Fell in love with this song last summer. After years of hearing about Adam Again and how great they were, it was this song that finally hooked me. It's actually about drugs -- which I know basically nothing about -- but it's so funky and cynical that I love it anyway. I don't usually like blues or jazz music, but here the band blends both genres with rock and the result is so fresh and different that you can't help but be entranced by it. If we're honest, though, my favourite part is the brooding chorus vocal from Riki Michele. It adds a little bit of sizzle to an already steaming song. My next favourite part is the syncopated guitar line at the beginning of the interlude (what can I say, it's the tap dancer in me).
Fun fact: Jon Knox of White Heart fame also drummed for this band.
Title: The Fine Line
Artist: Adam Again
Album: Homeboys
Year: 1990
iTunes here; YouTube here.
The devil in black
Break your mama's back
Feeling like a maniac...
P.S. -- There is a Kickstarter campaign NOW UNDER WAY (right here) to reissue their 1995 album Perfecta on CD and vinyl. Deadline to pledge is 30 June. Don't miss out on this! I funded last year's campaign to give Homeboys the same treatment, and I have no regrets.
Showing posts with label jazz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label jazz. Show all posts
23 June 2017
03 June 2013
Unofficial Choreography Month - Debrief
And so ends another thirty-one days of my life (and when the heck did it become freaking June? We seriously just had Christmas!).
But in terms of quality, it was quite satisfactory. As much as I hated actually working on Youth With A Machine, I have to admit the dance that came out of that was very cool. It was a lot less restrained by my ballet training (more honest-to-goodness jazz), but still technically dazzling. It's a very 'tight' dance too -- lots of quick canon work (which is why it took FOREVER to notate). I don't think there's a wasted count in this dance. It's pretty hardcore.
Future Now -- I love how this thing turned out. Going in, I was a little bit terrified... see, I had this idea of having four dancers at the back of the stage following the beat, and then two other dancers in front of them following the lyrics. I didn't anticipate much trouble with the lyrical pair, but I was seriously concerned that the line of four at the back would either look stupid or not really have anything to do. But it worked beautifully. I even managed to work in some concepts from Prodigal's original music video.
The line-at-the-back-following-the-beat thing was actually sort of a 'test run' -- I want to use the same idea for the Swirling Eddies song The Twist (which had been in the top eight for the month's playlist), but since Future Now was a slightly smaller scale, I decided to try it with that one first. Now that I know it's doable, choreography for The Twist may not be too far into the future...
What's next? Actually, I don't know yet. Sanctuary is still a very viable possibility. During April, when I was supposed to be writing a novel and leaving the choreography till May, I came up with about half the dance (each) for A Sigh For You, Shadow Catcher, and Memory Lane (all Daniel Amos). I've had a good chunk of White Heart's Raging Of The Moon already in my head and sketched out on basic notepaper for quite a while now, but not notated. Same also with White Heart's Let The Kingdom Come. In addition, I've been listening to Terry Scott Taylor's Changeless quite a lot lately, and it captivates my kinesthetic imagination more every time I hear it. And Strong Points, Weak Points (also DA) is half-composed.
I guess it depends on if I feel I can take on a mammoth project after pushing myself so hard through Unofficial Choreography Month (all but two of those dances I mentioned above have eight or more people). If so, any one of those is in the running, but if I decide I want to take it easy for a week or two, I'll probably be doing Changeless.
What's next? Actually, I don't know yet. Sanctuary is still a very viable possibility. During April, when I was supposed to be writing a novel and leaving the choreography till May, I came up with about half the dance (each) for A Sigh For You, Shadow Catcher, and Memory Lane (all Daniel Amos). I've had a good chunk of White Heart's Raging Of The Moon already in my head and sketched out on basic notepaper for quite a while now, but not notated. Same also with White Heart's Let The Kingdom Come. In addition, I've been listening to Terry Scott Taylor's Changeless quite a lot lately, and it captivates my kinesthetic imagination more every time I hear it. And Strong Points, Weak Points (also DA) is half-composed.
I guess it depends on if I feel I can take on a mammoth project after pushing myself so hard through Unofficial Choreography Month (all but two of those dances I mentioned above have eight or more people). If so, any one of those is in the running, but if I decide I want to take it easy for a week or two, I'll probably be doing Changeless.
16 May 2013
A Rare Bug, A Dance With Excitement, And A Choreography Update
So after several years of sleeping an average of five hours a night and subsisting primarily on nachos and salsa, my body finally hit panic mode and crashed.
I've known for a while that something needed to change, but [insert excuse here]. To boil it down, I was probably just too lazy to change. I liked my routine, and I was sort of... proud, I guess?... of being able to pull off a nice life-like appearance on only five hours of sleep and barely enough calories to keep a dog alive. (And just to be clear, no, I'm not nor have I ever been anorexic... just too busy to make myself real food.) In the past couple of months, with an increased dance workload and the additional stress of a last-minute college application (more on that once I feel better), the boundary I was pushing finally broke and Tuesday morning I woke up with the fires of Hell in my throat.
I'm not kidding. I've had colds and sore throats before, but this thing is the Big Daddy, the sore throat to end all sore throats. Plus it also managed to infect both my ears (during Unofficial National Choreography Month, of course, when I'm supposed to be listening to music every second of the day), and mess up my lungs. There have been a couple slightly terrifying moments over the past couple of days when it felt like the muscles in my ribs forgot how to work and there was a second of panic as I tried to remember how to breathe manually.
I haven't gone to the hospital yet, but if this continues, I just might. I'm kind of trying to avoid it because the dance team's first performance of the season is this Sunday and... wait for it... my choreography is going to be in it!
If I'm healthy enough to perform.
It's a ballet solo (for myself) that I choreographed for the gorgeous White Heart song Eighth Wonder (more about the dance here). If I'm feeling well enough to do it by Sunday, it'll be the first-ever public performance of something I've choreographed. Unfortunately, I kind of need to be in top physical condition to pull it off. I don't know what it is, but no matter how warmed up and well-fed and well-rested I am, I can't seem to make it to the end of that dance without nearly collapsing in a heap of breathless exhaustion. And that was before I got sick.
And since I'm writing anyway, here's a bit of an update on the Unofficial National Choreography Month thing... no, I haven't given up. There's too much stubborn German blood in me to give up. Plus, I actually managed to choreograph the Guitar Solo From Hell (mostly), and was thus finally able to finish the never-ending two minutes and forty-five seconds that make up Youth With A Machine. (Just to be clear, the label Guitar Solo From Hell is purely from a choreographer's standpoint. From a music lover's perspective, it's a pretty stinking good solo. But it's almost impossible to choreograph.) The bad news is that it was Day Twelve by the time I finally finished the thing and I still had three more dances to do (four if we're still counting Going Public).
So I plunged into Future Now (which really, really needs to show up on iTunes already so I can tell you in detail how freaking amazing this song is). It's supposed to be a jazz dance for six, but it somehow became very balletic. This amuses me, because seriously, listen to the link. Does anything about it suggest ballet to you?
But despite having the fires of Hell burning in my throat and threatening to blow out my eardrums (at least that's what it feels like), I've somehow managed to choreograph up to the second chorus of that one. I'm having a lot of fun writing this one, and I think it's turning out really well. Or maybe I'm suffering delusions due to illness.
What's scaring me a little bit is what's to come: Fade Into You and Sanctuary. I actually don't know the song Fade Into You all that well (it's a more recent addition to my collection), and I'm starting to worry that I won't have enough inspiration for it. I plan on doing that one next. And what scares me about Sanctuary is the fact that it's nearly six minutes long and I'm going to have to notate eight people for the thing. If Youth With A Machine -- half the length with half the dancers -- took me twelve days, how long is Sanctuary going to drag on?
So, there's your HUGE, once-every-couple-months post about my life and stuff that interests probably less people than I think it does. See you tomorrow for Music Day -- provided I'm not in the hospital...
I've known for a while that something needed to change, but [insert excuse here]. To boil it down, I was probably just too lazy to change. I liked my routine, and I was sort of... proud, I guess?... of being able to pull off a nice life-like appearance on only five hours of sleep and barely enough calories to keep a dog alive. (And just to be clear, no, I'm not nor have I ever been anorexic... just too busy to make myself real food.) In the past couple of months, with an increased dance workload and the additional stress of a last-minute college application (more on that once I feel better), the boundary I was pushing finally broke and Tuesday morning I woke up with the fires of Hell in my throat.
I'm not kidding. I've had colds and sore throats before, but this thing is the Big Daddy, the sore throat to end all sore throats. Plus it also managed to infect both my ears (during Unofficial National Choreography Month, of course, when I'm supposed to be listening to music every second of the day), and mess up my lungs. There have been a couple slightly terrifying moments over the past couple of days when it felt like the muscles in my ribs forgot how to work and there was a second of panic as I tried to remember how to breathe manually.
I haven't gone to the hospital yet, but if this continues, I just might. I'm kind of trying to avoid it because the dance team's first performance of the season is this Sunday and... wait for it... my choreography is going to be in it!
If I'm healthy enough to perform.
It's a ballet solo (for myself) that I choreographed for the gorgeous White Heart song Eighth Wonder (more about the dance here). If I'm feeling well enough to do it by Sunday, it'll be the first-ever public performance of something I've choreographed. Unfortunately, I kind of need to be in top physical condition to pull it off. I don't know what it is, but no matter how warmed up and well-fed and well-rested I am, I can't seem to make it to the end of that dance without nearly collapsing in a heap of breathless exhaustion. And that was before I got sick.
And since I'm writing anyway, here's a bit of an update on the Unofficial National Choreography Month thing... no, I haven't given up. There's too much stubborn German blood in me to give up. Plus, I actually managed to choreograph the Guitar Solo From Hell (mostly), and was thus finally able to finish the never-ending two minutes and forty-five seconds that make up Youth With A Machine. (Just to be clear, the label Guitar Solo From Hell is purely from a choreographer's standpoint. From a music lover's perspective, it's a pretty stinking good solo. But it's almost impossible to choreograph.) The bad news is that it was Day Twelve by the time I finally finished the thing and I still had three more dances to do (four if we're still counting Going Public).
So I plunged into Future Now (which really, really needs to show up on iTunes already so I can tell you in detail how freaking amazing this song is). It's supposed to be a jazz dance for six, but it somehow became very balletic. This amuses me, because seriously, listen to the link. Does anything about it suggest ballet to you?
But despite having the fires of Hell burning in my throat and threatening to blow out my eardrums (at least that's what it feels like), I've somehow managed to choreograph up to the second chorus of that one. I'm having a lot of fun writing this one, and I think it's turning out really well. Or maybe I'm suffering delusions due to illness.
What's scaring me a little bit is what's to come: Fade Into You and Sanctuary. I actually don't know the song Fade Into You all that well (it's a more recent addition to my collection), and I'm starting to worry that I won't have enough inspiration for it. I plan on doing that one next. And what scares me about Sanctuary is the fact that it's nearly six minutes long and I'm going to have to notate eight people for the thing. If Youth With A Machine -- half the length with half the dancers -- took me twelve days, how long is Sanctuary going to drag on?
So, there's your HUGE, once-every-couple-months post about my life and stuff that interests probably less people than I think it does. See you tomorrow for Music Day -- provided I'm not in the hospital...
08 May 2013
'Other' Choreography Month - Day Seven Recap
For the first three days or so of May, I worked on the tap dance to Going Public, however, I got sick of the song and my brain was starting to hurt from trying to keep up with formations and counts and everybody in the dance had somehow ended up doing stuff completely different from everybody else.
So before my brain shorted out and froze me for the next twenty-seven days, I began work on Youth With A Machine.
I still can't figure out how this one even got into the setlist. Literally the day before the contest it had been a toss-up between A Sigh For You and The Twist (same guy, different band). I have no clue where Youth With A Machine came from.
But it makes a decent jazz dance, and I'm currently trying to come up with something for the guitar solo.
As cool as guitar solos are to listen to (when they're done well), I hate choreographing them. It's much the same as choreographing a fadeout... there's nothing to advance the 'story,' so it ends up being meaningless pirouettes and pas de bouree piques and probably a half a dozen random flying hops. Except the speed and intricacy of the guitar solos in the music I tend to choreograph requires something more... intense. So what does my brain default to? Melodramatic modern dancing.
If there is any dancing I despise watching, it's modern dancing, and especially the melodramatic stuff where the dancer goes out of their way to make sure you know it's about pain -- they grimace, they cover their faces, they fall as if they've been shot and then writhe around on the floor in positions so inhuman they no longer impress, they only sicken. Why this is my mental default, I don't know. I never watch the stuff if I can avoid it. But it is, and I would rather do pretty much anything except contribute to such a falsely 'powerful' genre. So I try to come up with something, anything, less insipid and insulting to the (hopefully eventual) audience's intellect than that.
Unfortunately, in order to stay on track for this month, I had to finish this dance on Day Seven. Seeing as it is currently 10.37 pm on Day Eight, I'm now behind. And I have the sinking feeling that this was the easiest dance I'd had lined up for this month...
So before my brain shorted out and froze me for the next twenty-seven days, I began work on Youth With A Machine.
I still can't figure out how this one even got into the setlist. Literally the day before the contest it had been a toss-up between A Sigh For You and The Twist (same guy, different band). I have no clue where Youth With A Machine came from.
But it makes a decent jazz dance, and I'm currently trying to come up with something for the guitar solo.
As cool as guitar solos are to listen to (when they're done well), I hate choreographing them. It's much the same as choreographing a fadeout... there's nothing to advance the 'story,' so it ends up being meaningless pirouettes and pas de bouree piques and probably a half a dozen random flying hops. Except the speed and intricacy of the guitar solos in the music I tend to choreograph requires something more... intense. So what does my brain default to? Melodramatic modern dancing.
If there is any dancing I despise watching, it's modern dancing, and especially the melodramatic stuff where the dancer goes out of their way to make sure you know it's about pain -- they grimace, they cover their faces, they fall as if they've been shot and then writhe around on the floor in positions so inhuman they no longer impress, they only sicken. Why this is my mental default, I don't know. I never watch the stuff if I can avoid it. But it is, and I would rather do pretty much anything except contribute to such a falsely 'powerful' genre. So I try to come up with something, anything, less insipid and insulting to the (hopefully eventual) audience's intellect than that.
Unfortunately, in order to stay on track for this month, I had to finish this dance on Day Seven. Seeing as it is currently 10.37 pm on Day Eight, I'm now behind. And I have the sinking feeling that this was the easiest dance I'd had lined up for this month...
30 April 2013
Transition Day
I (finally) finished the piece of boring crap -- I mean novel -- yesterday. It somehow went from a heartwarming (G-rated) romance in which two cousins try to get their grandparents to rekindle their love to a kidnapping plot which involves said cousins getting violently kidnapped by their aunt who is blackmailing their grandmother into poisoning their grandfather to death. The story's not resolved, but I hit 50,000 words, and that's all that mattered. However, if I get an idea of how the cousins get out of their current predicament (locked in a cellar under the watch of their aunt) and if I ever manage to figure out why the aunt is doing this, I might finish it.
Tomorrow kicks off Unofficial National Choreography Month (the official one is in January, but my choreographer friend and I missed it last year so we did ours in May and it stuck).
So I spent today, the day of limbo, madly trying to whittle down a 'to-choreograph' playlist from eight songs to a maximum of five, and preferably four.
The official list is as follows:
Going Public - Newsboys.
Tap dance. I think it's for eight.
Future Now - Prodigal.
Jazz dance for six. Also, I freaking love this song. I'm just scared I'm not going to be able to do it justice.
Youth With A Machine - Daniel Amos.
Jazz dance for four. This one kind of accidentally made it onto the list -- I had started out with A Sigh For You in the running, but somehow it morphed into this one.
Fade Into You - The Choir.
Another jazz dance for six. I love this song too.
Sanctuary - Daniel Amos.
Ballet dance for eight.
If my math is right (which it probably isn't), it works out to about eighteen minutes and thirty-seven seconds of music.
I also notice, with some degree of horror, that White Heart doesn't even have one song on this list. What the heck, self? However, I've been on a mad choreography binge for the past couple of weeks so I'm thinking (hoping) I might finish early. In that case, whatever song captures my attention is fair game.
Tomorrow kicks off Unofficial National Choreography Month (the official one is in January, but my choreographer friend and I missed it last year so we did ours in May and it stuck).
So I spent today, the day of limbo, madly trying to whittle down a 'to-choreograph' playlist from eight songs to a maximum of five, and preferably four.
The official list is as follows:
Going Public - Newsboys.
Tap dance. I think it's for eight.
Future Now - Prodigal.
Jazz dance for six. Also, I freaking love this song. I'm just scared I'm not going to be able to do it justice.
Youth With A Machine - Daniel Amos.
Jazz dance for four. This one kind of accidentally made it onto the list -- I had started out with A Sigh For You in the running, but somehow it morphed into this one.
Fade Into You - The Choir.
Another jazz dance for six. I love this song too.
Sanctuary - Daniel Amos.
Ballet dance for eight.
If my math is right (which it probably isn't), it works out to about eighteen minutes and thirty-seven seconds of music.
I also notice, with some degree of horror, that White Heart doesn't even have one song on this list. What the heck, self? However, I've been on a mad choreography binge for the past couple of weeks so I'm thinking (hoping) I might finish early. In that case, whatever song captures my attention is fair game.
27 March 2013
Life (A Long Rambling Update From The Creative Mind)
You may or may not be wondering by now -- besides geeking out over eighties music, what else have I been doing lately? (In other words, I just realised I haven't posted anything other than Music Day for... months.)
To answer the question... more choreography. Give me a second to look through my stacks of notes and I'll tell you what I'm working on.
*removes half-inch thick stack of paper from clipboard and shuffles through it*
Okay, here we go...
Eighth Wonder (White Heart): Back in December I was asked to compose and perform a ballet solo for the local dance team. I was originally going to perform my choreography for David Meece's One Small Child, but after some rehearsing, discovered that the stage in my mind is much, much bigger than most stages are in real life (unless we're talking hockey arenas). Since we aren't quite booking hockey arenas at this point, I would either have to re-work One Small Child or come up with something else. I chose Plan B, and Eighth Wonder was pretty much entirely choreographed within a week. Performances start in May. (I say this so casually, but inside I'm jumping up and down and squealing like a five-year-old.)
Raging Of The Moon (White Heart): I've been dreaming about this one for a long time, probably from the second time I ever heard this song. I'm finally working out some visual motifs and I've got formations and basic choreography figured out until about the three-minute mark. It's a lot like what I did with Speechless (big epic formation dance with intricate visual 'harmonies'), only this one will be actually danceable by humans. I'm excited about this one. It's going to look so cool.
Hollow Man (Daniel Amos): I'm hoping this will actually become a joint choreographic venture with myself and the other two choreographers on the dance team, the idea being that each of us choreographs our own part in a different discipline from the other two, and then we put the individual parts together on the stage. This would be an attempt to build on the haunting almost-discord of the song -- it looks amazing in my head, but it remains to be seen what real life will do to it...
Montana Sky (White Heart): I haven't touched this song in over a month. It started out slow anyway, but the actual dance was turning out rather nicely. I just seem to have lost my ambition for this one. I'd still like to finish it sometime, as it was shaping up to be really pretty (soft, gentle ballet trio), and I was already past the halfway point anyway...
Shedding The Mortal Coil (Daniel Amos): I kind of doubt this will ever get staged. It's bubblegum Junior Jazz One at its finest. But it's so much fun...
(Yes, the linked video does cut it off, but there's only like five more seconds in the song after that. Basically he holds the note for 'coil' and the guitar reverberates for a few more seconds.)
Going Public (Newsboys): Seriously, does this song not have 'tap dance' written all over it?
Answering Machine (Prodigal): I'm not seriously working on this (yet), but the other day I was brainstorming ideas for it and I think there's some potential for this one. This would be another tap dance.
Other stuff I've been doing...
Photography -- just did a snow photo shoot with my sister yesterday. I waited nearly a week for cloud cover before I finally gave up and figured I'd just have to make it work with the sun's harsh glare coming off the snow (before it all melted away). Those pictures had better have turned out (I haven't looked at them yet).
On a side note, I, unlike everyone else in this province, am LOVING the snow. We got a mild blizzard here last Thursday... it was awesome. Except for the people in the 100-car pileup, but it sounds like they were all pretty much okay anyway. (If the idiots in this province would just learn that the speed on the highway is 110, not 300 gazillion, this wouldn't have been a problem.) Since I'm on my soapbox anyway, listen Albertans, you have no right to complain. It's MARCH, people. March. You have no right to be whining about missing spring yet. For crying out loud, it's March! What do you expect? Crocuses in your underwear drawer? Spring around here comes in May. IT. HAPPENS. EVERY. YEAR. Do you people not pay attention?
*gets off soapbox*
*abruptly changes gears*
So to make a long story short, I just became aware of a really cool old abandoned house literally a two-minute drive from where I live. Can you say 'video/photo shoot location?' Only one problem -- it's being demolished in two and a half weeks. But I really, really want to get something artistic out of that house before it's destroyed and forgotten. There isn't too much there for a photo shoot, but it has the best music-video lighting ever, especially in the basement.
At first I was thinking of doing a 'music video' for the dance to the aforementioned Hollow Man. However, as I thought about the logistics of choreographing, perfecting, and shooting the whole thing in two weeks, I was forced to admit defeat. There is no way I'm going to be able to pull that off, even with the other two dancers on spring break. I kind of doubt I'll ever be able to not regret getting that committed to film while I had the chance -- that basement, that lighting, is so so perfect for the mood, the sound, the dance of Hollow Man. I had camera angles figured out and everything.
So now I'm considering (hopefully) the next best thing: an already-choreographed piece that requires only one dancer -- me. Eighth Wonder. It won't pull as much creative awesomeness out of that basement as Hollow Man would, but under such a tight deadline, it'll have to do. I just hope someday I'll find another basement as aesthetically brilliant as that one with less of a deadline on it.
There's really only one problem with doing Eighth Wonder in there -- well, two -- but both would have been present no matter what dance I picked. One is I need someone to run the camera. I know almost exactly what kind of camera work I want, but I also need to be doing the actual dance. (What I really need to do is clone myself. That would make this whole creating-art thing so much easier because I would know what I want and I would always be available the same time as I am and then I could be in two physical locations simultaneously.)
The second problem is the fact that the basement floor is unprotected concrete -- a bit of a dancer's nightmare, and especially for one who's already showing signs of knee trouble. (And guess what makes the lighting in that basement so amazing? Yep... the light-conducting properties of bare concrete.) I have a bit of a temporary floor solution in mind (though it might kill the lighting a bit), so if it's possible to get in there and get the footage at the exact angles I want without any superfluous messing around, I should hopefully come out of there mostly unscathed. But it's gotten me thinking -- at what level does safety trump aesthetics/perfect lighting/space/opportunity? For me, just me, that's one thing. If I want to be potentially stupid and trash my knees, that's my problem. But even when I was seriously considering doing Hollow Man, I couldn't get it out of my mind -- would it really have been fair to ask two other dancers to risk it?
The Twitter-friendly version of that wall of words? 'Creative brain is exploding.'
And that's what I've been doing lately. How about you?
To answer the question... more choreography. Give me a second to look through my stacks of notes and I'll tell you what I'm working on.
*removes half-inch thick stack of paper from clipboard and shuffles through it*
Okay, here we go...
Eighth Wonder (White Heart): Back in December I was asked to compose and perform a ballet solo for the local dance team. I was originally going to perform my choreography for David Meece's One Small Child, but after some rehearsing, discovered that the stage in my mind is much, much bigger than most stages are in real life (unless we're talking hockey arenas). Since we aren't quite booking hockey arenas at this point, I would either have to re-work One Small Child or come up with something else. I chose Plan B, and Eighth Wonder was pretty much entirely choreographed within a week. Performances start in May. (I say this so casually, but inside I'm jumping up and down and squealing like a five-year-old.)
Raging Of The Moon (White Heart): I've been dreaming about this one for a long time, probably from the second time I ever heard this song. I'm finally working out some visual motifs and I've got formations and basic choreography figured out until about the three-minute mark. It's a lot like what I did with Speechless (big epic formation dance with intricate visual 'harmonies'), only this one will be actually danceable by humans. I'm excited about this one. It's going to look so cool.
Hollow Man (Daniel Amos): I'm hoping this will actually become a joint choreographic venture with myself and the other two choreographers on the dance team, the idea being that each of us choreographs our own part in a different discipline from the other two, and then we put the individual parts together on the stage. This would be an attempt to build on the haunting almost-discord of the song -- it looks amazing in my head, but it remains to be seen what real life will do to it...
Montana Sky (White Heart): I haven't touched this song in over a month. It started out slow anyway, but the actual dance was turning out rather nicely. I just seem to have lost my ambition for this one. I'd still like to finish it sometime, as it was shaping up to be really pretty (soft, gentle ballet trio), and I was already past the halfway point anyway...
Shedding The Mortal Coil (Daniel Amos): I kind of doubt this will ever get staged. It's bubblegum Junior Jazz One at its finest. But it's so much fun...
(Yes, the linked video does cut it off, but there's only like five more seconds in the song after that. Basically he holds the note for 'coil' and the guitar reverberates for a few more seconds.)
Going Public (Newsboys): Seriously, does this song not have 'tap dance' written all over it?
Answering Machine (Prodigal): I'm not seriously working on this (yet), but the other day I was brainstorming ideas for it and I think there's some potential for this one. This would be another tap dance.
Other stuff I've been doing...
Photography -- just did a snow photo shoot with my sister yesterday. I waited nearly a week for cloud cover before I finally gave up and figured I'd just have to make it work with the sun's harsh glare coming off the snow (before it all melted away). Those pictures had better have turned out (I haven't looked at them yet).
On a side note, I, unlike everyone else in this province, am LOVING the snow. We got a mild blizzard here last Thursday... it was awesome. Except for the people in the 100-car pileup, but it sounds like they were all pretty much okay anyway. (If the idiots in this province would just learn that the speed on the highway is 110, not 300 gazillion, this wouldn't have been a problem.) Since I'm on my soapbox anyway, listen Albertans, you have no right to complain. It's MARCH, people. March. You have no right to be whining about missing spring yet. For crying out loud, it's March! What do you expect? Crocuses in your underwear drawer? Spring around here comes in May. IT. HAPPENS. EVERY. YEAR. Do you people not pay attention?
*gets off soapbox*
*abruptly changes gears*
So to make a long story short, I just became aware of a really cool old abandoned house literally a two-minute drive from where I live. Can you say 'video/photo shoot location?' Only one problem -- it's being demolished in two and a half weeks. But I really, really want to get something artistic out of that house before it's destroyed and forgotten. There isn't too much there for a photo shoot, but it has the best music-video lighting ever, especially in the basement.
At first I was thinking of doing a 'music video' for the dance to the aforementioned Hollow Man. However, as I thought about the logistics of choreographing, perfecting, and shooting the whole thing in two weeks, I was forced to admit defeat. There is no way I'm going to be able to pull that off, even with the other two dancers on spring break. I kind of doubt I'll ever be able to not regret getting that committed to film while I had the chance -- that basement, that lighting, is so so perfect for the mood, the sound, the dance of Hollow Man. I had camera angles figured out and everything.
So now I'm considering (hopefully) the next best thing: an already-choreographed piece that requires only one dancer -- me. Eighth Wonder. It won't pull as much creative awesomeness out of that basement as Hollow Man would, but under such a tight deadline, it'll have to do. I just hope someday I'll find another basement as aesthetically brilliant as that one with less of a deadline on it.
There's really only one problem with doing Eighth Wonder in there -- well, two -- but both would have been present no matter what dance I picked. One is I need someone to run the camera. I know almost exactly what kind of camera work I want, but I also need to be doing the actual dance. (What I really need to do is clone myself. That would make this whole creating-art thing so much easier because I would know what I want and I would always be available the same time as I am and then I could be in two physical locations simultaneously.)
The second problem is the fact that the basement floor is unprotected concrete -- a bit of a dancer's nightmare, and especially for one who's already showing signs of knee trouble. (And guess what makes the lighting in that basement so amazing? Yep... the light-conducting properties of bare concrete.) I have a bit of a temporary floor solution in mind (though it might kill the lighting a bit), so if it's possible to get in there and get the footage at the exact angles I want without any superfluous messing around, I should hopefully come out of there mostly unscathed. But it's gotten me thinking -- at what level does safety trump aesthetics/perfect lighting/space/opportunity? For me, just me, that's one thing. If I want to be potentially stupid and trash my knees, that's my problem. But even when I was seriously considering doing Hollow Man, I couldn't get it out of my mind -- would it really have been fair to ask two other dancers to risk it?
The Twitter-friendly version of that wall of words? 'Creative brain is exploding.'
And that's what I've been doing lately. How about you?
01 February 2013
National Choreography Month Recap
So what was my first-ever official National Choreography Month like?
Pretty amazing. I (just barely) completed eighteen minutes and thirty-six seconds of choreography. That's roughly half my output over the previous ten months all over again. In thirty-one days.
It was kind of stressful at times, and I certainly wouldn't demand four full dances of myself every single month (not at this point), but I'm really surprised what kind of gold my brain churned out even under such pressure.
Observe:
Climb The Hill (White Heart) (choreographed in five days) -- Once I adjusted to the idea of the weird rhythm phrasing, I had a lot of fun with this one. It turned out very well, I think, except in the last minute or so (it kind of fell apart after Rick's verse). Still, once that minute gets an overhaul, it should be nearly stage-worthy...
Unchain (White Heart) (choreographed in ten days) -- Oh. My. Goodness. And I thought I liked this song before. Listening to it pretty much every waking moment for a full week, catching all the nuances of the instruments and the vocal track as they were repeatedly poured into my brain through the headphones... oh my goodness. It's like floating on a cloud, it really is. And the lyrics themselves are breathtaking -- so honest, so real. How are these phenomenal people not still creating stuff together? Seriously.
Oh, the dance? Well, that turned out pretty well too. I'm very excited about it. It was kind of a departure from my usual style -- less balletic (I refuse to say the word 'contemporary') (and anyway, there's no floor work in it, so it's not contemporary). But it turned out so emotional, so delicate. Three people -- one leading most of the dance and two moving softly, echoing in the background, all working off each other... on the right threesome, this would be a stunning, stunning piece to watch.
Creatively speaking, I grew a lot in this piece -- in my style, my voice, my ability to feel the song. It's not a pure technical showcase, like my earlier stuff was (Sing Your Freedom, anybody?). Certainly, technique is a requirement, but it's not pure straight-up technique this time. There's room for the dancers to put a little soul into it.
Fly Eagle Fly (White Heart) (choreographed in seven days) -- This one was pretty personal for me. It's a dance for two, and the faces I see are my own and that of a close friend. Last year was really cruel to her, and it took a lot of time and love for her to get back on her feet again. She's doing much better now, and you see that at the end of the dance -- both of them are dancing together, but the first dancer, while still at the second dancer's side, is slowly giving her a little more space, watching as she grows in confidence and begins to soar on her own again.
Creatively speaking, a lot of the let-it-breathe-don't-micromanage lessons I learnt with Unchain are still apparent. Make no mistake, this is a classical ballet dance, but feeling the vocal dynamic was very present here as well. Emotion factors heavily into this one too (perhaps even more so than in Unchain) because of the personal story behind it. Again, performed by the right people, this will be a really good piece to watch.
The Dance (Servant) (choreographed in nine days) -- Probably the closest thing to pure jazz I've written to date. And apparently my jazz knowledge can be summed up in the following list: jazz hands, skip-change-of-step (and I'm not even sure that's jazz), turned-in stuff, lindy, and ball change. So guess what the dance is chock-full of. I'm not as proud of it as I am of, say, Unchain, but this is also a completely different song. It should be fairly easy to teach, anyway -- after all, it pretty much consists of jazz turns, lindy-ball-changes and skip-change-of-step. Having more people in it makes it look like there's more to the dance than that, though (there's my pro-tip of the week. You're welcome).
Now to pick another song upon which to bestow my newfound depths of soul-baring emotion (or so I hope). I have a shortlist of about twenty songs that were in the running for National Choreography Month to choose from... The other day I was considering Raging Of The Moon (White Heart), because it's a dance for a large group and I haven't done a big epic group dance like that since Speechless back in September-October. However, I also have a neat little solo in my head for Eighth Wonder (take a guess), and as I just scrolled through the list of candidates, Michael Card's Chorus Of Faith jumped out at me, so we'll see...
In the meantime, I have two solos and a trio to memorise for the purpose of auditioning (this Sunday... who, me? Procrastinate?) and a pointe combination and my role in a piece at dance team to practice.
Pretty amazing. I (just barely) completed eighteen minutes and thirty-six seconds of choreography. That's roughly half my output over the previous ten months all over again. In thirty-one days.
It was kind of stressful at times, and I certainly wouldn't demand four full dances of myself every single month (not at this point), but I'm really surprised what kind of gold my brain churned out even under such pressure.
Observe:
Climb The Hill (White Heart) (choreographed in five days) -- Once I adjusted to the idea of the weird rhythm phrasing, I had a lot of fun with this one. It turned out very well, I think, except in the last minute or so (it kind of fell apart after Rick's verse). Still, once that minute gets an overhaul, it should be nearly stage-worthy...
Unchain (White Heart) (choreographed in ten days) -- Oh. My. Goodness. And I thought I liked this song before. Listening to it pretty much every waking moment for a full week, catching all the nuances of the instruments and the vocal track as they were repeatedly poured into my brain through the headphones... oh my goodness. It's like floating on a cloud, it really is. And the lyrics themselves are breathtaking -- so honest, so real. How are these phenomenal people not still creating stuff together? Seriously.
Oh, the dance? Well, that turned out pretty well too. I'm very excited about it. It was kind of a departure from my usual style -- less balletic (I refuse to say the word 'contemporary') (and anyway, there's no floor work in it, so it's not contemporary). But it turned out so emotional, so delicate. Three people -- one leading most of the dance and two moving softly, echoing in the background, all working off each other... on the right threesome, this would be a stunning, stunning piece to watch.
Creatively speaking, I grew a lot in this piece -- in my style, my voice, my ability to feel the song. It's not a pure technical showcase, like my earlier stuff was (Sing Your Freedom, anybody?). Certainly, technique is a requirement, but it's not pure straight-up technique this time. There's room for the dancers to put a little soul into it.
Fly Eagle Fly (White Heart) (choreographed in seven days) -- This one was pretty personal for me. It's a dance for two, and the faces I see are my own and that of a close friend. Last year was really cruel to her, and it took a lot of time and love for her to get back on her feet again. She's doing much better now, and you see that at the end of the dance -- both of them are dancing together, but the first dancer, while still at the second dancer's side, is slowly giving her a little more space, watching as she grows in confidence and begins to soar on her own again.
Creatively speaking, a lot of the let-it-breathe-don't-micromanage lessons I learnt with Unchain are still apparent. Make no mistake, this is a classical ballet dance, but feeling the vocal dynamic was very present here as well. Emotion factors heavily into this one too (perhaps even more so than in Unchain) because of the personal story behind it. Again, performed by the right people, this will be a really good piece to watch.
The Dance (Servant) (choreographed in nine days) -- Probably the closest thing to pure jazz I've written to date. And apparently my jazz knowledge can be summed up in the following list: jazz hands, skip-change-of-step (and I'm not even sure that's jazz), turned-in stuff, lindy, and ball change. So guess what the dance is chock-full of. I'm not as proud of it as I am of, say, Unchain, but this is also a completely different song. It should be fairly easy to teach, anyway -- after all, it pretty much consists of jazz turns, lindy-ball-changes and skip-change-of-step. Having more people in it makes it look like there's more to the dance than that, though (there's my pro-tip of the week. You're welcome).
Now to pick another song upon which to bestow my newfound depths of soul-baring emotion (or so I hope). I have a shortlist of about twenty songs that were in the running for National Choreography Month to choose from... The other day I was considering Raging Of The Moon (White Heart), because it's a dance for a large group and I haven't done a big epic group dance like that since Speechless back in September-October. However, I also have a neat little solo in my head for Eighth Wonder (take a guess), and as I just scrolled through the list of candidates, Michael Card's Chorus Of Faith jumped out at me, so we'll see...
In the meantime, I have two solos and a trio to memorise for the purpose of auditioning (this Sunday... who, me? Procrastinate?) and a pointe combination and my role in a piece at dance team to practice.
11 July 2012
Creative Brain Is Being A Jerk
You know what's annoying?
When you haven't done any substantial amount of choreography for like three weeks and then you put yourself on a guilt trip to catch it all up because you don't have forever but every time you so much as click on the iTunes window you fall asleep, even if it's still five hours before your regular bedtime. And then after several weeks of this nonsense your frustration grows to the point where you're thinking 'why do I even bother putting in all that effort to waking up in the morning with intent to do something with my life if my stupid brain is going to put me to sleep every time I want it to do what it was created to do in the first place?'
I think that must be one of the most annoying things in the world.
I'm starting to wonder if I'm not supposed to ever ever ever choreograph Glory To The King... which makes me sad, because it's a fantastic song which totally screams for jumping and high kicks and jazz hands and general all-round joyful exuberance. (In fact, I'm thinking I'll feature this song for Music Day this week, if I still remember by Friday.)
When you haven't done any substantial amount of choreography for like three weeks and then you put yourself on a guilt trip to catch it all up because you don't have forever but every time you so much as click on the iTunes window you fall asleep, even if it's still five hours before your regular bedtime. And then after several weeks of this nonsense your frustration grows to the point where you're thinking 'why do I even bother putting in all that effort to waking up in the morning with intent to do something with my life if my stupid brain is going to put me to sleep every time I want it to do what it was created to do in the first place?'
I think that must be one of the most annoying things in the world.
I'm starting to wonder if I'm not supposed to ever ever ever choreograph Glory To The King... which makes me sad, because it's a fantastic song which totally screams for jumping and high kicks and jazz hands and general all-round joyful exuberance. (In fact, I'm thinking I'll feature this song for Music Day this week, if I still remember by Friday.)
21 May 2012
National Choreography Month - Day 21
1.49 am -- Just spent two hours reading stuff on contemporary dance, jazz technique and the Shim Sham on the Internet. My eyes are tired now. Thinking maybe I can throw some jazz walks into Apathy Alert somewhere. Also, now I have a really annoying song in my head but I don't know what it's called -- just some song on one of the videos of some girl in a really skimpy dress that was actually more like a shirt. How can anyone walk on a stage before hundreds in that getup without either dying of embarrassment or freezing to death?
Sort of dreading choreographing The Gift. Yesterday morning I realised I've only heard that song like five times in my entire life -- I only picked it because it was short and I was feeling like an underachiever for only planning two dances.
Apathy Alert has picked up a little (as of early yesterday morning, before I went to bed), but it's fast becoming a Sing Your Freedom-like show of potentially-impossible-to-execute technical prowess. And speed. Because technique and complex sequences are nothing without speed to make it look even more amazing.
Also, getting sick of the song Apathy Alert. I've been solving the problem by listening to Sheila Walsh and reading random dance articles online. Unfortunately, that's not very choreographically productive.
Sort of intimidated by all the stuff I read on choreography though. Most of it was modern/contemporary-based, but still. I can't expect any of my output so far to get noticed. It's horrible stuff. But I only have till September to get some solid performance-worthy choreography in place if we want a shot at getting our first decent-sized gig. Thank goodness I'm not the only choreographer on the team...
3.10 am -- Just killed spider the size of a dinner plate. Off to bed now... though whether I'll actually sleep now is another matter.
12.39 pm -- My mother is yelling at me again because I'm apparently not productive enough.
7.39 pm -- Finally starting work (of the choreographic persuasion). Apparently today was spring cleaning and as such I was unable to report for duty till now. Am starting work at about the 2.04 mark of Apathy Alert.
7.59 pm -- Got a phrase divisible into threes? Eschappés are your friend. I doubt the poor saps -- I mean, highly skilled and amazing dancers -- who actually have to perform the sequence will agree, though.
8.30ish pm -- Am now at the 2.34 mark. (I'd like to know how I managed that kind of speed because I'll definitely need to replicate this feat in the future...)
11.45 pm -- iPod just randomly crashed and made me lose my place. Continuing on... Almost done notating the eschappé/relevé sequence.
Sort of dreading choreographing The Gift. Yesterday morning I realised I've only heard that song like five times in my entire life -- I only picked it because it was short and I was feeling like an underachiever for only planning two dances.
Apathy Alert has picked up a little (as of early yesterday morning, before I went to bed), but it's fast becoming a Sing Your Freedom-like show of potentially-impossible-to-execute technical prowess. And speed. Because technique and complex sequences are nothing without speed to make it look even more amazing.
Also, getting sick of the song Apathy Alert. I've been solving the problem by listening to Sheila Walsh and reading random dance articles online. Unfortunately, that's not very choreographically productive.
Sort of intimidated by all the stuff I read on choreography though. Most of it was modern/contemporary-based, but still. I can't expect any of my output so far to get noticed. It's horrible stuff. But I only have till September to get some solid performance-worthy choreography in place if we want a shot at getting our first decent-sized gig. Thank goodness I'm not the only choreographer on the team...
3.10 am -- Just killed spider the size of a dinner plate. Off to bed now... though whether I'll actually sleep now is another matter.
12.39 pm -- My mother is yelling at me again because I'm apparently not productive enough.
7.39 pm -- Finally starting work (of the choreographic persuasion). Apparently today was spring cleaning and as such I was unable to report for duty till now. Am starting work at about the 2.04 mark of Apathy Alert.
7.59 pm -- Got a phrase divisible into threes? Eschappés are your friend. I doubt the poor saps -- I mean, highly skilled and amazing dancers -- who actually have to perform the sequence will agree, though.
8.30ish pm -- Am now at the 2.34 mark. (I'd like to know how I managed that kind of speed because I'll definitely need to replicate this feat in the future...)
11.45 pm -- iPod just randomly crashed and made me lose my place. Continuing on... Almost done notating the eschappé/relevé sequence.
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