8/10/14 This was a pretty exciting week! On Thursday I met with Denita at MMA with four more 8-counts to add to the Mi Bongo choreography. First we rehearsed what we had put together last week, and we had both forgotten certain aspects, so I was glad I had taken a video. When we danced the first ten 8-counts to the music, we had to alter some things because of how fast the music was.
7/3/14 This week I got to make my own energy flow chart for the mambo piece I would be helping create! After listening to Mi Bongo, the mambo song we’d chosen, over and over several times, I made that horizontal line that represented the length of the song and divided the song into sections based on changes in rhythm, tempo, or instruments. There was a section where the instruments built up in intensity, seeming to
7/27/14 Earlier this week I met with Denita and she walked me through her process for creating choreography. After selecting the song, she creates an energy flow chart for the song to map out what she envisions the dance will look like based on the different sections of the song. For a salsa song for example, you could plan an intense footwork section at the climax of the song toward the end. This process requires
7/21/14 This Sunday Desueño had a little photo shoot at Links Hall, a seductively hidden arts and performance space complete with an old-fashioned wooden bar. I helped by taking videos of the dances against the backdrop of the wooden auditorium seats. It’ll be useful to have this footage on file to draw on for samples in the future. Denita also invited Allison, a freelance photographer, to take individual and group photos of Desueño. I asked
7/17/14 This blog will be about my experience practicing with Desueño for the summer of 2014, and learning from Denita Inez about her process creating choreography and managing a career in dance. She’s described to me the different methods that artists have incorporated to make a career in dance work, such as specializing and developing expertise in a specific area and creating a reputation for this expertise. She told me about her own dance career