area. We will be putting up videos and pictures from this event - they should be up by early next week. And we're also producing a DVD that will feature all the performances, award presentations and interviews. Posted by Doug Fox at 8:47 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) Metro DC Dance Awards MondayThe Metro DC Dance Awards takes place this coming Monday, September 26, at 7:30 PM at the Kennedy Center. Purchase tickets on Kennedy Center site. You can visit the Metro DC Dance Awards website to learn more: The Metro DC Dance Awards is a spectacular event celebrating the excellence of Metropolitan DC, Maryland, and Virginia's dance community. It showcases the diversity of DC's finest with performances ranging from ballroom to hip hop to modern dance improvisation and gives distinction to artists in categories including Outstanding Youth Performance, Emerging Choreographer and Outstanding Overall Production in Concert Dance. The Metro DC Dance Awards is the only annual opportunity in Metropolitan DC for artists and audiences to recognize professionals and youth in the dance field. And here's article from yesterday's Maryland Gazette.Net about this awards program. Posted by Doug Fox at 8:37 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) September 16, 2005Premiere Aqueous MythTonight is the opening of Aqueous Myth: Tales of a Water Planet
Here's partial description of this media-enhanced dance work: The Department of Dance at Florida State University joins forces with local, national, and international artists to proudly present the world premiere of Aqueous Myth: Tales of a Water Planet, a full evening of modern dance performed in a media-enhanced environment of projected video and surround sound. The Nancy Smith Fichter Dance Theatre located inside the newly retrofitted Montgomery Hall on the FSU campus will house the event. Performances are scheduled for 2 nights only, September 16 and 17 at 8PM. On the Aqueous Myth site, you'll find an excellent introduction to this event and the creative process. Posted by Doug Fox at 7:54 AM - Permalink | Comments (0) |
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