Duets

We spent some time working on duets in rehearsal.  I’ve wanted to take the piece more in that direction and it developed that way finally in rehearsal on Saturday.   It wasn’t really what I planned for that day but when it happened I went with it and had everyone work on that.  We had other duets but we used the travel material to develop these and so they have more physical momentum which I really liked.

I ask one dancer to do pedestrian movement and move or manipulate or push the other dancer around as they tried to do the travel phrase.  I asked them to use eye contact with one another as much as possible.

My instructions were kind of vague but sometimes when you give people space they give you something wonderful.   Those are my favorite moments.  I try not to over-direct.  There is a book I love about letting people have their own process called the Tao of Leadership.  I think it was intended for corporate people but it works in any group setting.  It emphasizes only stepping in when things go wrong and that feels like a good leadership style for me most of the time.

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