Wandering about dance

Delay

Hello,

I am consumed by my new work, by my study and by dancing. Hopefully more free time is ahead for me to sum up everything new.

Dance dance... 2008 in Jablonec

I was for long time curious about amateur dancers community in the northern part of Czech republic. There is very active, very well organised group of dance teachers around the nothern city of Liberec but I have almost no contact with them.

So I was sitting in the cute small theatre in the city of Jablonec watching choreographies and once again thinking that ve do have good dancers but we are lacking good choreographers.

By chance I am currently reading Noverre’s Letters sur la dance and I can exactly see almost all the mistakes he mentioned 250 years ago.

It was better than in Prague though.

So you think...

You know - here in Czech Republic we are way behind. :o)

For last two or so months I was watching So You Think You Can Dance TV show.  All four seasons in one go. I deeply admire bravery of the people who had guts to broadcast this in prime time. This competition clearly show why USA is world leader in dance.

It would never work in Czech Republic. As I mentioned earlier although we do have able dancers we lacks good choreographers and also people esteemed enough to be judges. And of course there is nobody with idea and vision to do anything like this.

So I guess it is just about time to take a deep breath and try to do something about it regardless how long it might take.

Playfull physics - Rob Anderson in Prague

So this guy (second one) was teaching us this weekend in Prague how to fly.

The situation in Prague CI community just now looks quite promising - right active people are on right places and our ties to international community are slowly strengthening.

In prague there is only small number of good CI teachers (um, two?) and they have their own style. Rob brought more international style, CI in classic Steve Paxton way and it was very refreshing. So I am happy with the classes and longing for more. Good job, Rob.

Backlog - The Journal of the Dance Master

So lets get back to business.

More than two months ago I attended performance called The Journal of the Dance Master. Danced and choreographed by Gudrun Skamletz (who danced in Que ma joie demeure by Béatrice Massin and in Le Burgeois Gentilhomme by Moliére) and directed by Jean-Denis Monory who also played the title role, this performance seemed promising. Accompanied by Collegium Marianum (which means that music will be outstanding, full stop) it was a must.

But I was a little bit disappointed.

I mean dancer was great, music was great, acting was great, costumes were OK, but… it was not baroque enough. It ought to be about dancing, yes? About baroque dancing, la belle dance, you know? It was not. In the whole performance which lasted about one hour there were only two recognisable baroque dances - Lully’s Chacone de Phaeton pour une femme from 1704 and Passacaile de Armide also by Lully.

First is quite easy nice dance apart from its lenght (132 bars). Director apparently thought that such a long dance (almost without leaps) will be boring so it was in the very begining and constantly interrupted by comments and remarks from the “dancing master”. If I remember well poor dancer not even finished it.

Second dance was virtuoso solo - Francine Lancelot called this dance “one of the most beautifull solo female dances of all time”. I have no objections here, it was very good. It came at the very end.

So, what was in between those two dances? Uhm, pretty much nothing to be frank. Some tarantella, some fandango, some commedia del’arte (I did not get it sorry), Folies d’Espagne was played but not danced (what a shame) all wrapped into vague love story between dancing master and his pupil.

By the way one should never perform contemporary dance in baroque costume. One should never perform contemporary dance in baroque costume. One should never perform contemporary dance in baroque costume. That one hurt.

And it was in French. I mean this was French actors so it kind of should be in French but something was translated, something was not. Please give us whole translation next time at least on paper, we can read. It was no big deal though, it was just annoying.

Once again - music and everything about musicians was great, great. They were outstanding in whatever they were playing.

So to sum up. I got to the conclusion that the whole thing was put together ad hoc and underline was that uneducated Czech audience will buy it anyway, and they did. But I am not. This was not a proper job. Kinda fastfood feel.

As this was performed so long ago there are some more reflection on the web (in Czech):

http://rwrana.blogspot.com/2008/07/cestopis-tanenho-mistra-letn-slavnosti.html

http://salon.tillwoman.net/akce/17245/;jsessionid=49CBD6CF66E3938B3A118138C13FF330

Struny podzimu

It seem that finally Prague is begining to be aware about baroque music and baroque dancers and musicians are in turn starting to come into Prague on regular basis.

1.11. Les Arts Florissants with William Christie will come to Prague and they will be performing concert version of their trademark - Les Indes Galantes by Rameau from 1735.

This is the first time when one of leading authentic interpretation ensembles arrive to our city.

Official pages (czech): http://www.strunypodzimu.cz/inspirace/les-arts-florissants.html

Time to resume!

Well.

I haven’t submitted my PhD thesis yet, but it is pretty much finished. I am just waiting for approval from my supervisor and for comments from my colleagues. I have started my new job as scientist and everything is slowly slowly settling down.

But. I am now officially student again. My dance science study has began and now I am choosing lectures and trainings. Of course I will have almost no time to attend so I rely on my self study an knowledge. However I will have to attend some dance trainings. I am so curious. :o)

So. Time to start again. I have little bit of backlog…

PS: I started my new personal site on bidak.posterous.com mainly pictures from my mobile phone.

Allmost done

Hello again!

My thesis is taking little bit more time than I expected (as always) so posting will resume shortly (say in ten days or something like that).

Looking forward to it!

Temporary shutdown

I am sorry to inform you that this site will not be updated until I will finish my PhD thesis.

Estimated resume: mid September