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Testify (Segue)
I love it when dancers speak on stage. It is a device I use often in making work primarily because I find much pleasure in hearing a dancing body's voice especially after the act of dancing: the breathy pauses, oftentimes the lack of hesitation in speaking. There is a kind of "come as you are," unpremeditated quality exactly because the dancer has just exhausted his/her body's physicality and is riding what I think of as both a purging and a rejuvenation of energy. This short interlude is a deconstruction - a deveiling and giving voice to what is often being said through embodied acts on the dancefloor: It is praise, love, honoring/homage, acknowledgement of ancestors and lineage, the recognition of the sacred's presence in the body who dances, of the dance itself as an affirmation of life and of higher, unknown, unnamed powers at work.
This segue came out of a writing exercise I gave the group wherein I asked each person to write what they each "gave thanks" for. No more specifics than that. What I received were a combination of poetic responses, free writes, word associations, narratives and short declarative statements. Bits of text from each of the performers in this section were interwoven. I liked that there was something womanly about this prayer for life.
There is an aura of "nurture," a generosity of feeling and touch that I find myself associating with maternal affection. And not that affection or emotions are privileged to the domain of women (certainly I think house in its many layers challenges that) but there is something about the things named in this section in the spoken text, the things that are given witness to and there is even something about the way the female performers use their voices and carry their bodies in relation to each other - so as much as how they do as what they say. There is a certainty about the power of relationships, of being awed by another human presence, of being open to connecting, touching, looking each other in the eye. Of paying respects to the elements of the natural world. It is firm but soft, confident without being overbearing.
And then, there's also a little bit of "drag" coloring the performance. An element that found its way through "fierceness" into most of the work. In this segue, Selena occupies that role, something akin to the House Mother who takes care of her "children" (i.e., in black gay ballroom circuit). She is the leader of their meandering line through space and the guiding hand that settles them into place.
Selena:
Gratitude
Gracias Diosa, Querida Madre Mia
I am grateful for your morning hues
The security of your fiery red
Your sultry orange
And gracious powerful gold
I am grateful for your guidance
Your love
Thank you for the many gifts
Gina:
For beaded necklaces my great grandmother wore
For memories of tomorrow and children not yet born
For eyelashes and temples and the small of our backs
Selena: May those I love feel my gratitude for them
Gina: For consciousness and health and letting go
For the forgiveness of the past and in the healing of trust
Selena: May those I love feel my gratitude for them
Both:
For breath
For sleep
For movement
Selena: These are my prayers, Diosa
May they be so
Namaste
Ashe
Enter two other performers (Lindsay & Yuka). The duet becomes a quartet. They become a chanting chorus.
Yuka:
For spontaneity, thought, laughter and smiles
Lindsay:
For the ability to create community
Wherever I go
For openness
And satisfaction in small things
For people and the spirit within
Yuka: For this time, this place, this space
(Repeat twice)
This segue came out of a writing exercise I gave the group wherein I asked each person to write what they each "gave thanks" for. No more specifics than that. What I received were a combination of poetic responses, free writes, word associations, narratives and short declarative statements. Bits of text from each of the performers in this section were interwoven. I liked that there was something womanly about this prayer for life.
There is an aura of "nurture," a generosity of feeling and touch that I find myself associating with maternal affection. And not that affection or emotions are privileged to the domain of women (certainly I think house in its many layers challenges that) but there is something about the things named in this section in the spoken text, the things that are given witness to and there is even something about the way the female performers use their voices and carry their bodies in relation to each other - so as much as how they do as what they say. There is a certainty about the power of relationships, of being awed by another human presence, of being open to connecting, touching, looking each other in the eye. Of paying respects to the elements of the natural world. It is firm but soft, confident without being overbearing.
And then, there's also a little bit of "drag" coloring the performance. An element that found its way through "fierceness" into most of the work. In this segue, Selena occupies that role, something akin to the House Mother who takes care of her "children" (i.e., in black gay ballroom circuit). She is the leader of their meandering line through space and the guiding hand that settles them into place.
Selena:
Gratitude
Gracias Diosa, Querida Madre Mia
I am grateful for your morning hues
The security of your fiery red
Your sultry orange
And gracious powerful gold
I am grateful for your guidance
Your love
Thank you for the many gifts
Gina:
For beaded necklaces my great grandmother wore
For memories of tomorrow and children not yet born
For eyelashes and temples and the small of our backs
Selena: May those I love feel my gratitude for them
Gina: For consciousness and health and letting go
For the forgiveness of the past and in the healing of trust
Selena: May those I love feel my gratitude for them
Both:
For breath
For sleep
For movement
Selena: These are my prayers, Diosa
May they be so
Namaste
Ashe
Enter two other performers (Lindsay & Yuka). The duet becomes a quartet. They become a chanting chorus.
Yuka:
For spontaneity, thought, laughter and smiles
Lindsay:
For the ability to create community
Wherever I go
For openness
And satisfaction in small things
For people and the spirit within
Yuka: For this time, this place, this space
(Repeat twice)
isislady |
Latest page update: made by isislady
, Nov 16 2008, 9:24 PM EST
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