ABOUT THE PROJECT
Cornfield Dance is working in partnership with arts organizations in Scranton PA to bring Cornfield’s work and company to this community, involving and including the community in the creation of a new choreography. Artistic Director Ellen Cornfield will work with local performers, developing material that will be integrated into the choreography executed by her company dancers. The completed piece will be presented April 11th on a shared performance with the Scranton Civic Ballet.
This new work Primer will be performed by Cornfield and two of her exceptional dancers accompanied by live music composed and performed by Andreas Brade. In this work Cornfield is investigating our inner world of emotions and memory, mapping the wild and wide-ranging nature of that world, using a movement language that combines pedestrian movements and ordinary gestures along with full-throttle dance phrases. She is developing a “Gestural Chorus” with actors, complete with vocals and facial expressions, and large and raw movement phrases with the dance students from Marywood University and the Scranton Civic Ballet School. Both categories of movement/theater along with the company's dancing will occur periodically throughout the piece. The final performance, in the handsome Scranton Cultural Center, will take place on the Center’s traditional proscenium stage as well as in the huge ballroom space directly behind it. With no solid wall between these two spaces, Cornfield will be able to use this unique theater configuration to layer material, creating levels of memory and presence, separating the spaces by a scrim and evocative lighting. Cornfield Dance will be “in residence” for the weekend, conducting classes and workshops for students of all ages, offering an open rehearsal on Saturday, with all the scheduled activities culminating in the final performance on Sunday afternoon.
BACKGROUND
Cornfield has been interested in the expressive range of the human face and the use of everyday and ordinary physical actions as part of her choreography for a long time, and seeks to juxtapose this language with her sophisticated dance vocabulary. Dancers with the technical ability required for her work are generally not trained in this level of expression, and she is eager to work with actors, drawing upon their skill in depicting emotional states with their voice and with their physical demeanor. She wants to combine their theatrical skills with basic movements they are accustomed to in their daily lives - pointing, dropping one’s head in exhaustion, giving an impish grin, sipping a cup of coffee, walking away in haste – all structured in a way that Cornfield can use to strengthen the thrust of her piece.
Her use of the local dancers will be to use unpolished pedestrian movement phrases, creating a middle ground between the actors’ movements and her company dancers’ movements.
BREATHING COORDINATION
Cornfield has studied “breathing coordination” for six years, a training that develops and strengthens the diaphragm (the main muscle-organ of the body), resulting in expanded respiratory function and freer vocalizations. This work focuses on releasing tension held in the body, and “exercising” the diaphragm through a series of out loud tonings. The less tension in the system the greater the resulting sound and overall condition of the body, as it is nourished by more oxygen traveling through the circulatory system. The underlying principle, that less effort and no forcing yields greater results, has been transformational for Cornfield’s work as a dancer, and in her way of approaching life. (For more information go to http://www.breathingcoordination.com/) This work, beneficial to everyone, is uniquely suited to performing artists, and will part of the workshops for both actors and dancers..
WORKSHOP FOR ACTORS
Actors' Requirements - ability to walk and move (not as a dancer!) and interest
Each session will begin with a warm-up appropriate for non-dancers – the breathing technique through vocalizations, easy movement stretching and centering, and pedestrian-movement phrases that focus on direction and functional intent. The second part of each session will be the creative “rehearsal” portion, and Cornfield will develop, with the actors’ input, simple pedestrian-movement phrases and gestures that will be shaped into what she is calling a “gestural chorus.” She will draw on the strengths of the individual performers, and does not expect or even want the actors to be like dancers! Rather she will work to access and heighten each individual’s own energy expressed through the created movements, sounds and gestures. There will be some spoken text. Cornfield has worked in many situations with performers of various levels of physical experience, and feels confident in her ability to develop an engaging and lively rapport with the actors, as well as a compelling and unique theatrical experience. This two-day workshop, followed by the April performance, should at heart be great fun!
Cornfield believes this project establishes a model for deeper community engagement in the world of dance, and the creation of deeper community through that engagement. As organizations and people continue to grapple with the financial and emotional demands of our current world, creative new models for pooling resources and engendering greater connection is more important than ever.
For more information, please contact Cornfield Dance: info@cornfielddance.org
SCHEDULE 2010
SCHEDULE 2010
Dance workshop @ Scranton Civic Ballet Studios - 234 Mifflin Avenue
February 20th & 21st / 1:45 - 5:45 PM
Actors' workshop @ Scranton Civic Ballet Studios
March 27th & 28th / 1:45 - 5:45 PM
Residency @ Scranton Cultural Center
April 10th - classes and workshops 1:00-5:30 PM
Rehearsal Schedule for ALL local participants @ Scranton Civic Ballet Studios
April 9th - 7-8 PM dancers, 8-9 PM actor
April 10th - 9-Noon @ Scranton Cultural Center
April 11th - 10-Noon @ Scranton Cultural Center
Performance @ the Scranton Cultural Center
April 11 @ 2 PM
Click here for Cornfield’s bio
“(Cornfield) has developed an ability in movement the way a good actress handles words: a taut whisper, a clear-firm tone, then a casual tossing away of a few words, a dwindling of energy--all within the continuum of the dance phrase.”
Deborah Jowitt, Village Voice