What's The Score?

Improvise.

Last week, nothing went as planned. It was a week of mishaps, things forgotten, cancellations, and miscommunications. Also at least one ruined pair of jeans in a laundry catastrophe, a broken but seemingly unnecessary car part, and the accidental flooding of a room of the house. Sigh. Not what I planned. Not how it was to go. 

I may have chosen to sink into a foul mood, to shake my fist at the sky, take it out on those around me, or generally grump and moan. But it wouldn't have done any good. Regardless of our hopes and best-laid plans, life follows no rule books or direct paths. It hands us what it has to hand us,regardless of our agendas or how inconvenient it may be. It forces us to improvise based on a score to which we may not be privy. 

So this week, instead of forcing my own intentions and will upon the world, I choose to listen, look, and ask. What is the score? What is life handing me? What are the turning points and opportunities? What is the tempo of this week? How might I play along?

There is only one dance to be danced at a time. Do it well.

Shake It Baby

Cues.

Every spring Seattle hosts a three day belly dance festival called Cues and Tattoos. What makes this event special is it's emphasis on the role of improvisation in the belly dance form. There are many branches of American belly dance, each with an emphasis on a particular movement style or regional music and movements, but improvisation is a fundamental part of nearly every kind of belly dance being practiced in the United States. That being so, in recent years there has been a marked shift way from improvisation and towards set choreography. Not so at Cues and Tattoos. One of the requirements for participating in their performance showcase is that at least 50 percent of the performance be improvised, which is especially challenging for any group that wants to present something other than the well-known and easily recognized movements of American Tribal or International Tribal styles.

My solution,  to play with "weaving" choreography and improvisation, unconventional formations, and a little bit of impish playfulness. What I have to show for it is a deeply textured and seamless piece that is, in fact, different every time. Time to put it on the stage.

Photograph:
www.rubygonewild.com

Yes, And...

Improv.

The first rule of theatrical improvisation is "Yes, and." Meaning, in order to keep the action moving forward, to progress the story or develop the plot and characters, you have to say yes to what you are given, and add to it. That means that if the other person decides in the first moments of the scene that they are a frog even though you have been asked to improvise, say, a scene in a doctors office, you have to accept the fact that in your new world, there are frogs in doctors offices. In dance, we call this "saying yes to your choices" and "keep dancing". Not as lyrical or succinct, but the idea is the same. No amount of pre-planning or rehearsal can completely prepare you for whatever will happen on stage, in that moment your only course of action is to keep moving forward, pressing into the piece and the other performers, not away. To stop, or roadblock is the only sure way to fail.

I think that the same rule is useful when applied to life, which is, after all, really just a grand improvisation. So today, say "Yes, and..." to the things you are given and push forward into the scenes you play.

Step In Time

Repeat.

Studying dance is a repetitive and unruly thing.  Most of what is taught in class is technique and form, the rules of the movement.  Good dancers, dancers with drive, dancers that want to dance, spend hours in repetition, sometimes excruciatingly slowly, sometimes at near impossible tempos.  Dance is learned in repetition; is it the primary tool for teaching the body.  Repeat, critique, repeat again.  Repeat, measure progress, repeat again.  Ability is not stored, a dancer has to always practice, always fight to maintain or push forward.  For every piece we master there is a new movement to begin to study.  Repetition makes it easy to be a technician.  True artistry though, comes from finding release from those things and dancing from the inside out.  Using technique and form to support the movement rather than dictate it.  Some artists work from the ground up, building the dance from assembled bits and pieces. Others work in retrograde, deconstructing phrases, and movements into their most basic elements.  Some are motivated by imagery, or the need to communicate something.  Others are driven by the music.  Ultimately, like most things in life, it is all an improvisation, the following of one impulse, and then another, and another until with repetition, we come to know it as a dance.  

What dances are in your life today?  What kind of improvisation will you do?  What are you using to support it?

Photo Courtesy of:

http://balletclassroom.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/ballet-stretching-feet-with-pointe-shoes.jpg