Preparing for my committee showing

As the semester winds down, the next milestone is my committee showing - a chance to get feedback from my committee on what I have so far and where I plan to go from here. I have had the chance to go to two of my colleagues' committee showings and its been really exciting to see things come together and how different each of us are approaching our concerts. I'm currently trying to prepare so that the showing goes as smoothly as possible. Some pieces are more "finished" than others, which I feel ok with. Two of the pieces are certainly more segmented, partially because they are more content-oriented which takes more time for me to filter out the unnecessary and organize. The more designed pieces are coming along at a much faster rate and are more like drafts, though I am fully prepared to revision and rethink anything that needs to be done between now and March.

This weekend, I have been sewing together my sensors "suit" which is beginning to look like some sort of holster. It was difficult to find something that would be easy to get on quickly and connects from the legs through the hands, so I decided to use various elastics to create something that could be worn over or under something else. I'm excited to get this done and working!

We have one working accelerometer!

High fashion

Video and sound editing have really gotten me frustrated, but I've realized I have a good bit of time over the winter holidays to work on this. I don't have rehearsals for a little over a month, so I will be more refreshed if I work on it then, rather than trying to cram it all in now for the showing. I'm not quite ready to get all of the technology set up for the showing anyways, so it will probably be best to hold off anyway.

As far as props go, I had a chance to dig through storage at my parents' house and was able to find a ton of old phones and electronics, as well as more lamps and shades.

New Show Order:

1. Habit of Change
2. Communication Duet
3. Sextet (followed by intermission)
4. Lights
• Lamps
• Flashlights
• Projections
• Candlelight
• Sensors

Feeling of Relief!

Last night, I officially "finished" a dance! Granted, it was the one piece that was actually previously choreographed, but I have been making some slight (and more severe) changes along the way. It feels great to be able to spend the next couple of weeks cleaning, tweaking, and refining before my committee sees my work on December 6th. Then, I can spend the next three months dealing with the feedback I get (or just maintaining, depending).

I have been thinking heavily about the relationship between music and dance, especially with a piece like "Habit of Change," because the music and the dance are so intertwined. When reflecting on my process of both intially creating the piece and in reconstructing, I have done two things: some times, I relied heavily on the music to inform where I was going, but other times, I allowed myself to find the dance first and then fit it into the music. Something I'm spending more time with now that the dance is "complete" is seeing how those two things affect the energy and flow of the piece. For example, in the original ending of the dance, I had the entire cast in the upstage left corner in unison and then from there, it suddenly disinegrated into different movement and spread out to a diagonal (opposite from the opening formation) and then the dancers turned their heads and looked upstage to the soloist. In watching the piece on video and trying different things with the cast, I realized that the music is still really powerful at that moment, so there was a sudden drop in energy and interest level as the piece drew to a close. So, I decided to come back to a powerful moment that happens before the solo in the middle of the piece to more gradually fall back from a group of eleven in unison to two opposing groups of five and six, to four opposing groups of three, three, three, and two, to finishing at a chaotic individual level, ending in a pose that eventually took them to the opening image, rather than just turning their heads. This seemed to give more contrast and attention to the soloist than before. The energy also mimics the music differently and it seems more exciting.