Loving Le Barre--IE checks it out

Remember the Days?

IE is always on the look out for new and fun workouts here in Marin. Le Barre is her latest discovery. It’s the brainchild of former dancer Jenn Hall, an international fitness and dance presenter who after retiring from dancing professionally with popular artists like Beyoncè, and Jay-Z, decided to focus on dance and fitness choreography and instruction. 

Le Barre class at Body Kinetics in Novato has teacher Debbie Gleeson A Le Barre and Flirty Girl certified instructor. Debbie has us moving quickly through the barre sequence building up from squats, aka plies, to toe taps, aka tondues, to leg swings that become  arabesques and panches.(Kinda--you get the idea) 

All this without stopping class and with everyone smiling and having a great time. 

The barre itself is this funny little gizmo called a "Lebert equalizer."

It’s lower than a real ballet bar so it’s not a tool that creates balance but rather assists in stabilizing the body for movement. Translation: it's not going to do the work for you, but it will help you learn your own body's individual balance weaknesses and strengths.  

What's also cool about is it's portable, so you can pick it up to do the left side. This is a subtle thing but it means that not only are you not glued to your barre, you are not glued a certain part of the room. 

So when Debbie tells us to chasse' around it it's no big deal because we are already in the center of the room and ready to move. It eliminates that dance-class-phobia where you get planted at "your spot" on the barre and forget that all these exercises are so you can move in the center freely! 

This brings me to the barre's other use: an 8 pound free weight bar that Debbie has us rotating around our shoulders in controlled circles.


Then we go to the floor for some neat assisted body-roll-up-Pilates-type exercises. It’s great to really stretch your spine as you hold onto it and do the "roll down." It's a little like the

Pilates springboard class  but the barre is not as solid when you hang from it. It actually becomes more of a play instrument.

Check out classes of LeBARRE with Debbie At Body Kinetics in Novato!

See you in class

IE

Brazilian Sportswear hits Marin

Ready to rock from Rio with Miado Athletic

Miado Athletic is the newest Pop-up store in Corte Madera Town Center. It's a great place to find unique dancewear that's eclectic and definitely "hot." 

Miado in Brazilian means the cry of the Gato do Mato or Wild Cat. Owners Brain and Patricia Wolf have a great eye for making fun and high fashion togs. Their creations will definitely go with Lululemon duds. Best of all it gives us all another option to stay ahead of the pack in style. 

Check out this Samba video for a little taste of Rio

Happy Weekend!

IE/ID

Physical Graffitti--ID checks out the College of Marin Dance Concert

There is a moment before the dance begins. You are sitting in the dark. There is a lone dancer on the stage whose body begins to move and you think: there will be no words, there is just this body, joined by more as the lights and the music are layered in.

It’s a rush for ID: knowing that the body will carry this incredible weight. The whole evening will have just the body to make the shapes, to talk to us, to tell the story. You can turn off that something in your brain that thinks, listens, reads, evaluates, and turn something else on.

It opens another door, and I walked thru with Physical Graffitti.
This concert was a mix of pure dance and theater pieces. A favorite was Sandra Tanner Mack's, "Bereft. " 

This piece was in my young daughter's description, "not really a dance but more of a story." There were no words and the movement though spare told the story better than any words could. PIna Bausch in Wim Wenders, Dance Dance Otherwise We Are Lost says:
  
"I never thought of it as choreography but as expressing feelings. Though every piece is different, they are all trying to get at certain things that are difficult to put into words.."
― Pina Bausch and Pina's Rite of Spring

When I first began choreographing, I never thought of it as choreography but as expressing feelings. Though every piece is different, they are all trying to get at certain things that are difficult to put into words. In the work, everything belongs to everything else - the music, the set, the movement and whatever is said.

Pina Bausch

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/p/pinabausch538675.html#ffCPShiFeMRscpQh

The piece began with a family of five
dressed in village peasant costumes and sitting on chairs. The music was Yiddish, Fiddler-on the Roof-ish.The movement was light, joyful as the girls spun around the around the chairs and father and mother watched, and joined them dancing as a couple. They created a feeling of a close and loving family.


The harmony was interrupted as the first act ended in silence and a dark stage with the dancers looking out, seeing something that made them gasp in terror.

The second act used contracting and releasing movement: floor to standing rolls and twists, wide leg reaches that all evoked a sense of fear, flight and inner conflict. The movements were simple but executed with great force and engagement by the dancers. It gave each gesture weight and gravity as if it was the only thing that could be done. 

As Pina Baush has said, " To understand what I am saying, you have to believe that dance is something other than technique. We forget where the movements come from. They are born from life.."


The music changed into the soaring and mournful violin strings of Schindler's List. The dance continued in that vein as they came in from the wings carrying suitcases. The family split apart with the three young women huddling together, and the man and woman trying to hold everyone together but unable to. The piece ended in gradually increasing darkness, first the couple offstage, then the three girl’s downstage and finally the suitcases in a solitary pool of light.




It’s a risk to end a piece with darkness and uncertainty, but from the notes, "For my mother: To honor the memory of our relatives who perished at the hands of Hitler's Third Reich." 
We knew what would happen. Did it work?

For ID it did because it gave us the sense of loss, and longing, a shape that while it may not be exactly the same for each of us, is known to all of us. 

"Love is so short, forgetting is so long." Neruda wrote. Sandra's piece gave us a snapshot of life before and life during, but life after? There is no shot, no dance for the dancers, because there is no way to say, to show how we live though loss. We simply do. We don’t know why or how. We just do. We make the dance. We see it. We remember it. That is perhaps enough. 



That will have to be enough.

we are officially in love

Remember Leotard Longings? Well now we have something that blows that away on virtually every level: style, functionality, and price.

Introducing Live the Process 

a chic couture exercise wear site--its not just clothes its the "process" creativity, health, wellness, and looking fabulous on so many levels.

Love this one especially--the corset style leotard

corset leotard

 

 

 

cape

clutch

Ready to go!!

yours,

 ID and IE

College of Marin Dance Performance--ID cant wait!!

 The College of Marin Concerts are a great place to see the" nuts and bolts"  of what it takes to create a dance and to make a dancer. Its been a thrill to watch several of these young artists grow into skilled performers. Its also inspiring to watch "first timers" go through unique experience of rehearsing within the choreographing process, and finally performing.

My guess is that these individuals, whether or not they go on to become "professionals,"  will be an important part of the next generation of dance and theater viewers; makers; and shapers.

Fall 2013 Dance Concert

November 1, 2, 8 and 9, 8 PM
James Dunn Theatre, College of Marin, Kentfield Campus
(Corner of Sir Francis Drake Blvd. and Laurel Ave.)

Choreography: College of Marin Dance Faculty
Production design: e.”Ernie” Ernstro

Featuring Guest Performers:
11/1, 11/2
Branson Dance Performance Ensemble, directed by Georgia Ortega
11/8, 11/9
San Domenico Dance Ensemble, directed by Erica Smith
11/1, 11/2, 11/8, 11/9
Primus Ballet Theatre presents the world premiere of Allegory of the Cave choreographed by Cole Companion

Box Office 415.485.9385
$15 general; $10 students/seniors

Pilates Private

 Well ID finally had her first private Pilates at the Pad Studio in Bon Aire

ID decided she would use this private session on the reformer to get more information about her persistently wonky knee. What did she find?

Becca, my instructor, is also a part owner of the studio and we decided my goal should be rehabilitation for reintegration. She watched me execute every exercise specifically targeting knee imbalances with an eye to developing even strength and flexibility. She held my knee and we pinpointed exactly where the cricks cracked.

We closely monitored how my body responded to the strategic usage of the reformer's pulleys and wheels highlighting unevenness in my legs and torso that was readable even down to my feet.
It’s different than being at the bar and looking at how your knee turns in or in a physical therapist office and doing an exercise. It’s as if you are encased in an instrument inside a controlled environment and from there can monitor closely what will my IE/ID body will do.




I learned some important IE/ID patterns. For instance, I rarely ever let my left ball of my foot down completely. I am often sitting on the outside of my feet so I can move more quickly to the next position.

Part of reintegration is realizing I am where I am, and appreciating the differences that are a part of that now. There is no visiting class teacher/ hot shot choreographer to impress. There is my body, to use and to live with. That is the  place to work from now.


“There is a greater power in listening to the body rather than telling it what to do.”  

Ohad Naharin, October 2013, Dance Magazine

October's Timeless Dancer

Who you were and who you are


Autumn in northern California 

is a sort of now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t-event. My garden is in its last frenzy of blooming, with the pumpkin making a last few tiny green bulbs; lettuce and wildflower seedlings several inches tall, hopeful. But if you look closely, it’s not a lush green, but a far paler solemn, yet determined green, as if pacing itself for the last harvest. The hue betrays a simple but deep confidence. 

 

It’s a little like the dance class I took last night. Everyone, except the teacher, was over 40; many of us former professionals, all of us dedicated aficionados.

I had a vision, like these shadow dancers:

except there were no shadows.

We were doing rhonde jambe en l'air—

And I looked around the studio and my eyes fell on Bob—maybe sixty?—with his incredible dancer physique. It wasn’t his body I saw though, it was something else. It was Bob in another time.  He looked different, lighter, but still intense, perhaps a more composed, gentler version of himself from long ago.

We all have these timeless moments, but this one in the dance studio with its layers of mirrors, music, counts and the combination, was magic. There was a mist that covered us all so we could all be in that place, like Bob, in our own timeless bodies for a moment. 

Somehow we finished the barre, and went to the center for the final adagio. It was a little tricky, as I haven’t been to a ballet class in some time. 

But Bob in his not-to-be-forgotten-danseur-noble-persona stepped in; 

“You know, Susie, I can partner you in that turn." 

It was only a class, but I went home on air.

 ID