Wind In My Head: Footloose
Wind In My Head
Saturday, April 15, 2006
Footloose
It threatened to pour all of yesterday. It didn't really. Just drizzled quite a bit and got the stage all soggy. All the better to dance on, my sadistic dance partner says. Right. He's not the one that has to be all snuggly with the ground one minute and act all anguished the next on the soggy carpeted stage.Despite the heavily strapped shoulder, it went pretty well. I've done better at rehearsals, but that's always the case. New environment, ugly green spots that make us look like we're about to get beamed back onto the mothership, no clear markings as to where the stage ends and the ground begins, hence sending me flying into the crowd, costumes that get caught and hinder movement. Murphy's Law was out in full force last night. But still, it was a pretty good show. Also considering that I spent half the day in comatosed, pain induced stupor, only momentarily waking up for my students to present me a costume they made for me. It's so great, it warrants another post, the moment I take a photo of it.
Packrat said I didn't manage to look as come hither as I should have. He said I just looked classical, aloof, the picture perfect ice princess ballerina in red. I didn't know "classical" was a look, but apparently it was and it was written all over my face. Darn! I was going for the more "Indian divaesque, I've got a secret and you don't know it "look. But according to Packrat, that's the classical look. So I have to find a way to better describe what look I was going for.
It's also got me thinking about whether I should start dancing again. It was fun. Exhaustingly, excruciatingly painful, but fun, to be one with music again. To work on steps, to fine tune steps. To fine tune the turn of the fingers and the tilt of the head. Things I've forgotten. Plus that forgotten love affair with the mirror that can so quickly turn into ugly with the wrong leotard or angle.
I don't know. I'll think about it. I stopped dancing years ago because I thought there was no more I could learn. And this, I don't mean it in a "I know everything, no one can teach me anything new" sort of way. More the, "you can't teach old dogs new tricks and I should be pretty darn grateful that I managed to learn how to sit, stay, beg and roll over". I also didn't want to fall out of love with it. But if I've realised anything in the last six weeks, it's that it's in my blood now, no matter how much I want to tell myself it's me from another life. On the surface, it truly is something from another life. I had great difficulty trying to find my ballet tights to put on under the costume. Then, I figured out why, I've thrown them all away. Those ratty tights that I spent half my life in. All tossed out. But it wasn't a jilted love affair. It was something I felt had to be done, that it was better for the two of us go our separate ways. These things have a strange way of coming back together under the strangest of circumstances.
So some pictures here to record the moment for posterity. And those are the spins that busted my shoulder in so many places and made Counterpain Cool my new best friend.
But it wasn't just about me trying to be an Indian Diva, there was much fun to be had. And some remarkably creative costumes and acts.
Smile on the front, frown on the back. How every JC kid feels. Or rather, the other way around. Or... ai, who knows kids these days? Whatever it is, cool costume. Cheap, creative and all you need is to break into the store cupboard or break into the janitor's closet.
My personal favourite is the fire show. This kid is amazing. During a rehearsal, he singed his jeans but also caused the hearts of an entire bunch of girls to flutter and go a thumping. I think I even heard a collective sigh when he finished, bowed, smiled and waved. It must have been the smell of solid fuel in the air that intoxicated everyone.
And someone needs to tell KW that Carmen wants her hat back and she is not happy.
I'm uncertain that I'll be around for the next one and I was so jetlagged for the last one, I left early. But at least I've got a hundred photos from this one to show that I was there this time. You rehearse for 6 weeks and in 4 minutes it's all gone and it's all quiet now, almost as if it never happened. That's what they call show biz, I guess.
Technorati Tags: Dancing, Carmen Miranda, Arts Festivals
Ondine tossed this thought in at 00:18