Vancouver Dance History (2006-2016): Post 34

Earlier this afternoon I interviewed Lara Barclay for our Vancouver Dance Histories project. I got to know Lara while participating as one of the community dancers on the PuSh Festival presentation of Sylvain Émard's Le Grand Continental, for which she served as rehearsal director. Since that time I have enjoyed watching her perform in work by Jennifer Mascall and Vanessa Goodman, among other local choreographers. And yet while Lara grew up and began her dance training in Port Moody, most of her adolescence was spent studying at the National Ballet School in Toronto, where, as she put it, she was always the tallest girl in the class (and frequently taller than her male partners as well). Following graduation from NBS, Lara won a scholarship to study in Europe, and she ended up in Hamburg, taking class and studying with John Neumeier. Her first company job, however, was in the northern port city of Kiel, Germany, where she danced repertoire that included works by Johann Kresnik and Martin Stiefermann. While in Europe, Lara also took class with Bill Forsythe at Ballett Frankfurt and workshops with Frey Faust and Lloyd Newson. As she put it to me, it was in Europe that she discovered a whole other world of dance--and also that ballet was, quite literally, not ever going to be the right dance fit for her.

Following this initial stint in Germany, Lara moved back to Toronto to take up a position with Toronto Dance Theatre, where she remained for three years, dancing in works by Christopher House and James Kudelka, and also reconnecting with mentor Peggy Baker, who first taught her modern dance at NBS. Dominque Dumais and Kevin O'Day, who were just starting up a new company in Mannheim, lured Lara back to Germany, but it was in 2006--following a soccer-themed gig during the world-cup with Brazilian-based choreographer Deborah Colker--that Lara and her husband made the big move back to Vancouver. This coincided with the birth of Lara's first daughter and a slight shift in focus to teaching (with Monica Proença, Lara is the co-founder of the Lamondance Company, a pre-professional training program in North Vancouver). However, very soon after arriving back in the Vancouver area, Josh Beamish asked Lara to work with Move: the company. And then, in 2012, came a transformative collaboration with Aszure Barton, who invited Lara to be part of the creative process that led to Awaa, a piece about motherhood and masculine-feminine relations that I remember seeing at the Chutzpah! Festival, and in which Lara is the lone female dancer among a cast of six other male dancers. Lara continues to tour the piece in slightly different iterations to this day (including an upcoming stint next month in LA), and she said that working with Barton taught her to discover patience on stage.

Lara ended our interview by saying this is a transformative time in her career. She's recently had surgery on her right foot, which has meant making certain adjustments in her dancing. As she framed things, aging as a dancer means you have to become better at listening to your body, and also choosing work that pertains to what it is that you are still able to do to the best of your abilities, and without fear of injury. Lara is also interested in moving into the area of expressive arts therapy, and she and her family are contemplating a move back to Germany. If and when this happens, I will be sad to have Lara leave the Vancouver dance community. In the immediate future, however, I can look forward to seeing Lara (alongside VDH co-conspirator Alexa Mardon) once again in the full-length premiere this fall of Vanessa Goodman's Wells Hill.

P

Dances for a Small Stage at PAL Studio Theatre

For the latest iteration of Dances for a Small Stage, artistic producer Julie-anne Saroyan has set up shop this weekend at the intimate Performing Arts Lodge Studio Theatre on Cardero Street. The gala program last night was a mix of the classical and the contemporary, both musically and in terms of movement.

The first piece, Flow, paired composer and musician Loscil with burlesque dancer Burgandy Brixx. Loscil played his electronic music live, via a computer and digital console, as various images of the waves and shoreline and the ebb and flow of the tide washed across the upstage screen. Following a brief blackout, Brixx appears on a raised upstage platform, positioned like a mermaid upon a rock. Unfurling her long legs, she moves onto her back and begins a series of bicycle kicks. Before long the black tunic she is wearing comes off, revealing sparkly pasties and a g-string. Brixx then begins an elaborate fan dance that forms a somewhat odd visual juxtaposition to Locsil's hypnotic music. Without the standard sis, boom, bang of the standard bump and grind burlesque score that cues us for the slow tease and reveal of skin, we are left to wonder at the particular erotics of display being invoked here--especially as Brixx's body is interpellated at various points into the screen projections.

Following a longish intermission, Small Stage mainstay Karissa Barry led off the next set with a solo set to a sampled stop-and-start score by the group Venetian Snares; her piece also featured a unique lighting installation. Next up was Vanessa Goodman's Contrapuntus, which uses Bach's "Art of the Fugue"--here transcribed for violin and played live by Meredith Bates--to explore parallel techniques of contrapuntal movement. Dancers Lara Barclay and Bevin Poole begin standing in close proximity, weaving their limbs around each other's bodies in perfect synchronous response, and only rarely touching. In the same way that in the fugue one voice or instrument will begin a musical phrase and then another voice or instrument will come in to match it, but in a different pitch, so here do we see these matchless dancers, so attuned to each other's rhythms, initiating, responding to, and subtly changing the directional flow of their paired movement. Literally opening things up in the second half of this short excerpt, Goodman choreographs a variation on her main theme by having Barclay and Poole face off on a diagonal, almost like toreadors, before bringing them together centre stage for more physical and hands-on partnering. Here I detected some trace phrases from Goodman's Wells Hill, which premiered earlier this year at the Chutzpah! Festival (and which featured Barclay and Poole); afterwards, Goodman confirmed to me that this excerpt will indeed form part of the larger work she is building, which is based on her research into the collaborations between Marshall McLuhan and Glenn Gould, whose "So You Want to Write a Fugue?" is a famously witty take on Bach.

I had a double dose of Le Grand Continental reunion last night; not only was LGC rehearsal director Barclay performing, but rehearsal assistant Caroline Liffman's The Fitzner Sister, a solo for Lina Fitzner, was part of the program. Set to a musical loop by Colin Stetson, the piece sees Fitzner, dressed in an amazing black and red tutu, move in and out of various classical ballet positions and poses, at the heart of which is a series of slowly and precisely executed arabesques. Because, unlike in most classical ballet, Fitzner is moving into her leg extensions without the aid of a male partner to help balance her, and because her poses are slowed down, held for much longer and not tied to set musical cues, what was made most manifest to me in the piece was the sheer physical effort and training that goes into each movement. In a big ballet production we are wont to gloss over such effort because classical technique is premised on the willful erasure of the fleshly corporeality of the dancer's body. As Arlene Croce famously wrote, onstage it is the ballerina's arabesque that is real, not her leg. Precisely because Liffman draws our attention to the realness of Fiztner's legs--which, unlike the typical prima ballerina's, are not stick-thin and sheathed in lyotards--the somatic illusion proffered by Croce is here deconstructed and materially exposed to feminist scrutiny. Which is to say to both Caroline and Lina: right on, sister!

The middle section of the evening concluded with dancer Caitlin Griffin improvising to the live musical stylings of street musician David Morin. I was not all that taken with Griffin's movement riffs, which seemed a bit wan and ho-hum. But Morin's deft use of his looping machine to overlay his guitar licks, vocalizations and finger snaps was most enjoyable.

After the second intermission, we were treated to a "musical intermezzo" featuring Elisa Thorn on harp,  Meredith Bates on violin, and Marina Hasselberg on cello. Apart from Debussy's "Claire de Lune," all the compositions were by Thorn and I was quite taken by the tonal juxtapositions. However, I'm not sure it suited the normally staccato beats of flamenco, which is what we were treated to when dancer Dayna Szyndrowski joined the trio on stage. I wanted to hear more of Szyndrowski's clacking feet, but it was almost as if she was afraid to cut fully loose for fear of drowning out the musicians. I did admire her lovely, blooming floreo, and there were several appreciative ole's at the end of the piece.

P.

Vanessa Goodman and Idan Sharabi at Chutzpah!

Last night at the Norman and Annette Rothstein Theatre, the Chutzpah! Festival presented a double bill of dance. The evening opened with the premiere of a new work by local choreographer and SFU Contemporary Arts alum Vanessa Goodman. Wells Hill takes its name from the street in Toronto where Marshall McLuhan lived before moving to Wychwood Park, and where he wrote three of his most famous works: The Gutenberg Galaxy, Understanding Media, and The Medium is the Massage. (It helps that I live with, and was sitting beside, a noted McLuhan scholar.) Goodman takes inspiration from McLuhan's ideas about mass communication and, especially via his collaborations with Glenn Gould, how media affect the ways we produce and consume art.

To a recording of Gould performing The Goldberg Variations, a sextet of incredibly gifted Vancouver dancers (Lara Barclay, Lisa Gelley, James Gnam, Josh Martin, Bevin Poole, and Jane Osborne) begin moving in formation stage right, their deconstructed white tuxedo shirts and grey skirts and slacks evoking elite private school uniforms (the costumes are by Deborah Beaulieu), an image reinforced by the evocative floor and overhead florescent lighting design by James Proudfoot. The five dancers, initially tightly grouped and moving their arms synchronously and geometrically to frame their heads and torsos, slowly break apart and fan out across the stage. At this point, Barclay begins weaving in and around them, our focus drawn to her different movement patterns, the amount of space she is covering relative to the others, and, in this instance, the deliberate showcasing of her virtuosity. If dance is a performance medium that also in some senses performs us, Goodman seems to be asking, in this opening sequence, a key structural question: how, to paraphrase W.B.Yeats, do we separate the dancer from the dance?

This parts/whole, content/form equation was what I kept focusing on throughout the remainder of the piece. For example, following the opening group sequence we get a gorgeous duet between Gnam and Poole; as they finish, they move upstage, making way for the pairing of Gelley and Osborne. As kinetically compelling as the the downstage duo is (and these women are truly exceptional movers), our attention is necessarily divided between them and the upstage duo, a reminder that in contemporary dance our awareness and sensory-motor perceptors are being hailed in multiple ways, and often simultaneously. So too is it when Martin joins the group a bit later in the piece; he is moving differently than the others, more fluidly, and as he floats in and out between the others' bodies we cannot help but follow his progress. Finally, there is the stunningly arresting final tableau that Goodman gives us: Barclay, having first been grabbed from behind by Gelley, is steered stage left, as one-by-one the other dancers attach themselves to her body (and to each other) from the wings, manipulating her limbs like she is a marionette (an image with obvious dance-world resonance). However, Gnam remains apart from this group, dancing a solo in counterpoint to the larger group machine.

A lot is going on here. On the one hand, Goodman seems to be suggesting that if the dancer's body is a medium, then it is the choreographer who ultimately works it over. But sometimes even the most disciplined bodies can resist being conscripted for a particular message--hence Gnam dancing alone off to the side. Then, too, the dance-as-performed works on us (including kinaesthetically), a reminder that in the feedback loop of communication it is the audience that completes the circuit of both the medium and the message. This is something Gould recognized. Influenced by McLuhan, he famously gave up live performance for the perfectibility of the recording studio. But he never forgot who was at the other end of "his master's voice," that his records needed to be played and listened too. (Gould and McLuhan both appear at various points in screen projections curated by Goodman and Ben Didier). Likewise, in this very smart and important new work, Goodman recognizes that if, in McLuhan's words, "Art is anything you can get away with," that art nevertheless demands a response.

Idan Sharabi's Interviews/Makom is a set of twinned works based on a series of conversations the choreographer conducted with Israeli residents (and members of his own dance company) based on the concept of home. Excerpts from the interviews play throughout both pieces and in Makom (Hebrew for "a place") dancer Ema Yuasa, originally from Japan, speaks about her feelings of displacement--even after eleven years, and despite pursuing her dance dreams--living in Holland. Interviews, the newer of the pieces, is staged first; the conversations, recorded during the most recent conflict in Gaza, are filled with moments of quite tension that the dancers occasionally respond to through physical gestures. For example, when Sharabi makes a reference on the tape to the balled up fists of the woman he is talking to, we see Sharabi and fellow dancer Dor Mamalia shake their own fists at each other on stage. Later, in Makom, another interview subject also references his hands, stating that he routinely walks with his hands in his pockets as a defence against having to shake anyone else's hand. At this point, we see Mamalia take off his pants, turn them inside out, and put them back on, the interior flaps of his front pockets now plainly visible to us.

These moments of theatricalizing the interview tapes were less satisfying to me than the otherwise mostly non-representational movement. All the dancers (the fourth of whom is Dafna Dudovich) are superb in interpreting Sharabi's alternately propulsive and flowing choreography. The complex floorwork in both pieces is a particular highlight, with the dancers sometimes sinking liquidly into jointless splits and at other times throwing themselves aggressively onto their backs, legs and arms angled awkwardly about their torsos. The threat of violence is never far from the surface in both works, with a transfer of chokeholds between Sharabi and Mamalia featuring in the first part, and with Sharabi moving Yuasa about rather wildly by the back of her neck in the second part.

Trauma--the trauma of exile and migration, as well as the trauma of a homeland that is contested and under perpetual siege--is an important through-line in Interviews/Makom. And, as Diana Taylor has noted with reference to theatrical responses to Argentina's Dirty War (in The Archive and the Repertoire), the structuring motif of trauma, like that of performance, is repetition. Thus it should come as no surprise that Interviews and Makom are to a certain extent mirror halves, with the male and female dancers further twinned along gender lines. Sharabi and Mamalia begin both pieces by walking from the wings onto the stage (in the first work backwards and more slowly, in the second facing front and much more quickly), eventually meeting in the centre and extending but not touching their hands. The women, however, never dance together. Instead, they exchange over the course of both pieces each other's roles. Yuasa lies prone upstage left at the beginning of Interviews, before eventually taking a seat in the audience to watch the proceedings--including, eventually, Dudovich dancing up a storm alongside both men--along with us. In Makom the women's positions are reversed: it is Dudovich, likewise initially lying inert on the stage floor, who watches Yuasa and the men from the audience. Maybe this was Sharabi's comment on the important role of the witness in traumatic events; but his explicit gendering of this role was a concern for me, as was how much less, as a result, the women had to do relative to the men.

While both pieces had moments of outright silliness, Makom, created first but staged second, was far lighter in tone. This is a reminder that trauma can produce moments of spontaneous comedy, not least in bodily eruptions of what Henri Bergson would call "mechanical inelasticity" (when, for example, our brain tells us to do one thing, and our body responds by doing the opposite). There were many funny moments when one marvelled at the apparent incongruity of what the very elastic bodies of Sharabi's dancers were able to do. That said, I was a bit surprised by the degree to which Makom elicited outright guffaws from some quarters of the audience, including for the songs of Joni Mitchell that Sharabi incorporates into the score.

Sharabi, in his choreographer's notes, admits that for him Interviews/Makom is still a riddle. I tend to agree, and while I'm not all that concerned that the riddle be solved, I would suggest that as the piece evolves not only should it be edited for length (each half is about 10-15 minutes too long), but also for the overall quality of feeling the choreographer is seeking to provoke in his audience.

P.

Le Grand Continental: Day 2 Performances

No rain. A bit of sun even. And warm. What a difference a day makes. Sylvain seemed a bit disappointed that the inclement weather hadn't continued; he says it makes the dance really beautiful. However, I have to say I much preferred staying dry yesterday--or at least finishing both dances dripping only with sweat.

I also didn't mind the later call time. Gathering in the green room (which was a lot roomier minus all of our rain gear) at noon, we checked in with each other about our evenings--and our bodies. A bit of stiffness and soreness here and there, but mostly people seemed ready and eager for round two. Before that, however, Sylvain had us gather outside to practice the opening, as he said the day before we were late with our counts on the bit where the two lines rush towards each other in the centre of the square. The few folks who had turned up early to watch must have been a bit confused when the music cut out abruptly at the beginning of "Gogoprado" and we all trudged back inside.

As for the 1 pm performance itself, Sylvain said afterwards it was our best yet, especially in terms of keeping our lines. Funnily enough, I felt I had turned in my own worst performance, with a myriad of small, stupid mistakes--most egregiously in "India" when I forgot to do the second of the two waltz turns when the Group A and B lines merge. It also seemed like the group's overall energy was lower; for one thing, we didn't make as much noise as usual. As for the audience, I tried to whip up a bit of fervour by yelling at them to make some of their own noise at the start of "Cumbia." I got a few half-hearted whoops and claps, but they tapered off pretty quickly. As Jane Heyman said to me after the show, it's not that people weren't enjoying themselves; rather, they were just behaving like the typical Vancouver audience. Still, I now get how this can be definite energy suck for a performer and I've made a note to myself to be more boisterous from now on if I'm watching something that I really like.

A bit despondent with myself over my mistakes, I went for a long walk between shows, which I mostly spent going over the choreography in my head. There was a brief panic attack when I blanked on a whole section of "Champagne," but by the time I checked in for our 3 pm call I had resolved to just enjoy myself and give it my all for this last show. That seemed to be the general consensus with everyone else as, gathering in small groups to watch the crowds assemble and the sun peak through the clouds, we told ourselves to have fun--and, most importantly, to let the audience know it.

Which we did. As soon as the wave sounds started in the intro section I was in a calm place. And by the time we got to "Gogoprado," I knew this was going to be my best run. Even the fact that my pants kept falling down couldn't deter my enthusiasm. Checking in with friends in the audience afterward, they all had massive praise, which was a great high on which to end. PuSh Festival Artistic and Executive Director Norman Armour jokingly asked for my autograph, which I gladly wrote on his hand; then he said that the Festival was so pleased with how the whole Le Grand Continental experience had unfolded that there were very tentative plans afoot to possibly bring an even bigger and better version back next year. If so, I'm there in a heartbeat.

Partly that's because this experience has been about making a connection with a wonderful group of people I otherwise would never have gotten to know. And while, over the past 10 weeks, we've mostly been focused on learning the choreography, at last night's after party (generously organized by Mark and Diane) there was a chance to have some proper conversations with my fellow dancers. Speaking with Marion in my rusty French, I learned that she hailed from Sherbrooke, and so I was able to tell her that I lived there when I was six and seven. Eewa showed me her wounds from her job as a cook for the Glowbal restaurant chain. And Brenda, who is from Mexico City and completing a doctorate in urban planning from Amsterdam, talked to me about her fascinating research on housing in Nanjing, China. I talked with Lara about how hard it still is to make a living as a working dancer in Vancouver, and with Caroline about the merits of doing an MFA.

And, of course, we danced. It's funny, I've always been an incredibly self-conscious social dancer, even in clubs. But something about participating in LGC has loosened me up--and I'm not just talking about my hips. Last night, as Ling spun classic 80s tunes on her iPod, you couldn't hold me back, and I'm so grateful to Sylvain for inspiring us keep dancing together as a group.

Stay tuned.

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 22

Tonight at the Roundhouse was our last rehearsal before Saturday and Sunday's performances. Needless to say, we were still fine-tuning a number of things: the timing of the swaying and final crash in the intro; how to get back into our lines before the soldier walk in "Cumbia"; how far to travel during the lasso move in the same section; to remember to play out to all sides of the audience during any improv section; even the quality of our scream at the end of "Gogoprado."

And yet while Sylvain and Lara both had abundant notes at the end of our final run-through of the entire piece, what both mostly emphasized was how far we'd come, and what an excellent job we were doing. Sylvain then also explained why he kept teaching this piece to new groups of community dancers, and why after more than six years he wasn't frustrated or bored. He said it's because with every group he always sets himself new challenges and that the reward comes when each group meets or, as he claimed in our case, exceeds those expectations. And I don't think he was just spouting a bit of pre-performance flattery; while there are obvious differences in ability among individual members of the group, together we have gelled into an ensemble that is now moving as one. And not just in terms of the execution of the steps, but also in terms of the collective energy and spirit that you cannot help but feed off of in a piece such as this.

Speaking of energy and spirit, Sylvain also warned us that we will likely feel a low following Sunday's final performance. It's a regular fact of putting a production such as this together--after working so closely and intensely with each other over 10 weeks, we're bound to feel a bit of a void come next Monday when there's suddenly no regularly scheduled rehearsal to go to. From past experience, I can certainly attest to the feeling Sylvain was describing. Mercifully, Caroline let us know that she and Lara and Anna and the PuSh team would be putting together a list of local community dance resources for us to partake of should we wish to find something specifically kinetic to fill that gap. And already there is a move afoot in the group, spearheaded by Mark Haney and Diane Park, to keep dancing together in the future, with LGC dancer (and SFU Contemporary Arts alum) Jessica Barrett our resident choreographer and the always on point Peter Cox our de facto rehearsal director.

Sign me up folks. And merde to everyone for Saturday!

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 19

Back at the Roundhouse, Sylvain first had us refine the "Fatboy Slim" section with the children: once on its own, when I accidentally hit poor Shauna's head during the writhing-on-the-ground bit; and then moving into it from "India," the cross of which I thought we pretty much nailed. (Not so later on, during our full run through, according to Lara.) I'm now following Peggy during this cross, as there was some final futzing with line-positioning last night. Alas, that means I have fewer opportunities to tease Caroline.

After we bid goodnight to the children, we then learned the moves that accompany the intro, our last bit of new choreography. The moves themselves are not very complicated, but there is more silent counting we have to do in order to hit our various musical cues--not least just before the big crash at the end, which leads directly into the start of "Gogoprado." And woe betide the dancer who is late to his or her mark for that.

Following break, we welcomed our first unofficial audience into the rehearsal room: members of the PuSh Patrons Circle, who'd been invited to catch a sneak peek of the work, along with several PuSh Festival staff. It was the latter group's presence that made me most nervous, precisely because I know them so well--not to mention their own personal and professional stakes in the show. At the same time, even this relatively small group immediately raised everyone's energy levels. But before we could release that energy fully, Sylvain had us show him "Champagne," which he hadn't yet seen since his return from Montreal. The one key bit of information we learned from that was that we don't have to land on our marks at the end of the ninth and final count of eight during the improvised jumping that concludes the piece; we just have to land on the beat and all together (which is easier said than done).

As for the full run-through that we then performed for our guests, it was super-fun. And from my perspective in the upstage right corner, it also looked pretty sharp. Sure, we made mistakes here and there (myself included), and our lines are still wobbly from time to time (especially during "Cumbia"). But where for the first time I really felt we were all in sync was being fully in the moment: focused, but having fun; and self-aware enough to recover quickly when we'd made mistakes. Not that Sylvain and Lara didn't have abundant notes for us (see above). But those notes are now less about issuing large-scale corrections than encouraging us to be bigger and bolder, or else refining the quality of a move we already know. The best thing of all was seeing how stoked everyone still was at the end of the run-through. Indeed, Jody was disappointed we didn't have time to do it all again.

Saturday afternoon we'll be outdoors at the Queen E Plaza for the first time. Goodbye sprung floor, hello concrete. And likely rain. It should be an interesting test. And I have all of two days to finalize my costumes.

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 17

Last night we said goodbye to the Ukrainian Centre; following Saturday's final movement clinic at the Dance Centre, our remaining indoor rehearsals will now take place at the Roundhouse. There's only four more of them--plus two run-throughs on the Queen Elizabeth Plaza itself. Yikes! This is starting to feel real.

One consequence of moving to the Roundhouse will be an increase in space. Where our lines get most out of whack at the moment, and the two sections Lara drilled us on the hardest last night--the bit in "India" leading from the big arms into the ballet step and the waltz, and the part in "Cumbia" where we do the three cool walks, followed by the soldier steps--are largely a consequence of there not being enough space on either side of the UC. Hopefully that issue will be resolved next week.

One issue Jane and I resolved on our own in the free practice time before rehearsal began was which way to turn into the leprechaun steps from the skipping forward in "Stockfunk." I continue to be amazed at how well we have all been working together as resources for one another on this project, and our commitment to getting things right, now matter how long it takes. Of course, sometimes we trick ourselves into the wrong answer, as Jane and I discovered again in trying to sort out the puzzle of how many crocodile arms each side during "Gogoprado."

We also rehearsed for the first time the introduction to Le Grand Continental, including our entrances. It involved a lot of math to begin with, but eventually we were able to see how the desired effect all came together--and, I have to say, it was pretty cool.

An added bonus last night was that I was dancing beside Caroline for most of the evening, as she was temporarily filling in a blank spot on the grid. We were able to tap her for many of our more immediate questions following each run-through and her overall energy and virtuoso movement were a spur for me to step up my game. Plus it was fun to give her a hard time when something went awry--rare in her case, but also a nice reminder that we're all in this together, regardless of our levels of dance training.

I will say that I am starting to feel the pressure of putting together my costumes. Several people have been trying out different outfits, including Jane and Hilary last night. Me, I'm so far drawing a blank. I think I'm partly stumped by trying to second guess the weather. That and the fact that everything in my closet that looks good is also decidedly unconducive to vigorous movement. I may have to visit the thrift shops this weekend.

Next Monday Sylvain returns--gulp! And the children join us. It just gets better and better.

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 16

Last night we were back at it at the Ukrainian Hall following our two-week holiday break. I had gotten there fairly early and was surprised to see how many people were already on the floor practicing the "Champagne" section with Caroline. Following several catch-up conversations (including one between Ling and myself on the importance of comfortable undergarments, and another with Diane et al on the belly dancing revival), we were called to order by the acerbically irrepressible Emily--who immediately freaked us all out by reminding us that we opened just over two weeks. And that, apparently, we still had two sections to learn.

Wait, had I missed something? I'm assuming that these new sections refer to the intro (how we arrive on stage) and the "Fatboy Slim" section, which, since we're mostly just lying on the ground, shouldn't prove too taxing.

Getting back into the groove of what we'd already learned, however, was very challenging indeed. In truth, we were all a little rusty and despite the fact that I'd practiced in my little home office garrett nearly every day during the break, when Lara led us through each of the sections, there were still some obvious hiccups. For most of us, the actual steps came back quickly; it's refining the execution and character and energy of those steps we have to work on. As Lara noted, we can't just mark the choreography; we have to commit to it each time. Otherwise, there's bound to be a pile-up of bodies somewhere down the road.

The other thing we still need to perfect is the clarity and precision of our lines. They get a little wonky in various sections, as some of us take bigger steps than others, or travel a bit when we should be remaining more or less on the spot, or move more quickly during the cross in "India" (a bit which we had down before the break, but that last night was somewhat scattershot). We have to keep remembering to check in with the others in our lines and adjust accordingly--preferably, as Lara reminded us, in one or even half a count as opposed to three or four.

Easier said than done, but I'm sure we'll get there. Sylvain returns next week, at which point things will really get serious!

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 15

Last night was our final official rehearsal before the holiday break. To begin with, there was a considerable amount of shuffling of positions on the floor, with the elimination of a whole row from Group B (mostly owing to people dropping out). Mercifully, I stayed put. After that, we learned how to fall properly to the ground at the end of the "India" section, including how to avoid stepping on the head of the person behind us for those of us in the last two rows.

Then it was on to a general review of all the sections, refining some of the trickier moves in each, such as the "Where's the Bunny?" pirouette from "Cumbia." I still don't have that one down--at least not as expertly as Gatis, who was coaxed on stage by Lara to demonstrate for our benefit. But I'll work on it over the holidays. More successful was perfecting the cross of Groups A and B in the middle of "India," with all of us definitively arriving at a consensus about how many marks we are to move at a time, and with the lines from each group now aligning nicely during the little circle move we all do in the middle. Whew!

At the end of the two hours, Lara praised us all for how far we'd come since we started this process. She said we were going to blow Sylvain's socks off when he returns in January. But to do that, she reminded us, we needed to practice over the holidays--preferably just with the music, and not the videos, so that we could listen for cues and learn to anticipate what move was coming next.

A large group of us then began a semi-epic journey along Main Street to find a bar that could accommodate us for a celebratory drink (I think there were about 20-25 people in total). Ling, who was our ringleader, announced that the folks at The Cascade Room, whom she had originally been in touch with about holding their back space for us, had sold us out and given up the room to another large party. So after various desperate telephone calls, she received confirmation that The Whip could take us. Except that when the first wave of us arrived, the aggrieved hostess was aghast to learn that the six people she had anticipated had morphed into a double digit mass. After various other suggestions (The Narrow, The Anza Club), we tramped to nearby Main Street Brewery, which more or less had the space to accommodate us.

It was nice to get to chat with some of my fellow dancers at more length outside of rehearsal. I learned, for example, that Cheryl writes for the Courier; that Ling has previously lived in London and Berlin, working in the arts and entertainment industry, and that after several years in Vancouver she was still finding it hard to make new friends; and that Jessica, the virtuosic mover at the front of my row, did her dance degree at SFU, and is a good friend of my student Alana Gerecke. I also discovered from Caroline how quickly she and Lara and Anna had to learn the piece from Sylvain at the end of October, and from Lara that she was going to be part of a new work at Chutzpah! choreographed by Vanessa Goodman, and featuring Lisa Gelley and Josh Martin from the 605 Collective, alongside top Vancouver dancers Jane Osborne, Bevin Poole, and James Gnam (who studied alongside Lara at the National Ballet School--something I'd learned on Monday having coffee with James).

A common refrain in my conversations with my fellow community dancers was what we were all going to do come February, after our public performances of the piece. We're already anticipating being bereft without our regular Monday and Wednesday evening rehearsals and many of us would like to find a way to keep the group going--not just as an occasional social gathering, but actually as a regular community dance project. Super talented husband and wife team Mark Haney and Diane Park apparently have access to space at the Roundhouse and the Moberley Arts and Cultural Centre and, even better, may have successfully convinced Jessica over her second beer to take creative charge of our motley crew come February/March.

In the meantime, members of the group (again, chiefly Mark and Diane) have taken it upon themselves to organize two additional and self-directed workshops of Le Grand Continental this Saturday and two weeks hence, on January 3rd. Non-professional, volunteer performers wanting to give up their free time to rehearse more? Clearly something--nay, everything--about this project is clicking.

I am so stoked for January!

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 12

Last night marked something of a milestone in our rehearsal process for Le Grand Continental. Not only did we learn the last few moves in "Cumbia," but we were also taken through the start of the penultimate section of "Champagne." This means that apart from the rest of "Champagne" (which we will presumably be learning on Wednesday), the piece's intro and conclusion, and a short section in the middle when we're lying on the ground and most of the movement is mercifully ceded to a group of children who will join us in January, we now more or less have all the choreography in our bodies!

To mark this achievement Lara had us put all six sections together in order ("Gogoprado," "Stockfunk," "Ima," "India," "Cumbia," and the start of "Champagne") with the music for our first (again, more or less) continuous run-through. We stumbled through it, some better than others. I had several brain farts along the way when I couldn't remember for the life of me what step came next. But the important thing was that I kept moving and always found my way back into the choreography. And while our lines were looking a bit amorphous and misshapen at various points--especially in Group A, as we were missing several dancers--we did remember to check in with each other and recover our grid formation when we could (or when Lara shouted at us to do so--which, I have to remind myself, won't be happening in performance).

Of no less minor consequence was the fact that my position has changed on our dance chess board! Caroline informed both Hilary and I of this news at the top of rehearsal: specifically, that Hilary was being moved to the back outside edge (gulp!), and that I was being moved as well so that we might stay together (awww...). At least for the time being, as Caroline let us know that our current positions may very likely change again, not least because she herself covets Hilary's spot.

I was a bit traumatized at first--I'm not good with change. But I quickly got used to things and one of the happy byproducts of such shuffling is that one gets to kibitz with more people. I'm now between Leslie and Cheryl, who is a lot of fun, and near enough to Sara and Jane to engage in plenty of witty banter at the back of the room.

Onward!

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 11

It must be flu season, as there were many absent bodies at last night's rehearsal. And several more who did turn up were sniffling and blowing their noses, or else wrapped in even more layers of clothing than usual--despite the always near-stifling conditions in the Ukrainian Hall (my spot, in particular, seems to be directly underneath a vent that only emits hot air).

On top of this, Lara announced she'd fallen on her chin earlier in the day at The Dance Centre, suffering a mild concussion! And yet, there she was, alongside Anna (Caroline was also absent), leading us with her trademark calm aplomb through the next section of "Cumbia." Lara is right that it's much easier to get the hang of this section's more free-flowing moves and multiple changes of direction in person in the rehearsal studio, rather than following the video at home. I'm feeling much more confident with where we've gotten to so far after last night. I also love that Sylvain has given us several freestyle moments in this section, where we can just shimmy on the spot for multiple counts. My kind of choreography!

That said, I am still planning to make it to the extra movement clinic this Saturday, especially as I had to miss the last two.

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 9

Emily Neumann, our inestimable stage manager, made several revelatory announcements at the top of last night's rehearsal, including: 1) that they were now recruiting for several children between 8 and 13, who apparently will have key walk-on roles during the performance, and; 2) that Sylvain has been known to veto participants' more outrageous costume choices. I didn't even know we had to think about costumes. Worrying about staying dry is all I have been preoccupied with so far. But even here Lara disabused me: apparently there hasn't been a performance yet of Le Grand Continental when it hasn't rained. And that was all before Vancouver in January!

Far more comforting to me was my conversation with Jane Westheuser during our pre-rehearsal practice session and warm-up. Jane is co-president of the Board of the Vancouver Fringe Festival and a loyal PuSh patron (not to mention a fantastic dancer). She has been surfing the Internet for clips of past performances of the show and said that during the New York production there were all kinds of people messing up at different points and forgetting their steps--but still having lots of fun. It reduces the pressure somewhat to know that even in the Big Apple community dancers are fallible.

That said, last night went pretty well. Practicing at home from the video for "Gogoprado," the section we learned on Monday, I was initially in despair. On my own I had a hard time remembering the sequence of steps during the repeats. But with some help during warm-up at the Ukrainian Hall, things eventually got into my body--even the crocodile arms (more or less).

After having put "Gogoprado" together with "Stockfunk," the section that comes after it, we spent most of our time locking down the cross of Groups A and B during "India." It's the trickiest bit so far, not least because one of the groups is smaller than the other, and so working out how big each group's steps need to be in order to arrive on our final marks requires lots of precision. Then, too, we don't want to give the impression to the audience during this bit that we're only worrying about following our marks. Thank heavens I'm not in either of the lines initiating the cross; instead, all I have to do is follow Hayley to my left (who is an expert guide) and keep my eyes peripherally attuned to Eva behind me and the lovely woman with the head band whose name I should know by now in front of me in order to ensure that our vertical alignment remains more or less in tact. Simple right?

Unfortunately, I have to miss most of next Monday's section due to an important Senate meeting at SFU where I have to represent on behalf of the new Institute for Performance Studies. I let Emily and Lara know; Lara in turn let me know that we would indeed be learning a new section and that it was the hardest one yet.

Just my luck.

P.

Le Grand Continental: Rehearsal 6

Last night was our first rehearsal at the Ukrainian Hall with both groups together, and also the first rehearsal without Sylvain present. But Lara, together with Caroline and Anna, did a great job in his absence as we made our way through most of "Stock Funk," the very beginnings of which we had learned on Wednesday of last week.

"Stock Funk" also includes choreography we had learned for our auditions back in September. My, how quickly the body forgets. Plus that leprechaun move is a killer to nail. Ah well, we'll be reviewing it all again tomorrow, so there's time yet to perfect this section.

In learning last night's new choreography Lara told us not to worry too much about our places, or keeping our lines. However, she also let us know that we'd gradually be moving to setting our more or less final spots for the performances proper. This will mean putting the stronger dancers on the outside edges, closest to the audience. Apparently, Lara and Caroline and Anna have been making notes to this effect and last night concluded with each of us making compulsory eyeball contact with Lara and our stage manager Emily Neumann so that they could put names to faces--and so that Lara could make a preliminary placement notation next to each of our names...

P.