Tag: The Place

Easter Courses For Young Dance Students

Easter 2013 Dance Courses

Despite many dance schools taking breaks for the Easter holidays, eager dance students still have the chance to dance their way through the holidays. There are a wide variety of courses to suit every dance taste, such as hip hop, musical theatre and ballet, enabling students to build on existing skills, and even gain an idea as to further training in dance which they may like to undertake in the future.

ZooNation Easter Academy are inviting beginner and intermediate level dancers to learn from ZooNation company members, covering a wide range of hip hop and street dance styles including Locking, Popping, Breaking, House and Waacking. Students will also be able to learn some original choreography from the hit West End show Some Like It Hip Hop.

The Place Youth Dynamics course can see students work with the renowned national touring company Tavaziva Dance, allowing young dancers to develop their contemporary technique and learn some of the company’s repertory.

The Royal Academy of Dance are holding a Boys’ Day of Dance for male students aged 7 – 16, enabling them to experience four different dance styles: Ballet, Street Dance, Contemporary and Capoeira. The classes held will be taught by professional male teachers and performers, helping to inspire young males in introducing them to dance.

Laine Theatre Arts’ International Easter course will incorporate Jazz, Musical Theatre and Drama workshops, building up a range of skills for students perhaps interested in auditioning for the vocational training course offered at Laine Theatre Arts in Musical Theatre and Dance.

All courses offered by a whole host of dance companies, examination boards and training institutions are fantastic opportunities to inspire new talents and develop existing skills of dance students who are eager to further their training and improve their skills.

Robert Cohan and British Contemporary Dance

The PlaceWith 2013 marking The Place’s 43rd anniversary, it was the opening of The Place theatre and the London Contemporary Dance School that saw a distinctly British school of modern dance. Although Robert Cohan may not have been the first person to teach or perform contemporary dance in the UK, he was the first to do it with a vision. As a dance partner of Martha Graham, one of the mothers of American modern dance, Cohan came to the UK from the US in 1967 and set in motion the careers of many of the UK’s most influential choreographers, from Richard Alston and Siobhan Davies to West End veteran Anthony Van Laast. Beginning humbly by teaching Graham technique to students, actors and artists who had little formal dance training, they were soon performing Cohan’s choreography as LCDT.

Cohan became the first Artistic Director of the Contemporary Dance Trust in London and was consequently the founding Artistic Director of The Place, London Contemporary Dance School and LCDT, which he directed for 20 years. Cohan choreographed 43 works for the company, and puts his success down to being unafraid of aiming for the mass market, with a theatrical eye, making dance theatre which appealed to people who weren’t just balletomanes.

Cohan’s influence on the development of modern dance in Britain has been considerable. Having pioneered the teaching of contemporary dance technique, he was instrumental in developing the repertory of LCDT in the 1970s and 1980s, laying the groundwork for the many other British companies since. As a teacher, Cohan has taught extensively: besides being a senior teacher at the Martha Graham School he worked at The Julliard School, Harvard, Radcliffe, and the University of Rochester in the US, York University in Toronto and at many colleges and universities in the UK.

In 1988, Cohan was awarded an honorary CBE in recognition of his outstanding contribution to dance in the UK, and he has since taken British nationality. Cohan remains active in the running of The Place as a member of its Board of Governors.

The RADC Autumn tour

The Place

The Richard Alston Dance Company Autumn tour 2012 sees the company’s 10 dancers taking to the stage for 16 performances throughout UK, and in the US, leotards and all. The tour opens in London at The Place, Robin Howard Dance Theatre, (3-6 October), for the annual At Home season, and ends in New Jersey, at Montclair State University, (13-16 December), as part of the internationally renowned Peak Performances series.

Prior to the tour’s beginning, the company took part in the Design Museum Ball as part of the London Design Festival 2012, performing a one-off special event of contemporary dance on 21 September. A series of dance moments was created especially for the evening with the dancers wearing a set of dazzling crystal-encrusted costumes created for them by fashion designer Julien MacDonald. The audience discovered dance episodes scattered throughout the museum with sculptural forms, digital projections and crystal-inspired visual effects creating a dramatic backdrop against which the dancers engaged with the space. The event was inspired by the literary heroine, Miss Havisham for Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, with those wearing a wedding dress, rather than leg warmers, rewarded free entry to the ball.

The tour following this event will contain pieces Shimmer, Isthmus and Madcap. Shimmer is danced to the music of Ravel, played live with Julien Macdonald’s jewel-encrusted cobweb costumes illuminating the choreography in a beautiful piece of theatre. The barefoot dancers emanate thoughts of fairy dust with magical effect. Isthmus will be performed for only the second time following its premiere at A Celebration for Bob Lockyer at The Place in April 2012. Alston uses the music of Jo Kondo, whose composition Isthmus moves with rapid light rhythms, both sharp and delicate to present nimble and breathtaking precision. Following his recent commission by Scottish Ballet to mark the 2012 Olympics, Martin Lawrance has created Madcap as an original, new choreography, creating a powerfully charged work.

Image courtesy of The Place.

Dance Classes Discusses

Dance Classes Discusses

Dance classes around the country are not few and far between. Dance is becoming increasingly popular, as a result of commercial television shows, and more recently, the Olympic Games.

Open dance classes are on the up with over 200 classes a week taking place at Pineapple Dance Studios in Covent Garden for example, also featured in a television series on Sky 1 complete with jazz pants, cropped tops and urban dance sneakers. Other open classes taking place across the capital include The Place, Danceworks and Studio 68.

In addition to this, many dance students attend weekly technique classes with the view to take examinations with their dance school and progress through the ‘dance ranks’, trading in leather practice ballet shoes for pink pointe shoes. Many dance students dream of one dancing upon a vast stage in a feathered tutu, and others of becoming teachers themselves, correcting the leotard-clad young dancers before them and embarking on a variety of techniques. These techniques are similarly seen in the open classes of less formal institutions, without the commitment.

Despite one class option being slightly stricter of uniform than the other, both offer dancers the chance to engage with their passion, be it classical ballet, tap dance, jazz dance, musical theatre, and everything else in between. Both offer the chance to progress through the increasing levels of the technique in order to both challenge them and achieve goals as dancers. Whilst these goals may not differ in themselves, classes all over the country and even the world offer dancers the great opportunity to engage with likeminded individuals and teachers, reach their potential, and most importantly to have fun. Whether dancers are kitted out in the world’s most prestigious pointe shoes or ten-year-old jazz shoes, the power of dance unites all these dance students in one love.

Summer Programmes at The Place

The Place

In July and August 2012, as in many years previously, The Place will present its annual two-week programme of dance courses for both young participants aged 6 to 16, and adults aged 16 and over of all abilities this summer. Whether your interest is the graceful beauty of ballet and you live to fulfil your dream of stepping into class in perfect pink ballet shoes, the toe-tapping energetic buzz of wearing jazz shoes, or whether it is actually heaven on earth to put on your leotard and leggings and engage in some thought-provoking and challenging Contact Improvisation, The Place will have something to suit you.

Summer Shakers, over four days, is an annual programme of dance classes for young dancers, with this year’s theme surrounding “Victories and Losses”. Each group participating will work to create a sport-inspired dance, fusing energy, competition and power which are prevalent in both activities of sport and dance. Summer Intensives is the programme that will be led by a team of international dance teachers and companies, allowing participants to ‘create their own course’ from the extensive range of five-day options available including creative workshops, body conditioning techniques and repertory workshops with resident companies in addition to the above. The companies involved this year are the BalletBoyz and the Jasmin Vardimon Company, two prestigious companies who individually have contributed much to today’s contemporary dance scene, and beyond into the dance sector as a whole.

2012 will see the addition of the traditional Japanese dance form, Butoh, taught by Marie-Gabrielle Rotie. This particular strand of the programme encourages structured improvisation, working with poetic images and scores in order for participants to create simple movement.

For additional information, visit The Place.

Image courtesy of The Place.

Something Happening For Kids

Something Happening For Kids

The Place is set to present Something Happening For Kids, a full day of dance performances and activities specially curated for children aged 11 and under. Taking place on 21 July 2012 at The Place in the Robin Howard Dance Theatre, children will be encouraged to pull on their leotards and leggings and engage with both movement and play.

Choreographer Darren Ellis is restaging extracts of his latest work Long Walk Home, which portrays a series of four women, each at a different stage of their lives, as they analyse their hopes and their dreams, accompanied by atmospheric live music by the folk band Askew Sisters.

Alongside them, The Place’s First Moves, with the youngest dancers aged 5-8, will show two new pieces in the round and up-close from the Children and Youth Dance programme. Something Happening For Kids, especially through First Moves, demonstrates that the art of performance is hidden with everyone of all ages, ready to burst free and present itself centre stage, be it wearing ballet shoes, tap shoes or jazz flares and sweat bands.

Circus dance artist Ilona Jantti will premier the fantastically imaginative HUHU, commissioned by The Place, in which a web of ropes and architectural devices will create the backdrop for an urban chase, combining circus, contemporary dance, animation and the idea of the city’s space, inspiring and interactive.

Author Michael Rosen will recite his much-loved We’re Going on a Bear Hunt in a series of participatory readings, in which the magical story will be brought to life by dance artist Joanne Moven, combining art forms and connecting directing with children.

Shuffle, The Place’s new junior dance company, will complete the programme with Lookout, a dreamy and suggestive site-specific piece, originally created for a window overlooking the river Thames.

In addition, a series of workshops, ranging from percussion and dance will also be available, allowing the young participants to explore rhythms and create movement to live musical accompaniment.

Image courtesy of The Place.

London Contemporary Dance School’s End of Year Season

Each year, the UK’s contemporary dance house The Place announces its annual End of Year Season, in which graduating students from London Contemporary Dance School perform both a varied and excellent programme. This marks the completion of their training at one of the world’s leading conservatoires and inspires the next generation of dancers to harness their dance talents and hone their training.

London Contemporary Dance School Graduation 2012Image courtesy of Benedict Johnson Photography.

Rather than a focus on pretty pink pointe shoes or the West End tap tones, the Robin Howard Dance Theatre is overrun each year with bare footed talent, sporting a range or dance clothing, which is generally thought to set the standard of contemporary dance throughout the rest of the country. The season includes In Performance: Postgraduate Alumni, which will feature the work created by MA Choreography Alumni, celebrating the work produced by the course over a period of 11 years, performed by London Contemporary Dance School’s alumni.

Additionally, EDge, the postgraduate performance company of LCDS, will be presenting a repertoire that has been toured around Europe by the company’s 12 dancers since March 2012, including upcoming choreographer James Wilton’s Through Shards, and Avant Garde Dance’s Founder and Artistic Director Tony Adigun’s Unleashed, inspired by Richard Alston’s iconic Wildlife.

The Graduation Performances will feature over 40 graduating students performing specially commissioned works by professional choreographers, including The Place’s Artistic Director Richard Alston. Alston has restaged his latest piece A Ceremony Of Carols, originally commissioned by The Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury and Sadler’s Wells. A selection of the students’ own choreography, chosen from the body of work created over the last year will also be featured to complete the programme. This represents the culmination of the graduates’ experiences at LCDS, completing their BA in Contemporary Dance and Postgraduate Diploma in Advanced Dance Studies. The diverse range of works demonstrates the breadth of their studies and the excellence of the performance demonstrates the sheer quality of their training.

Dance In The Making

Dance In The Making 2012

Dance In The Making is the name of a two-day seminar programme in the 14th and 15th of July, focused around the theme of choreography by and with young people, open to tutu twirling aspiring ballerinas, bare-footed contemporaries, and every young dancer experiencing the dance sector today. Combining industry professionals and young people from the UK and overseas in discussion, Dance In The Making is to be hosted by Chris Thomson, Director of Creative Teaching and Learning at The Place, and Linda Jasper, Director of Youth Dance England.

The talks will delve into questions on the “best” choreographic practice, be it for waerers of pointe shoes, tap shoes or any other dance shoes. The programme will also focus on the importance of young people understanding choreographic process, industry professionals’ experiences of working with young people and the greatest methods of how to support and ensure the stable futures of young people and their choreographies. So many dance courses in the twenty-first century now offer a choreography-heavy strand within their modules, with many choreographic platforms and graduate companies or apprenticeships also emerging.

Speakers at Dance In The Making, in partnership with The Place, will include young professional choreographers such as James Cousins, who has launched a successful choreographic career through graduate transition companies, professional companies such as Matthew Bourne’s New Adventures, and is now creating his own company. Other guest speakers include professional choreographers who work with young people, such as Kerry Nicholls and Katie Green, and an international perspective is added through their French colleagues Brigitte Hyon and Agnes Bretel from the Centre National de la Danse.

The £35 day ticket includes a ticket to one of U.Dance 2012’s high-profile evening performances in Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall.

The Place Prize 2012

The Place Price 2012The prestigious The Place Prize, sponsored by Bloomberg, has announced the commissioned artists who are to compete, unveiling another year of innovative contemporary dance, semi-professional dancers kitted out in their dancewear and the upcoming choreographic talent of the UK. As one of the most high-status dance awards, The Place Prize is returning for its 5th edition, premiering the commissions during The Place Prize Semi-finals in September.

16 new dance works have been commissioned from over 200 entries, a phenomenal interest and the highest number to date. By the end of summer 2012, The Place Prize will have enabled the creation of 92 pieces of new choreography, with an investment of over £1.2million in British dance. Since the cuts made to Arts Council funding by the government in April 2011, many dance organisations have had to reduce their activity, even preventing many leotards and ballet shoes seeing their familiar studio floor again.

The 16 entrants competing for The Place Prize have been awarded a total commission fund of £100,000 to realise their dance dreams, and the recipient artists will also benefit from free production time and support from The Place Prize team to create their pieces. The commissions encompass a wide range of contemporary styles, reflecting the sheer diversity of today’s dance scene in Britain.

The commissioned artists include former Place Prize Finalists (2011) Riccardo Buscarini and Eva Recacha, and Place Prize Semi-finalists Ben Ash (2006), Ben Wright (2006; 2008), and Darren Ellis (2010). In addition to previous alumni, Jonathon Goddard, the first contemporary dancer to win the Critics’ Circle National Dance Award for Best Male Dancer in 2008 and fellow Rambert dancer Gemma Nixon are also involved. Mamoru Iriguchi, a self-taught performance maker who originally trained as a zoologist, and then a theatre designer, has also been commissioned. His work was first seen on The Place stage during Resolution! 2011, another choreographic platform. As only the 5thversion of The Place Prize platform, who knows what choreographic talent it may uncover.