slow Saturday/dance stuff

[cassidyrose]

We had a show last night and have one tonight so I am taking it easy today. The show went well and I am looking forward to tonight. We are in a choreographers' showcase at Dance Mission and we have been in it before, but this time is really quite different for me because I am the choreographer showing work which feels a bit weird. Actually, it is the first time that any Big Moves company has been in a show like this with work from an internal choreographer (as opposed to someone we hired from the outside). It is a big step. I am happy with the piece even though I know we can tweak it a bit more. The Fly Girls have really stepped up to the challenge of doing a piece that is not only fast and rather technical, but also that involves contact work and lifts. Everyone has worked really hard to make it look good. We also have awesome costumes, thanks to Matilda. We definitely win "Best Costume" for the show, if nothing else. :-) I am also somewhat proud of myself that I ventured into the contact work as a choreographer and developed it the way I did. I also feel I achieved something by using music that was more challenging to work with than I normally use. I used two pieces by Morphine and if you are familiar with Morphine you know what I am talking about (maybe). I love Morphine and had wanted to choreograph something to their music for a long time, but I did find it very challenging. Basically the contrast between fairly fast timing in their instrumentation versus the very laid-back, somewhat slow, and dreamy sounding vocals combined with syncopation and drastic mood changes within a song made it more difficult than the average choreography task. But, I did it and am pleased with the results.

I am off to clean some more and rest and eat and then get ready for tonight's show!

Comments

[krasota.livejournal.com]

Love Morphine. Which songs?

[cassidyrose.livejournal.com]

I used Lilah and Potion off of "Like Swimming". Lilah opens the piece and that is the part with the contact/lift work and then it moves into Potion and that part of the dance is unison work probably best described as lyrical or contemporary.

[deepspring.livejournal.com]

I have never heared Morphine until your post. Dialed up a few tracks and I love it! Going to have to get a CD. Which is your favorite?

[cassidyrose.livejournal.com]

"Like Swimming" and "Yes" are my favorite albums. I think "Like Swimming" is a bit more accessible (and I mean that in a good way) as a couple of the tracks on "Yes" really do veer into some serious beat poetry territory and it is more jazzy. "Like Swimming" maintains a bit more of a jazz-influenced rock focus, whereas I think "Yes" goes more dreamy-jazz more often. I probably like more songs on "Like Swimming", but some of my favorite all-time Morphine songs are on "Yes" (Honey White, Scratch, Radar, Super Sex, Whisper). I like the production a bit more on "Yes", but I still really enjoy "Like Swimming." The two songs I used for my dance piece were from "Like Swimming".

Hope that helps!

[deepspring.livejournal.com]

Awesome, thanks! I will have to buy one this weekend.