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Finale/Melodies (image seven)
The finale section is all about the reintegration of community. It begins with a group clap. The performers are layered into the space and sound. The clap is also a reminding image of church and spirit depending on where you want to enter and how you want to identify. At bottom, their collective polyrhythm is dependent on folks' listening to and for each other, adjusting volume and keeping tempo, making up for the loss of sound if too many folks fall out, etc. I tried to imagine what an urban folk dance might look like by playing with circle formations and other group-based spatial patterns that emerge and then fade away but always looping into another version of partner/group contact.
I am intrigued by how spatial forms/patterns can suggest certain things. For example, the "circle" can evoke this kind of romance, nostalgia and/or for connection, a kind of fetish of the folk embodied in the simplicity of a circle. Yes, it's oversimplified but its clarity is so useful, so clear as a physical/visual symbol. There are also allusions to couples' dances (e.g. hustle, merengue, salsa, stepping) which is different from the community of the circle. The partnering goes back to this idea of body-to-body contact that comes in and out throughout the piece. Here though it's about pleasure, play, joy, sensuality, sexiness, a little bit of that fierceness popping back in. Then there is the "Army of Queens," the accumulating long phrase (4:46-5:50) that riffs again off the vogue/ballroom aesthetic. Masking as strength/vulnerability comes back in their forward motion march and direct attack on the movement. But there's also an elegance, dignity and challenge that figures in those brief tableaus line by line.
The final image of Give Thanks is this ending circle. It is the strongest coda of community. It combines movment, clap, breath. It solidifies the union and codepedence of this group - one sound, one vocabulary though always with infinite individual variation.
I am intrigued by how spatial forms/patterns can suggest certain things. For example, the "circle" can evoke this kind of romance, nostalgia and/or for connection, a kind of fetish of the folk embodied in the simplicity of a circle. Yes, it's oversimplified but its clarity is so useful, so clear as a physical/visual symbol. There are also allusions to couples' dances (e.g. hustle, merengue, salsa, stepping) which is different from the community of the circle. The partnering goes back to this idea of body-to-body contact that comes in and out throughout the piece. Here though it's about pleasure, play, joy, sensuality, sexiness, a little bit of that fierceness popping back in. Then there is the "Army of Queens," the accumulating long phrase (4:46-5:50) that riffs again off the vogue/ballroom aesthetic. Masking as strength/vulnerability comes back in their forward motion march and direct attack on the movement. But there's also an elegance, dignity and challenge that figures in those brief tableaus line by line.
The final image of Give Thanks is this ending circle. It is the strongest coda of community. It combines movment, clap, breath. It solidifies the union and codepedence of this group - one sound, one vocabulary though always with infinite individual variation.
isislady |
Latest page update: made by isislady
, Dec 7 2008, 8:38 AM EST
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