Read about TDIF 2010 in the press!

• Leslie and Rosie appeared on KUHF’s Front Row on Tuesday Oct. 4.  to talk about TDIF– Link coming soon!

• Read Dance Source Houston’s preview article on TDIF http://houstondance.org

• Below is an interview on TDIF 2010 between Toni Valle,  Leslie Scates and Rosie Trump:

Interview:  Leslie Scates and Rosie Trump on the Texas Dance Improvisation Festival

By Toni Valle

September 24, 2010

Leslie Scates and Rosie Trump through Rice University are presenting the second annual Texas Dance Improvisation Festival on October 7-9, 2010.  Scates, a well-known Houston choreographer and no stranger to Dance Improvisation, has been creating and presenting works based in Improvisation for years.  Rosie, the new Director of Dance at Rice University, brought her own quirky style to the Big Range Dance Festival this past June.  I talked with both to find out why they’ve joined forces to bring a Dance Improvisation Festival to Houston.

Where did this idea originate?
Leslie: the idea originated with Jordan Fuchs from Texas Women’s University in Denton, Texas.  He had been talking to a few people about it for several years after he moved here from NYC.

Rosie:  Leslie as an advocate of bringing the festival to Houston and we were both very excited about hosting TDIF 2010 at Rice University.

Why is Dance Improvisation your special interest?
Leslie:  Improvising calls on the part of my dancing brain/body that is the most responsive and reflexive.  I improvise movements and partnering to create repeatable choreography, as I did with NIGHTLETTER for Weekend of Texas Contemporary Dance which I am presenting at Miller Outdoor Theatre next week.  I use improvisation as a performance language by myself and with partners and ensembles in order to spontaneously create intricate or simple and powerful choreography in the moment.  Improvising choreography is difficult and riveting.  The process can go awry, it can get off track; it can be over adrenalized.  It can also be thoughtful, meaningful, architectural, delicate, and virtuosic. But only if the improvisers speak the same language in performance and are disciplined enough to sense space, line, energy, humor, shape and time.

Recently, someone introduced a dance concert by saying the presenting company had rehearsed their choreography thoroughly and had not simply decided “hey, let’s get together and jam.”  This struck me as a perfect example of the pervasive definition of Improvisational Performance that persists in current movement dialogues.  Disciplined improvisers continually push the edge of their own dancing by observing and interrupting/challenging set patterning in their own movement vocabulary.  Improvisers also develop stylistic movement signatures of their own.  Long term improvisational partnerships offer a solid performance world of juicy risk taking with regard to movement and content.  Improvisers learn to capitalize on a brilliant moment and develop it or leave material when it is time to do so.
Improvisation is my special interest because it is thrilling to be thrilled in performance.  To act on immediate, authentic material presented by other human beings, and collaboratively build work.

I studied and performed improvisationally for the last several years and purposefully did not set choreography during that time.  Many lovely dancers and movers experimented with me during this time.  NIGHTLETTER is the first dance I have set to be repeatable since this learning curve started for me.  I had a feeling that by improvising only I was actually deeply studying choreography.  I was.  Making NIGHTLETTER was an intuitive process.  I brought nothing but ideas and tasks to rehearsal.  No set movement walked through the studio door with me.  Michelle Garza, Catalina Molnari and I created the piece together as an ensemble.   They are treasures.

Rosie:  I have been practicing improvisation forms of dance as long as I have been choreographing.  To me, improvisational dance is a form that demands as much practice, intention and craft as any other dance technique.  Improvisational dance has been able to feed and rejuvenate my personal choreographic process the way other techniques such as ballet and modern have not.  I am in love with the idea of crafting in the moment, because it involves a level of risk.  That excites me and forces me to be present in a way practiced choreography may not.  I always say, if I could only do one kind of dance for the rest of my life, I would chose contact improvisation.

Discuss the background of Improvisational Dance from the original “jams” and “happenings” to the art form it is today.

Leslie: I think people are saying now that contact improvisation has a set choreography and are interested in leaving that behind and getting back to truly improvising a contact duet instead of using “tricks.”  Improvisation did not start with “jams.”  Contact Improvisation did.   I view Improvisation as a big umbrella and Contact exists under that umbrella beside Ensemble and Solo Improvisation and other techniques and practices.  Certainly Judson Church happenings were truly improvisational and the audience and artists of that time were ripping apart definitions of what dance and dance performance meant.

Isadora Duncan improvised performances.  As did Mozart and Beethoven.  Artists can swing both hammers.  They can create repeatable works that move on throughout history with ease and become great works of art for generations later.  Improvised performances disappear as soon as they are made.  This creates a connection between audience and performer that is electric.  DELICIOUS!!
Rosie: Improvisation and Contact Improvisation has a long and rich history in Western dance and beyond.  There are many excellent books dedicated to its history and Contact Quarterly, a journal dedicated to the form, is an excellent current resource as well. But for me the history comes down to the fact that it is still a very relevant form, alive and kicking in dance today!

Is Improvisational Dance a true performance?
Leslie: Is a college football game a true performance?  Is rehearsed choreography a true performance?  Is improvised choreography a true performance?  YES YES YES

Who are the people that still don’t consider performing improvisationally a true performance?
Improvising to get your feelings out and calling it a performance is a dead art at this point in dance.

I see a real individual and their true response to space, time and energy when I see them improvise with other dancers.  Performing set choreography can be thrilling …  no doubt.  Even a set choreographic work is subtly different every time because the performance is an improvisation.  There is a giving side in improvisational performance because there must be agreement to create substantial works.   There can also be virtuosity and sabotage because these ideas create artistic tension and/or humor, but a talented ensemble supports the material being introduced and crafts it into choreography.

As teachers, how does Improvisational Dance fit into the bigger scheme of teaching dancers?  Non-dancers?
Leslie:  It teaches them to find fresh vocabulary and critically observe themselves and their bodies’ language; it teaches them to craft movement for repeatable choreography, to improvise with other bodies and vocabularies … and to see other people as source material providers and not competition. This is gigantic information to a lot of dancers.

A group I am truly interested in working with right now are professional ballet companies as they are an elite group of technicians.  Ballet dancers already practice contact improvisation in a way, although they don’t name it as such.  Hey, Ballet, call me.  Let’s make a dance!!

Rosie:  I have been thinking a lot lately about the fine line between good art and bad art.  I think improvisation can be used as a tool in performance and dance making, however it also stands as its own form.  The amount of time, investigation, and practice invested into the process is what will determine it as a device versus it as a work of art truly happening in the moment. As an educator and student, what continues to excite me about improvisational dance is that it will take you are far as you are willing to go; there is no ceiling, no wall and no floor to it if you are willing to do the work.

Can anyone participate in Dance Improvisation, or do you have to be a dancer?

Leslie: Human Being is the Biggest Improvisation of all. Of course anyone can improvise movement – we already do. Dancers may think improvising is one long boring line of generating vocabulary.  There are multitudes of structures for improvising that produce cohesive movements and gorgeous vocabulary.  Actually, the tighter the structure or limits on an improvisation, the better it can be.

Rosie: I agree with Leslie.  I have been to jams where children and seniors and everyone in between are dancing.  Because you define the physicality in your dancing while improvising, it can be very appealing to all levels.

I  know that Improvisation is a staple of Acting Training.  Should all dancers practice Improvisation as a technique, just like their other classes?
Leslie:  Most curriculums recognize the foundation that improvising provides in dance education.
One thing I have learned is that inside ongoing dance company structures, there is a true need for improvising together as an ensemble.  Even if the company never performs improvisational choreography, it provides connection that nothing else does.  So if your company is exhausted, stagnating, needs some relief or a jumpstart in a new direction…improvise together.  The benefits are real and long lasting.

Rosie: Agreed!  This is a legitimate form with a recognized lineage and secure future.  Although TDIF is relatively young festival, there are dance improvisation festivals that happen regularly all over the country and internationally.

Why does Texas need a Texas Dance Improvisation Festival?
Leslie:  Because it did not have one before now.  The state is full of art and artists and people who love art.  Fort Worth, Austin, San Antonio, Marfa, These places are full of art organizations, theaters, galleries.  Not to mention the countless folk, craft and individual artists that grace our highways and byways.

Rosie:  Texas is a big state and the cities are fairly spread out, I think it is important to have a dedicated place and time to gather together each year and practice, grow and celebrate dance!

Who is your guest artist?

Rosie: Meg Wolfe is a Los Angles based dancer, improviser and arts activist.  She curates a regular choreography showcase, organizes a master class series, co-edits a dance journal and is the coordinator for a new grant project in LA.  We wanted to invite her to be the TDIF guest artist because her work is based in an improvisational practice, but also because she is an arts activist.
The Texas Dance Improvisation Festival is hosted by Rice University on October 7-9, 2010.  For more information, visit http://tdif.rice.edu.

This project is funded in part by grants from the City of Houston Mayor’s Special Initiatives Grant program of the Houston Arts Alliance.