the Christmas rush

I just wrote my last email for the day (by day, I meant yesterday, as it is now 1am and it is a new day, after all) and I set up my very efficient Out of Office Assistant so that I can concentrate on my school's recital tomorrow. My school is the near-30-year old TEAM Dance Studio, and we'll be doing the full-length Nutcracker and some new works by my dad, Eli Jacinto. This is why I haven't blogged much, or updated Runthru much -- at this point, let me apologize to those who have features upcoming, I'll get to them very soon. For the rest of you, do check http://www.runthru.com.ph for new stuff by next week (at the latest).

Admittedly, I'm always busy when there's a show; the work-life balance (wherein "life" translates to "dance," as it does to all who dance) is very challenging when you need to take time out of your 9-to-5 to rehearse and perform. But with our school's recitals, performing and rehearsing is the last on my mind. And then, we always have the annual recital three days before Christmas. You can see how things can get quite crazy.

At this point, I think I'll take the liberty of not promising that this, the inability to update Runthru Online, won't happen next year. This is so going to happen again next year. No apologies. Many people have Christmas family traditions, like completing Simbang Gabi together, or decorating the Christmas tree, or going up to Baguio to roast marshmallows in a fireplace. My family's is putting up a recital every year.

I used to feel bad that I couldn't watch others' shows during this season - either I'm too busy, or I got sick I'm so busy - but when I think of it, I owe a lot to TEAM Dance Studio, and there shouldn't be anything to feel bad for at all. This is where I started dancing, but at the same time, my dad started TEAM Dance Studio because of me. As it approaches its 30th anniversary as a school, I realize that I myself have been dancing for 30 years (well, I'm counting from my first ballet class at the age of 6). In a way, TEAM Dance Studio's history is my history, and of the many kids who've studied dance under me, the many kids I've restaged recitals for. It survives because I chose it as my priority. This makes me proud and, sincerely, quite moved.

If you're around the Alabang area, TEAM Dance Studio will be presenting The Nutcracker at the Insular Life Theater tomorrow evening (December 22, 2010) at 7:30 pm. You'll find me onstage with this big, proud grin on my face.

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Would also like to mark the milestone that is The Nutcracker becoming a part of Filipino culture, what with the manic number of Nutcrackers put on this month (which has always been an American phenomenon, never a Filipino one), the use of the Overture and the Waltz of the Flowers as pipe-in music at coffee shops and restaurants and the army of Nutcracker Soldiers strewn all across the Ayala malls. Thank you Ayala, for the free advertising.

Earlier today, on our way to the theatre and worrying about breaking our Nutcracker -- the doll is supposed to break in the first act, and neither of us were keen on breaking a particularly good Nutcracker even for a show -- my brother stopped the car in front of his neighbor's house and said to me, "Quick, go get the Nutcracker on his gate! We'll return it naman..." Some of the other neighbors had the Santa lights with the racing reindeer up front of their house. This family had two Nutcrackers guarding the entrance. It just fills me up with glee.

Of course, there will be those who just looove to say that even if it's becoming a "Filipino" tradition, isn't that still an elitist tradition? Well, gee, isn't Christmas at its capitalist best? Don't rain on my parade, Ebenezer.

Okay, gotta get my old, decrepit body ready for tomorrow's craziness. Good night, everyone! Happy holidays!

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Photo from our last Nutcracker back in 2005, taken by either Francis Reyes or Nina Sandejas. That's me as King Rat, one of my favorite roles, ever.

shift in priorities

This is sort of an update to this blog entry, where I discuss how I have to prioritize my dancing over dance writing and how I was planning to blog more to make sure my writing doesn't get rusty. I realized that if my time was dedicated to only dancing, I was effectively not seeing the dancing of other people, and therefore I'm limited to quite narcissistic topics, aren't I? Hence, the almost non-existence of blog entries posted up after. I mean, there's only one entry and it's about my niece/godchild.

Also, I am in the process of reconfiguring my life to move my priorities around a bit. I believe this is more exciting than it has been in the last few months. Hopefully, it will continue to be exciting and I'll have more blog posts up here soon.

Thanks for reading, and staying. Cheers!

The Day of Berry

For those who don't know yet, Berry is my goddaughter, my baby brother Lucas' first (and so far only) child. She loves Minute Maid orange juice, spaghetti noodles and ensaymada. She also loves to dance. The first time she danced, she was inside her mommy's tummy while mommy was watching me, my siblings and my family's ballet school perform Don Quixote at the Insular Life Auditorium. Seriously, as the entrada started, Erica's tummy started pounding as if there was a furious basketball inside.

She spent the day with us today, she arrived at our ballet school as I started class for our second level kids; she was wearing her tights, ballet shoes and a ballet skirt made of tulle. When I started rehearsals for this year's recital, she walked over to me and held my hand. So when my students started rehearsing, she was dancing with them also, sorta. Mostly she walked around as the students carefully danced around her, sometimes holding my hand, sometimes on her own. She would also stand in the midst of the girls doing skips and ballet runs, sometimes shaking her hips and shoulders. Since we're doing The Nutcracker this year, she would run about with her own wrapped gift (for the Christmas party scene) or holding a clump of fake flowers (for Waltz of the Flowers). At one point, while my students were swaying and galoping side to side, she would sway her head and shoulders along with them.

This is how I always envisioned how it would be when I have my own child, while I'm teaching or rehearsing, she or he would be hanging out in the studio with me; kinda like Twyla Tharp and her son, except not as cool. Of course, there already is the constant harassment to actually have my own kid and not play pretend with my brother's, and no, I don't mean my mom as she doesn't really mean to pressure me, she just likes the idea of having grandkids (and she won't admit it). The constant harassment is my own biological clock tick-tick-ticking away, at odds with the pact I made to keep dancing for as long as I can. I truly feel that when I do get pregnant, I will not be able to recover from it and dance the way I am dancing now. I'm giving myself a couple more years. The thing that frightens me though is what if after giving myself a few more years to dance, I find that my childbearing years have passed? I have recently been convincing myself that I'm not too old to have children and won't be too old to have children. After all, Jenna Elfman had her second baby at the age of 38 and she was producing and starring in a tv show the entire time she was pregnant. A couple more years is just about right. I hope.

There are days when I have this idea in my head that I can live the rest of my life childless. That it's okay to be selfish in this way in this day and age, that I'm just programmed for a different life, that I don't want to eventually deal with a sullen teenager (especially if it turns out that they take after me), that we all die alone anyway as I won't force my kids to take care of me in my old age. And then there are days like today.

priorities

I haven't been updating this blog, nor Runthru online as of late, and neither have I actually been going to watch other people's shows because of 2 things. First of all, at the day job where I'm working full time (that I've been doing for over a year), I was assigned to a new boss and there has been a turnover from simple website publishing to full blown strategic editorial concerns which has not been easy. It's a total paradigm shift, and not just a matter of getting used to the demands and quirks of the new boss.

I was hoping that this won't last forever, that this is just a really extensive turnover phase, but realistically, it does seem that this is going to be how life is going to be like for me, given the new demands of the job. And so I am forced to decide what to do with the little free time I have left, as there's not much room for so many things. Although I will try my darnedest to get some writing done, and will continue to post up events and news on Runthru Online, it is no longer a priority. The priority, of course, is dancing.

Yes, dancing is the second reason why I haven't been actively writing. I find that there's just not enough time in the day for both dancing and writing. At this point in my life, it's kind of obvious why I would pick one over the other. If you'd like, if you can convince me otherwise (or at least present a strong, almost compelling case for writing over dancing), I'll give you tickets to the next PBT show. (Yes, my day job has trained me to push interactivity with the audience haha).

In the interest of keeping my writing from getting rusty, I've promised myself that priority or no, I have to keep updating this blog - at the very least. It's not a big commitment - blogging is not the same as writing a review of a performance which deserves deliberated construction. It's just bits and pieces of thoughts on what's going on in dance. Sure, there's going to be more reflections on my own dancing, but I do promise not to post whining about how old I am and how difficult it is to rond de jambe my left leg higher than 90 degrees. I still have a lot of drama left in me, but I think I'm not that puerile anymore.

Will write more tomorrow. Hopefully, I'll have time to publish what I write some time between meetings, supervising my team and stretching my hamstrings.

In the meantime, I've recently put up Donna Miranda's performance notes of Agnes Locsin's Sayaw, Sabel and a profile on ballerina Carlos Garcia on www.runthru.com.ph. Baby steps, yeah?

Sayaw, Sabel

Just came from watching Sayaw, Sabel at the CCP tonight. It is, in one word, phenomenal. There is so much to say, that I'm worried that it won't fit in a review. Will find a way to to be able to say more about it, adequately. Will also get back to you when I do, hehe.

Photo of Sayaw, Sabel by Darrel Sicam for Runthru Magazine :)

Regional Dance Critics Workshop in Jakarta + 3 Reviews in Real Time Arts Magazine

I haven't blogged since March and I apologize, there was just so many things happening that I couldn't stop to discuss. One was I danced in a local version of Swan Lake, and it's no mean feat to rehearse everyday, and run a ballet school, and update a corporate website, and update the Runthru website AND see the actual magazine out in print. See, so many things happening.

In the middle of all that, I was invited to attend a Dance Critics workshop by the good folks at Goethe Institut in Jakarta, Indonesia from June 14 - 18, moderated by Real Time Australia's Keith Gallasch, a very lovely man who walked in the rain with us. The workshop fell on the same week as the Indonesian Dance Festival and it was a whirlwind of dance, writing about dance, and talking about what we wrote. Despite all my years as a dance critic, I still learned a lot from that workshop, especially how to clean my words and word choices, and how dance criticism is a responsibility and not just a blowing off at the mouth. I know all this, but I needed them reiterated.

Here's Keith's account of the experience, with lots of photos of me (okay, 2 photos): http://www.realtimearts.net/article/97/9920

And here's a list of the three reviews I wrote in that crazy week.

Aspiration and Influence: Final Night Program at the IDF

They look out from behind the frame as if from a window, peering at the audience as we inescapably stare back. The man in the tutu, revealed to be the source of the relentless singing, pauses only to rudely ask, “What are you looking at?” From a choreographer who has danced for Madonna and appeared in films, Supriyanto is obviously questioning such scrutiny and what all the hoopla is about. What I find compelling is that the audience gets this.

Journey Into Light: Asri Mery Sidowati's Merah

The dancers are only very slightly illuminated by a smattering of light on the cyclorama that simulates moonlight shining through thick leafy branches. Because we had been in the darkness so long, I was not even sure if the second dancer, situated in an upstage corner, was indeed actually there; he seemed to blend into the cyclorama so much that my still-adjusting eyes were convinced that he was merely an image projected on the screen.

When Does Forever End?: Meg Stuart and Philipp Gehmacher's Maybe Forever

In Meg Stuart and Philipp Gehmacher’s Maybe Forever, the pair then sit with legs outstretched and backs to the audience, leaning to the side at the same angle, plagued by a weight that neither can ignore. The performance space is hazily semi-lit, reminding me of the way light creeps into your bedroom at dawn. There is little stylization in the way the couple suddenly grab each other and spread against each other full length only to discreetly remove themselves from contact to find another spot on the floor; but this push-and-pull feels like a dance.

Remembering Giselle

(Lucas as Albrecht, me as Giselle convinced that "he loves me not" during the mad scene)

While putting CDs into storage (because who uses CDs in this day and age?) and checking on a bunch of unmarked discs, I came across a DVD of my school's 1998 recital, where we did Giselle. It was unmarked because it was originally a VHS copy that I had digitized, and it had snow and static from the deterioration of the tape. Still, I went on and watched parts of it (forwarding is easier when digital obviously) and marveled at so many things.

First, I'd like to comment on our choice of a full-length Giselle for a recital. After the show, we (my family who owns and runs the school) all agreed that it wasn't such a good idea for a school recital - the story was too sad, and almost scary (Erin is caught off cam saying to our videographer, "Daddy, I don't want to watch ballet na..." while I'm losing my mind in Act I) and the kids only got to be 2 characters: peasants and wilis. Swans are okay, even fun, but wilis? As Lucas put it, it seemed we just wanted to do a full-length Giselle and we forced our students to humor us. Granted that none of them complained at all, and they really got into the story as much as we did, it was still something we never did again.

Secondly, you know how it's easy to say, oh it's just a recital? Therefore, not really taken seriously? Given that there were kids as young as 5 who made up the corps de ballet (we simplified a lot of their steps), if you look closely at myself, Lucas (who of course played Albrecht), Quincy (who of course played Hilarion), Jacqui (who of course played Myrtha) (of course, I was Giselle, if it isn't obvious yet), and even at our Bertha (Mimi) and Bathilde (Besy), we were oh-so-seriously doing Giselle. Very seriously, really.

This struck me right after I died in Act I, when Lucas and Quincy blame each other for my death - how real they were portraying it. Before that, I was watching the mad scene with amusement - how Ika was just a baby but she was already acting and projecting, how the kids were filed in single line watching me go crazy, how my Capezio pointe shoes didn't show off my instep at all when I was not en pointe (I hated Capezio, but I only discovered Gaynors around 5 or 6 years later), how fat I was and how super OMG thin both Lucas and Quincy were, and how my hair was giving me such a hard time because it was at the height of being balik-ayos (What I would kill to have that kind of hair again) and therefore falling all over my face at every opportunity. It's not that I wasn't doing it seriously, it's just that, as a spectator being nudged by this distant memory, I was noticing EVERYTHING. There were so many things about it that was so, "Wahaha, school recital!" but there were so many things about it that was very real, too.

Fast forward to where Giselle rises from the dead and tries to make her presence known to Albrecht, who is visiting her grave. I am flooded by memories of all the hard work I put into dancing this ballet - making sure my leg was high enough, the pains I took to make sure that my characterization emanated from each movement, practicing not jumping into the air but evaporating as would a mist. My technique 12 years ago is nowhere near what it is now (or better yet where it was 5 years ago), but I'm really impressed with my then-24 year old self. It's actually quite inspiring.

My mom would chide me when I get too emotional over preparing for a performance in one of our school recitals, saying the audience won't notice if I don't live up to my standards, that what I do is pretty good already. I love my mom, but this is one case where I'm glad I don't listen to her. If I found this video now and my performance was lackluster, I would wonder why I try to dance at all. Getting older and nearing that point where I won't be fun to watch anymore, I've been treasuring each day that I can still dance and the kind of dancing that's worthy of my time, that's worthy of me. Tonight, I'm realizing again just how lucky I am, and I'm very grateful.

Itim Asu on Runthru Online

My first foray into dance criticism this year is challenged by writer's block over Myra Beltran's Itim Asu. So, finally getting it published is sort of a small victory. An excerpt:

There is a lot of text in Itim Asu. In dance, the movement can be seen as the text; but this piece doesn't limit itself to just movement as text, which is only practical as there is a lot of text to deal with. Actually, for much of the group dancing, there is no text. As if text took a breather for the audience to rest their minds a bit and enjoy the dancing.

Not that anyone can get away from the texts in Itim Asu. There is a synopsis, choreographers' notes, and dramatist's notes in the souvenir programme, and a voice over during the performance. Aside from words, there is a "sound score" and a film of old Manila in sepia to help evoke the era. The historical material is analyzed on many levels, including how the validity of Burgos' account of the murder of Gov. Gen. Bustamante has been questioned, and even bringing in Jose Rizal's own texts inspired by Burgos' contributions to the fight for freedom. At the end of the show, Moreno even decides to contribute to the text, by posing who is the real hero of the story, is it Bustamante, or is it Itim Asu? It's kind of a lot to take in at a time.

Thankfully, the piece is organized into several sections to address these levels and layers of text. This sectioning and sequencing of events and the use of text in its various forms helps set the dance free of the responsibility of telling the story and allows the dancing to be as abstract as possible, when it can. At other moments, the dancing tells the story and there is no need for explanation.

From "Reading into Itim Asu"

by Joelle Jacinto on Runthru Online

Read the rest here

Runthru is now online

Ah, so here's the exciting news I told you guys to watch out for. Please visit my beloved pet project Runthru Dance Magazine as it's now live online on http://www.runthru.com.ph. Basically, it's the online component of the print magazine: we have pages listing the content of each issue we put out, and you can read our cover stories, and some selected features online.

Since we don't publish regularly, dance fans can get their regular updates here. We'll regularly feature local news and announcements of shows and events, and dance reviews. I actually have three lined up already (just have to finish/start writing them), so stay tuned. I've drafts on Myra Beltran's Itim Asu at RCBC, and Ballet Philippines' Neo Filipino. Just tonight, I saw Airdance's In Between Tenses and I'm excited to write about that too.

I also just recently proofed the new revised dummy of our Issue 4, which goes to the printers this month. It's lovely! It's going to be a good year for Runthru, yes it is.

This weekend: Airdance's In Between Tenses

Airdance looks back and peers into tomorrow with its upcoming show entitled In-Between-Tenses. Challenging the transience of dance and fleeting memories through movement and multi-media, choreographers and performers struggle with sanity and self and the many possibilities therein.

The show will feature explorations in remembering, in living in the moment, and in hoping. Worthy of looking forward to are new choreographies from Rhosam Prudenciado Jr., Mia Cabalfin, Johnny Amar, Marielle Alonzo, Clarissa Mijares and artistic directors Ava Villanueva, Jed Amihan and Avel Bautista. Part of the performance is coming to terms with yesterday, with the company will also restaging dances from previous shows. The dance pieces are part of an attempt to reconcile the past with the present and hopefully be able to fuel a future all the while aware that the dance, the body moving, is reflective of the passage of time.

In-Between-Tenses is presented to you by Airdance with shows on March 13 and 14, 2010, at 7pm at the Dance Forum Space located at 36e West Avenue (diagonally across Persian restaurant Mister Kabab). Tickets are priced at P200 with 50% discount for seniors and students. For tickets and inquiries, call (02) 415-2185 or call/text 0916-356-6693 or visit our newly-updated website www.airdance.com.ph

AIRDANCE

36E West Ave., Quezon City

Tel. No. (63-2)415-2185

Mobile No. (63) 916-3566693

http://www.airdance.com.ph

Sa Itim, Sa Puti

This is Yasnina Jumalon and Gianella Reyes' upcoming graduation recital, as part of their requirements for a Diploma in Creative, Performing and Musical Arts. It's a deconstruction of Swan Lake, which I heartily applaud because Swan Lake has been deconstructed many times before, the most infamous being Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake, with topless male swans in feathered pants. I didn't think of their current take on it, and I must say I'm excited to see it, given that the slant is very very Filipino.

I actually wish that UP Dance Majors would stop reconstructing ballets as their gradation recitals. The tradition began with myself and former classmate Angel Lawenko, who is now Angel Baguilat and part of UP's faculty. We put on a deconstruction of Cinderella as a japayuki (Filipina "cultural" entertainer in Japan) to the Prokofiev score. Since then, there have been Filipinized deconstructions of Nutcracker, Giselle, Petrouchka, Alice in Wonderland, and now Swan Lake. I'm pretty sure each recital had their own merits, I just wish the students would be more assertive about their original ideas come recital time. But that's just me.

Given all that, I think Sa Itim, Sa Puti will be great. Yasnina and Gianella are really promising contemporary choreographers, and I'm just waiting for the big surprise.

Sa Itim, Sa Puti

7 pm, Friday, March 26, 2010

Abelardo Hall Auditorium, UP College of Music, Diliman, Quezon City

ABAP's Pampanga Dance Caravan

Because Dance should thrive all over the Philippines :)

For its kick-off event this year, ABAP (Association of Ballet Academies, Philippines) offers the public a FREE performance in PAMPANGA DANCE CARAVAN on MARCH 6, 2010 4PM at the MARQUEE MALL. Featured dancers are from Center for Movement and Music, House of Dance, Lilibeth Trinidad Santos Dance Exercise Center, Ridgepointe Ballet and The Dance Conservatory. This event is sponsored by the Ayala Malls and spearheaded by Bubbles Encarnancion, director of The Dance Conservatory, and the 2010 Executive Board : Chairman and President Liza dela Fuente Castaneda; VP Abigail Yee Alvia; Secretary Maritoni Rufino Tordesillas ; Treasurer Kathy Domingo and PRO Ma Rosario Nepomuceno.

Neo-Filipino - Dance in the Time of Change

I'm not fond of the title of this year's Neo-Filipino (it always makes me think of Love in the Time of Cholera, yet not as deep or as witty), but I'm hoping that the line up of the choreographers (Tinnie Crame, Dwight Rodrigazo, and my very own Carissa Adea!!!) will more than make up for it. The gala was tonight but they only had tickets for me tomorrow, so I'm watching with Erica and Inky. So exciting in a time of change!

Please check back this week for more shows (I've got lots of posters to put up, but thanks to the moneymaker, I had to collect a backlog of sorts) and more importantly a very nice surprise. Thanks!

Eli Jacinto's Rhapsody in Blue

Thank you for coming, hope you had a great time.

DLS-CSB Dance Major program, open for applications

Want to dance and earn a college degree at the same time?

De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde

Bachelor of Performing Arts major in Dance (BPA-D)

In consortium with Ballet Philippines and the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) Dance School, the DLS-CSB Dance Program is a twelve-trimester course that nurtures the dancer’s technical and artistic competencies. The College’s dynamic learning atmosphere and state-of-the-art facilities combined with the CCP’s environment, professionalism and ethics produces artists and entrepreneurs in the dance field with a strong theoretical perspective, firm technical and artistic skills, and good management capabilities.

Benildean Entrance Examination for SY2010-11 is on February 21, 2010.

Application period until February 17.

For more information, contact:

SCHOOL OF DESIGN AND ARTS

950 Pablo Ocampo Street

Malate, Manila, Philippines 1004

Tel. No.: 536-6752

Email: sda@dls-csb.edu.ph

www.dls-csb.edu.ph/admissions

CCP Dance School of Ballet Philippines

Ground Floor, Cultural Center of the Philippines

CCP Complex, Roxas Blvd., Pasay City

Tel. No.: 832-3689

Email: rubylee.gomez@balletphilippines.org

www.balletphilippines.org

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This is where I teach, mostly major courses. If you're interested in applying, I do hope to meet you soon.

it's been a while

Spent the day rehearsing for Pasinaya 2010 tomorrow: TEAM Dance Studio's slot is at 12:40pm at the CCP Rehearsal Hall, if you're interested. Anyway, it's been a while since I've felt this way - post dancing ache all over my body, but happy euphoric feeling all around. I'm not sure I was able to "feel" this after rehearsals for my school's annual recital, held last December; or perhaps I've not been dancing too often recently to remember how this feels. I know I used to feel it on a regular basis, back when I was dancing full-time around 5 years ago.

I really like what we're performing tomorrow: Rhapsody in Blue, choreography by Eli Jacinto (my father) to music by George Gershwin. The piece is a tribute to our school, as we're celebrating 30 years of existence this year and my dad got a wee bit sentimental. It's a fusion of jazz, ballet and modern styles, and he copy-pastes signature moves from his older choreographies, but to accentuate that this is who the company is, this is what the company dances. I was catching glimpses of it from the mirror (of course, the CCP Rehearsal Hall has a mirror) while we were doing our run through and regularly kept saying, "Wow!" Hilarious.

I think my dad is very underrated as a choreographer in the Philippines, mainly because he doesn't like to put himself out there as much as other choreographers do. He won a venue grant at the CCP in 1991 and was often invited to feature his works there, but he did/does not offer himself to other groups, nor actively look for venues for his choreography outside of our annual recitals. I suppose he felt that he didn't need to prove himself to anyone, and he can be quite the antisocial grump; something I've always felt I took after.

He actually, these days, feels that he's retired from it all - meaning from the networking, the politics, the winning favor parts, etc. Retirement is staying home all week, doing mini-carpentry projects, and spending the weekend teaching and choreographing at our school. The dance personages I happen to see while at "work," often ask about him, what is he doing these days, etc. They also sincerely ask me to give him their regards. I love this - although he's not written up in history books as a major, influential choreographer (hehe, which is another, much more intriguing story), he has the respect of many important people.

I don't go around telling people that a choreography he's done (and that I'm dancing in, to boot) is fabulous, because, yeah, that would be too weird and full of myself. But if I can be honest here, I think he's one of the best Filipino choreographers of all time. I don't love ALL his works (I have yet to meet a choreographer who's not done bombs), but he's up there in my list, and no it's not because he's my dad. And this is how cool he is: he doesn't want me to write about him. He says, he doesn't need it. These are exactly the guys we should write about more.

At the risk of sounding weird and full of myself, Rhapsody in Blue is beautiful. What's more, it's a delight to dance. You can tell I'm looking forward to tomorrow.

Hope to see you guys there. If you can make it, do say hi.

"Wait, what's the step again?"

Open Dance Kitchen: Contemporary Dance Classes this February

OPEN DANCE KITCHEN
Contemporary Dance Class (advanced and professional level)
Wednesdays 3-5pm / Saturdays 11am - 1pm
P300 per class
classes start FEBRUARY 10

Physical actions render our intentions and motivation. This training session is intended for professional dancers, actors, choreographers as well as people who wish to pursue further interest in contemporary performance. In this class, we shall activate mind and body connections, articulating dynamic movement material, energy, time, rhythm, via clarity of images and intention. Drawing heavily from releasing technique, the class progresses gradually from a slow warm up to rhythmical movement combinations as we explore different spatial orientations across space. As always we shall challenge our instincts, intuition, energy and perception looking utilizing gestures, authentic physical and everyday actions. Class will be taught by Donna Miranda

Transitopia Studio, Unit 4C Michel Apartments, 2030 A.Mabini Avenue, Malate, Manila
for inquiries call/text 09266635606 email thelovegangsters@gmail.com

Pasinaya 2010

Choose from more than 80 shows at the Cultural Center of the Philippines as the CCP Resident Companies lead more than 2,000 artists perform excerpts of upcoming shows on Sunday, February 7, 2010.

Dubbed as the biggest one-day performing arts festival, Pasinaya 2010: CCP Open House Festival is the opening salvo of the National Arts Month in February. The event will be held in all venues of the CCP including the Front Lawn, the Promenade areas and the alley in front of the Production Design Center.

Highlights include the biggest gathering of "Tinikling" (bamboo dance) dancers at the CCP Front Lawn entitled "Bonggang Bonggang Bamboo: The Tinikling Showdown".

The public is invited to "see all they can, pay what they can" from 8:30am till 5:30pm. Various activities will be held in different "Zones" all over the CCP.

CCP Resident Companies regale audiences with snippets of their performance seasons in the Resident Company zone. Featured are Ballet Philippines, Bayanihan Philippine National Folk Dance Company, National Music Competitions for Young Artists, Philippine Ballet Theater, Philippine Madrigal Singers, Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra, Ramon Obusan Folkloric Group, Tanghalang Pilipino and the University of Sto. Tomas Symphony Orchestra. Other such zones are the Music Zone, Dance Zone, Theater Zone, Film Zone, Literary Zone, Visual Arts Zone, and the Children’s Zone.

Pasinaya 2010 offers workshops, information booths, exhibits, film screenings, puppet shows, storytelling, performance poetry, a culinary fair and cooking demos, and an arts and collectibles market. The CCP Pasinaya is held annually, and seeks to increase awareness of the CCP performance season and programs. This year’s Pasinaya is expected to draw crowds to the CCP anew as it offers audiences a day of fun and excellent entertainment through the popular "see-all-you-can, pay-what-you-can" scheme.

For particulars, contact the CCP Performing Arts Department at 832-1125 loc. 1611.

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My group, TEAM Dance Studio, is performing Rhapsody in Blue, at 12:40pm at the Bulwagang Francisca Reyes/CCP Rehearsal Hall. Hope to see you!

Check out the full schedule here.

CCP Dance School Scholarship Auditions on Jan. 9

I gots this through email. I remember my time as a scholar for Ballet Philippines, and what full of glee I was upon discovering that my hair was long enough to qualify my casting as one of the Kalikasan in Encantada. If any of you decide to take up the challenge, best of luck and, hey, have fun :)

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The CCP Dance School will be holding scholarship auditions for its SY09-10 January-March term on Saturday, January 9, 2010 at the CCP Rehearsal Hall. Limited slots for full and half tuition scholarships are available.

AUDITION SCHEDULE

12:45-1:45pm for ages 9 to 13 and Male Scholarship Program
2:00-3:00pm for Intermediate and Advanced levels

Applicants are required to submit 2 pcs. 1x1 ID photos, dance resume and registration form with their audition fee prior to the audition.

For more information, please contact the CCP Dance School at 832-3689.

Happy new year everyone!

Watch out for dance news and views and generally more exciting things all around this 2010. :)