Finding a way

By Paul Gordon Emerson

Of trees, birds and a few metaphors.....

We've been focused on trees for months now. From "Revolution of the Butterflies," the dance Isabel Croxatto has made for us and which is featured throughout earlier video, photographic and text postings on this blog to our commitment at CityDance to create a carbon-neutral office through better practices and through an offset charge payment channeled mainly into the donation of funds for planting trees, trees have been a "thing" with us. 

Apparently they're a thing with most everyone right now. 

That's not a bad thing (well, except for the endless allergens floating around the DC/Metro area now that the "things" are in full bloom). But its a funny thing. Not "hah-hah" funny, but funny in that, as with so many things in Western society we are "discovering" trees and realizing that -- oh, wow, these things are really beneficial. We have this tendency to chop things down, or up, and then, years later, discover them. Its that "Everything old is new again," thing. 

The entire enterprise of "rediscovering" trees is much harder than it at first seems. Major metropolitan areas around the US, and the world, have embarked (there's a pun in there somewhere) on massive tree-planting campaigns. New York is looking to plant a million all by itself. But as it turns out, there's a limited amount of available space in which to do the planting, and where you need it most its hardest to achieve. There's no space, the soil is completely denatured, and the people in neighborhoods without trees sometimes have to be persuaded to accept them. That despite the fact that trees in heavily populated, and cemented, areas tend to yield far more benefit than those planted rurally (that's not including the billion slated for planting in the Eastern Amazon). We are in that crazy place where every tree has a carbon value, a dollar value and a real estate value. Oh, and they're nice to look at, too. 

The birds part: In the past 14 days, randomly, I've seen three astonishing things. All of them have something to do with birds. None to do with dance. Directly.

At 8:15 on a working Wednesday morning I entered one of the biggest and busiest traffic circles in the endless melee of Washington/MD rush hour. This one, at Connecticut Avenue and Western Avenue, represents the dividing line between DC and Maryland. Its a madhouse. 

Pulling up from a side road on the Western edge there was no traffic coming towards me. None. That doesn't happen. Except that on this day there was a woman standing in the middle of the street, blocking traffic. For a family of ducks. One mamma duck and 7 ducklings, who were, somehow, someway, crossing from a nest somewhere by a local church to the center circle, in which there is a fountain to drink from and a pool to learn to swim in. These ducklings were not making their first trip. And somehow not only were they alive, but traffic had stopped for them. In DC. At Rush Hour. Hopefully that has happened every day since, and will happen for so long as they choose to cross. 

Second: the hawk. I live in a house at the crest of the highest point in DC -- in a neighborhood named Mt. Pleasant. I have a south facing deck that looks at the entire southern side of the city. And a few weeks ago that deck had a visitor -- an exceptionally large and remarkable hawk, who appeared to be looking for a meal of pigeon or squirrel, both of which frequent the deck as well. A hawk. In the middle of DC.

Third: the vultures. Aside from the completely ill-informed view of vultures as foul (yes, another pun in there somewhere) creatures, the idea that they thrive in DC is hard to grab onto. But on MacArthur Boulevard the other day there were two, in the median, munching on a breakfast of a squirrel that hadn't made it to the other side. They scavenge, and there has to be enough scavengable food to survive -- and here they were. 

Now -- trees and birds rare and birds doing things seemingly involving a death-wish (as Kathryn said today, people die crossing traffic circles, so what chance do baby birds have). And dance.  The point is that given a chance, life finds a way (to quote, somewhat inelegantly, Jeff Goldblum in, egads, "Jurassic Park"). Trees grow. Birds find a way to coexist with man if man gives them even the most remote chance to do so. And everything is the healthier for it. Birds are a vital indicator of the health of an ecosystem, and as these birds return and thrive, its a measure of what happens when nature is not plowed under at every opportunity, even in the midst of a major metropolitan area.

Its not so different for the arts. Given a chance, given the opportunity to take hold, it does. But it takes effort -- sometimes dedicated and sometimes benign. We plant trees, sometimes over the preconceptions and opposition of those who will benefit most from the planting. We allow birds to live -- not nurture; not help. Just allow. We leave spaces for art and artists, whether in the form of housing in which they can live and studios in which they can work, and they, too, thrive. Sometimes you act. Sometimes you choose not to act, which is in and of itself an act. And things get better. 

Seems simple, but, like the "discovery" of trees, it turns out we have to re-learn it. That's not a cynical statement, but one of encouragement. While we might wish we'd never forgotten in the first place, the point is we figure it out. It just takes someone who will stop in the middle of a four lane road to let a family safely make the journey. 

Very Funny

By Paul Gordon Emerson

The book is closed on Jungle Books, the road kill show, 2008. 

Final count: 

3 Mowglis

3 Shere Khans

2 Kaas

6 monkeys/wolves

Talk about living the endangered species message. 

The bear survived (turns out they really are the hardiest animals in the land) and has fled to North Carolina and the narrator is planning to burn his costume (except its owned by the Washington Opera, so that's probably not the best way to keep that relationship going). 

Best story: The urban jungle of Pomfrey, Maryland

Only one show was more than 30 minutes away. And it was in Texas (well, Southern Maryland). 90 minutes away, a mad dash down Maryland Route 5. No time to waste. Pull up. Unload. We'd spent the morning getting ready for the show the next day because Mowgli #2 had to be in New York for a court date (Mowgli #1 never even got out of the gate... felled by pneumonia the morning the run started). And, yeah, well, the costumes were still in the lobby at Strathmore. 

ALL of them. 

So, welcome to the urban jungle. The tiger went from a purple velvet to jeans and a red t-shirt (that read "hotter than I should be" -- from of all things the World Wildlife Fund). Mowgli wore shades and an attitude. The "imagination station" was rolling. I couldn't stop laughing. 

Best question: 

"What inspired you to become a writer."

Kid couldn't have been more than 9 and was totally into the story, quite convinced apparently that I really am 143 years old and was just shining. Talk about a future Tony Award winning writer. Of course, I'd like to think I was just that convincing..... But seriously, this is what you live for in doing these shows. 

Best review:

"On a scale of one to five, I give it a five." Jenny. Aged 5; from some school lost to identity in the blur of seeing 3,500 kids in 9 days. 

Best save: Shere Khan III (sounds like a Star Trek sequel)

Friday morning. Last day. Last shows. Mowgli #2 ALSO apparently comes down with pneumonia (evidently a high-risk part for pulmonary problems) and is out -- 30 minutes before we leave for the school. Kate Jordan, who normally lives the part of a monkey or wolf, and who isn't even supposed to go that day, volunteers to be Shere Khan, sliding Shere Khan #1 into the role of Mowgli #2. No rehearsal. She never even studied the part (its a guys part, after all), but she goes rocking out there in front of 700+ kids as the jazziest tiger, with rock star hair flowing and the only real nails the tiger had. Meanwhile Mowgli #3, Ja'Malik, is jamming along and cracking up not just the kids but the cast with all the turns and flips and lifts out of NOWHERE. 

(The stage was also pretty much of a storage space, so there was this big love seat off stage left and the whole first show Alice, who somehow wound up along for the ride with nothing to do, was curled up on it missing only popcorn and a beer to look like she was in the living room of a sit com.)

Best Warriors: Jerome and Maggie

The only two people in the cast who did all 15 shows. 

If the run had gone another week we could have opened up our own Animal Planet MASH unit. And gotten it syndicated. 

But it was a ton of fun to see the kids get completely absorbed into the show. EVERY show we heard from teachers and Principles that they couldn't believe the entire room was silent and totally into it. That was great. 

On to Springsteen and doing "Born To Run" right. 

Dumbing Up

by Paul Gordon Emerson

There is a tendency in arts education -- maybe in most education -- to "dumb down," to assume that people, particularly children, won't get it if you challenge them. It seems to come from a place of insecurity. Not the insecurity of the people to whom you are presenting, but of the people doing the presenting. And its never, ever the right answer. And, if there's a place where its even more not the right answer, its with kids. If anything, you have to dumb up. You have to take your preconceptions as an "adult" who "knows" and raise the barre from what you think they're going to take in. 

I remember as a kid always having that reaction when some adult was talking to me. Anytime someone who was 20 years or more older than I was said "you'll understand this one day" I wanted to either crawl under a rock or hit them with the rock. 99% of the time I got it then. And, as Josh liked to say in West Wing, my IQ doesn't exactly break the bank. If I got it, then all those kids in front of us week after week are just as able to get it. More, probably. 

Whatever it is that makes us talk to kids like they're suffering from some sort of cognitive dyspepsia, where challenging them just results in intellectual heartburn, we are constantly reminded by our audiences that we've got it wrong. If you talk to them like they get it, then they'll go with you, and they'll not just get it, they'll get on it. They'll take a story in. They'll take the enchantment you offer and do it with enthusiasm. If anything, kids have a "bull____" meter that is better than ours as adults. 

Jungle Books has been a clear and present reminder of this. From the 5 year olds at the front to the 11 year olds at the back, their questions are smart and their attention to detail is startling. And they are completely willing to be enchanted. Its really just a matter of making sure that we, as the people at the front of the room are genuinely willing to, interested in and inspired to do the enchanting honestly and with passion. If you offer that, if you offer the best story, at the highest level you can manage, dancing and story-telling for 400 kids goes from being a challenge to being a delight. Why we make it more complicated than that -- that's the question, and the place where we get dumb ourselves. Maybe we should just make sure every performer spends a show sitting in the middle of the audience. 

Teach Your Children Well

By Paul Gordon Emerson

The old Crosby, Stills and Nash song has a stanza in it --

Teach your children well,

Their father's hell did slowly go by,

And feed them on your dreams

The one they picked, the one you'll know by.

As CityDance embarks on a two week journey into 15 elementary schools throughout the DC area, for some reason that line -- "feed them on your dreams" -- recurs for me. What is it that we are trying to do, and what is it that we dream, both for ourselves and for them, and how are we sharing the dream with them? We're traveling and touring a version of Jungle Books, the adaptation of the Kipling tales that is a concert program for us and now a road show. Today we shared that story with some 300 children who lost themselves in a story about a fictional boy that was written 112 years ago and set in the heart of a Central Indian jungle. The dancing made them sigh and wonder. The story help them. But what resonated was something which had nothing to do with the tale. It had to do with illness, injury and perseverance.

As departure time neared this morning, as the van was loaded with costumes, props, stereos and a five pound bag of coffee, our lead character, our Mowgli, came through the Strathmore doors. Jason, the star of the show, was too sick to do more than tumble into a chair and mumble something like "I'll be fine." An hour later, as we were preparing to go on stage for our first audience, he was in the Emergency Room of Sibley Hospital. We had a show. He has pneumonia.

Christopher Morgan, who has become our all-purpose utility player, who was supposed to be, intermittently, our narrator, was suddenly Mowgli. With no notice and no warning the company embraced him, and embraced the change, and wondered and worried about Jason alone in ER and told the tale of a young boy, a bear, a snake and a tiger with such skill that no one knew what was different from what was planned. And we could easily have just not told them.

But the lesson -- the teach your children lesson -- the dreams lesson -- is that sharing yourself with little people is something that goes far beyond the flash of a trained dancer and the adaptability of a professional performance troupe. What was memorable for them is the same thing that was memorable for us -- that you train, you practice and in so doing, you persevere. They loved the story and the dancing. But they'll remember Christopher, who shared that he had just stepped in, and that he succeeded because he practiced, because he was willing to take a risk and because we wanted those kids to have a great day with us. We succeeded because all the company was determined. But the kids got something more, and something we often try not to let them see -- the challenge, and thus the humanity, of the day.

Our dream, to share, to dance, is also about that -- to be the people we are with the people they are. That's what made the day special. That's "the one they picked, the one you'll know by."

LITTLE TREES AND BUTTERFLIES, HAPPY EARTH DAY !

Earth Day '08

By Paul Gordon Emerson

Art has a role to play (literally and figuratively) in the political questions of the day. That role can be direct and political. But it can also be communal and very non-political. Both matter.

The Green Apples Earth Day Festival on the National Mall is Sunday, April 20th (Earth Day itself is two days later, on the 22nd). CityDance is dancing on the main stage of what is being called the Flagship Event of a worldwide festival. Its an honor, an extraordinary honor, to be invited.

My God-Daughter, Lucy, is 17, and she said the other day that "her entire school is going." Her passion is two-fold for the day, and herein lies a part of the power of art on a day like this that few other more traditional, and political, participants can claim. That power is to pull people in. Its an irony that so often we complain in this field that we can't sell enough tickets to shows, that there isn't enough interest in our programs and blah, blah, blah. Earth Day is just one example of how that isn't -- and must not -- be true.

Earth Day is about fundamental things --- the need to change our practices on this planet, and our stewardship of it -- if we aren't going to be talking about beach front property in Orlando and the consequences of watching the entire Delta in Bangladesh vanish beneath the surface. But to get people to "buy-in" to fundamental things you often have to make such fundamental things something that feel like a positive and not like a penalty. You have to build community. You have to inspire. You have to draw folks together in common purpose, not divide them in the petty details of difference. Earth Day is a deep and defining opportunity to do this, and art is serving a vital mission in making it happen. It is a source of unity -- the celebration of the art as well as of the message that will be on the concert hall stage.

Its a safe bet that at least as many people are coming to see The Roots as to wander the booths of all the business, NGOs and not-for-profit organizations who are there to demonstrate their "green-curriculum vitae's." And its absolutely the truth that more people are into the idea of listening to Chevy Chase or Chris Rock than the Senate Majority Leader. Rock is there because he believes. Whether Harry Reid (the Majority Leader) can convince anyone of the same is unimportant -- he holds the power of change in a way none of the rest of us do. But that's not the point. The point is that people are being drawn in by the art as much as well as by the cause -- and many are simply being drawn by the art. But they're coming, and that -- particularly in Washington -- is how movements begin. Celebrating the day opens the door to positive ways of changing, and of getting us together to say "this is how we do it."

There are going to be political statements from the artists, as there should be. But while all the focus is on the politics of the day, its too easy to forget that you can inspire change without a sledgehammer, and that its often more effective, and more lasting, when you realize that it doesn't all have to be heavy. There's nothing wrong with taking on the question of a heating planet by doing things which are cool.

The Revolution: Reflections

by Paul Gordon Emerson

Coming to the end of the first phase of creating "Revolution" is both a bit sad and also very inspiring.

Sad because Isabel has journeyed back to Chile, and left the magic she makes in a room to memory (at least for now). Inspiring because she has made something extraordinary and done what gifted choreographers do -- challenge the performers to be more than they were when she entered the room for the first time. Normally those journeys take months. She had three weeks. To create a dance in three weeks is challenging enough. To create a culture on stage is vastly more difficult. But this is what she did. To ask dancers, who are driven by their DNA to move, and most of the time to move at exceptional speed, to forsake the use of their legs would create its own revolution in most companies.

But in this one, it didn't. It created a willingness to understand. As esoteric as that may sound, its critical to the success of any art. Artists paint. They make music. They use inanimate objects to generate color or sound. But dancers are the color and they are, in many ways, the sound. So if something is going to succeed in the mission of challenging, inspiring or captivating an audience, the performers must embrace their roles. These did. The result was a wave of comments about "Revolution" being "breathtaking" and "brilliant."

As an outsider, what captivated me was the dual brilliance of making a work on an impossible subject not just compelling but embracing, and of making it on a group new to the concept and giving them the opportunity to thrive, and thus to realize the mission of the work.

For choreographers, this is a pinnacle. Its what makes something last. Its what makes something captivating for more than a few minutes, and makes it stretch in the consciousness into the days and weeks after the performance is long gone from the stage, but is lingering there in the heart.

There were two "Revolutions" at Warmer. One was the literal revolution -- the dance. The other was the one in the hearts and culture of the dancers. Rare indeed.

"Revolution of the Butterflies" 09

Dance Is A Miracle That Happens When We Are There

by Isabel Croxatto

I believe that artists are catalysts of their communities and social, political and cultural environments.

As a choreographer I feel as an antenna, capturing and sending signals. I can´t help seeing, hearing, sensing, smelling and tasting "movement" of all kinds, (visible and invisible), in my own personal life, in a crowded metro station, in a poem or music, in the streets, in a political speech, in nature, history...everywhere!..movement talks to me, and sometimes it just gets into my organic, spiritual and mind system until I do something about it...and that something is a dance.

I ask my self many times, do I know how to dance ? do I really know how to do this ?...after 25 years of trying, I realize that I will never know…and that probably it is not important that I do.

The truth is that when something “calls” me and “moves” my heart, I have to start to work: create, research, explore, learn, develop, practice,... what ever it is need, no matter how long it takes, till I find my way to put it out in a movement that I can transmit back to the world.

And in that process I start to involve others and others start to get involved with that call as if they were hearing it too: dancers, artists, composers, musicians, family, friends, etc. And when I realize that the original movement that had urgently touched me so deeply is already out and expressing itself through a poetic language of movement that we have come to or invented and that has inspired it´s own propitious environment (costume, music, setting, lighting, etc ) - for that to become a visible movement in a time and space that we can share and experience with others, I realize that we are a part and witnesses of a little miracle…that is called, ART.

Sometimes I would also like to know and understand what is moving us to go on dancing and creating dance when nobody seems to care any more… and many times, concerning the apparently insolvent relation between the artist´s work and the audience, I also, ask myself "was that supposed to mean something?"... but that is only my head, reading too close to really see!

And many times, I say to myself,...go home, drop it, their is nothing you can do about it...but then a unexpected angel with many names, crosses my way and brings me back to trust, belief, hope, passion, purpose, love…and back to DANCE and ABUNDANZA!

And here I am in Washington DC, dancing with Butterflies and Trees ... extending our roots and branches to fly directly to your heart, so you can join us in a "revolutionary" movement towards a better future for the generations coming and the amazing planet in which we live.

Do we need to intellectually understand a movement that is happening in a space and time that we are part of as and audience ?... I believe that dance only declares it self when we are all there, but once it starts to unfold we can not stop it and the fact that it is happening is already meaningful beyond our understanding. Dance is a MIRACLE that refreshes and nourishes life, and we together (audience + artist) are part of it. We can open ourselves more and let her come in, touch us and move us ... and why not dance with her. We might at the end come to a different understanding or conclusion, (is that bad?), or maybe we will not like it at all. But coming to experience what artists have to say with no words is a significant ritual to cultivate and exercise, in these days where social pollution is threatening bonds to extinction. I believe that only for that matter it might be worth the risk of intellectual understanding. Do you?

Isabel Croxatto

Coreógrafa y Directora

ABUNDANZA

Santiago, Chile

Was That Supposed To Mean Something?

by Paul Gordon Emerson

While we've been focusing on the evolution of Isabel's "Revolution of the Butterflies," there have been other things happening in the company. On Friday, April 4th CityDance had a performance in the studio for a group brought together by the Education Department at the Music Center at Strathmore (our Montgomery County home). Ostensibly, they were coming up to see us doing something related to the theme of their package -- Broadway. Except that we don't really do anything that has anything to do with Broadway other than that we all like going to it.

We opted to show "On A Train Heading South," the dance that is the bookend to Isabel's for our upcoming concert, "Warmer." As I've mentioned in earlier posts, "Train" takes a very different approach to the question of climate change. We picked "Train" because of its narrative line -- its sense of being a story with a beginning, middle and end. That led us to the idea that there are similarities between a musical and a modern dance. In this case the similarities were about story and the dissimilarities were in that our story had no words and a musical usually has a zillion of them to get you through and to the story. And that, in turn, led to the question everyone in modern dance has hanging over their heads whenever they set out to make a dance -- "was that supposed to mean something?" If you want a question that sends a chill into a choreographer, artistic or executive director or, perhaps most important, a potential patron, this is it. Our friend and colleague Gesel Mason has made a dance about it -- and its a brilliant take on how quickly an audience can, and usually will, get lost watching this stuff. Her take through "How to Watch a Modern Dance Concert" was to just go right at how obscure this can get even when the choreographer thinks he or she is being as clear as the water in Lake Tahoe (something that is apparently about to change due to algae growth in the lake because of, you guessed it, climate change -- hmmm, Lake Tahoe in a stunning, anaerobic green, now that's a realtor's dream).

The further into a field, whether art or inorganic chemistry, you get, the easier it is to forget that you are really just learning a language, and getting better and better at speaking that language. The fact that that excellence is taking you into very rarefied company is fine if you only intend to talk to people similarly skilled (think the annual convention of the American Society for Chemical Engineering, where I suspect a coffee order comes with a request for sugar in its chemical designations), and if your purpose is to investigate, and discuss, with people who are in the know the same way you are.

What happens, though, when your existence is predicated on communicating, not with the 10 people you work in a room with day in and day out, but with tens or thousands of people who have absolutely no experience with you and, more, who haven't spent 20 years learning how to "speak dance?"

You spend 6 weeks making a dance filled with an endless amount of "deep meaning" and concept, put it on the stage convinced that the audience will rise up at the end in celebration of all that you've said. And what happens? Someone at the reception, someone exceptionally well informed, bright, inquisitive and just a little bit poorer for having plunked down his or her money, sheepishly walks up to you and says, in a quiet undertone "I really enjoyed it, but....was that supposed to mean something?" At this moment you typically spend 20 minutes trying to explain your profound concept, turn the question back and ask "well, what did you think it meant?" which is pretty much the kiss of death most of the time, or you head for the bar.

Then you commiserate with colleagues about how "no one gets it." They share in your pain, 'cause they feel the same way. That would be the art world's road to hell. If we want people to come and share in an experience, then, at least in my view, we better meet them way more than halfway. Assuming that building an audience, expanding a love of an art form, communicating thoughts and ideas and creating a great and entertaining environment is a significant part of the point, then the transformation of how we get people the language skills to "speak dance" better be a key part of the conversation we have with ourselves, our colleagues and our marketing departments.

If its not, we should be content with tiny houses and low priced tickets, similarly tiny salaries, few returning patrons except those 50 devotees (and the families of the dancers), and a better come back to "was that supposed to mean something?" than Isadora Duncan's unfortunately famous phrase that "if she could explain what she meant, she wouldn't have had to make it." There are those who would argue, whatever her CV, that she didn't. Ordering dinner in a restaurant in a country where you don't speak the language and can't read the characters is fun and an adventure, despite the fact that you have no idea what you are about to eat, but it probably won't keep you alive very long.....

Time to find a Starbucks.