Big Apple Update

Exciting news today! I heard back from theThomas Telford Trust (a funding body that offers help to students). I applied last week to see if they were able to help us out with the costs of our New York Trip. We are lucky enough to receive £1,000!! I am sooo pleased with this as I really wasn't expecting to receive any help from the college. This money will go towards the cost of dance classes, workshops, shows and any other dance related opportunities we come across. The New York dance scene has so many new dance techniques for us to experience and there are many that I am interested in trying, most of which I have never seen over here in Scotland.

Gaga Movement Technique

It was developed over 20 years ago by choreographer/dancer Ohad Naharin. He suffered from a back injury that restricted his movemet, this lead him to create Gaga technique as he aimed to used other individual body parts to move. Gaga is based on the use of imagery to encourage the dancer to explore isolated body sensations. It needs a lot of focus and really opens up your mind and imagination. "As a dancer, it’s easy to get caught up in wanting to be technically perfect and always in control of your body..you can’t take it so seriously. Connect the effort to the pleasure, the joy and the passion of dancing” (Holmes, 2007).

The class sounds a lot of fun, maybe it can teach me to let go and just enjoy my passion for dance, instead of worrying about the steps. Have a wee look at the video below and see what you think. Will keep you posted of any other classes I find... 3 weeks and counting!