ACE dance and music are looking for dancers to take part in professional residencies building up to its next production, Mana. The next professional development opportunity is with José Agudo at the Link Dance Space, 7-11 May. To apply for a place, email Charlotte Gregory at info@acedanceandmusic.com with a CV, photo, and letter of interest. The deadline for applications is Friday 13 April.

I follow quite a few local dance blogs so I thought I’d share some of my favourites. If you don’t already, why not subscribe to some of these blogs to keep an eye on what’s going on in the world of dance.

If I haven’t included your blog, don’t worry. Add it in the comments on this post and I’ll make sure to subscribe. And if you haven’t got a dance blog, why not start one?

ACE Dance and Music

ACE Dance and Music are regular bloggers. They often post lots of interesting chats with their dancers, photos from recent events and news from across the industry.

Blue Eyed Soul

Similarly, Blue Eyed Soul share lots of good content and are particularly good at previewing their upcoming events as well as sharing photos of their past events. This week their work experience placement took the reins to give a different view of working at a dance company.

Dancing for the Games

This blog provides all you need to know about the Dancing for the Games projects which are part of the Cultural Olympiad in the West Midlands. A lot of local dance companies are involved and there’s activity from now all the way through to the Games themselves. The blog provides interviews, news, photos, and listings.

Dancescape

Dancescape covers dance news across Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire and is a great resource for dance development, events, jobs, and opportunities in the region.

Birmingham Royal Ballet On Tour

Birmingham Royal Ballet have a couple of blogs, but the On Tour blog is particularly interesting as it goes in-depth into how a dance company tours and gives a voice to the dancers, crew, and  senior staff. The blog has covered the recent tour of Japan and is now looking at the company on tour closer to home.

As I mentioned earlier, add your dance blog to the comments on this post. You can also check out our blogroll with is the list of links in the right hand column of this blog. Get subscribing!

More Dancescape news:

The West Midlands Centre for Advanced Training (CAT) is based at DanceXchange, Birmingham. The CAT course is part of the national Music and Dance Scheme, and is designed for young people between 11 and 16 who have passion, creativity, commitment, talent or potential in Dance, but need support to pursue their desire and ambition. DanceXchange, in partnership with sampad South Asian Arts, run the CAT course and offer high quality training in Contemporary dance, and the South Asian dance styles of Kathak and Bharatanatyam.

As part of the Outreach Programme, the West Midlands CAT is offering free dance workshops to specialist schools, youth groups and dance schools in the West Midlands region. This will involve a half-day taster workshop in the three dance styles (Contemporary, Kathak & Bharatanatyam) that the West Midlands CAT offers. These workshops are fully funded by the DCSF and are offered on a first come, first served basis. The workshop will look to boost awareness and understanding of the CAT course, and encourage gifted and talented students to audition for the 2010 programme.

To book a free dance workshop, please contact Anita Srivastava, Project Manager (Outreach): anita@newdimensions-arts.com To find out more about the Centre for Advanced Training, visit http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/mds/

Company Decalage are offering workshops in contemporary technique, breakdance and body popping. Delivered by the company artistic director Mickael Riviere who teaches breakdance at DanceXchange, The Drum, The Custard Factory and Aston University in Birmingham, and worked with first year students Warwick University, the workshops can be tailored to individual needs to create a performance.

The company’s breakdance classes have an excellent reputation and are an especially welcoming environment for young males and individuals from a range of social and cultural backgrounds: those who would perhaps not be directed towards dance by other social or cultural influences. An example of this is his employment with Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Education Outreach Department (Leaps and Bounds) which started in January 2006. This encompassed working with and choreographing on disadvantaged young people with a goal of including these individuals in a professional performance of Romeo and Juliet.

The company was established in 2003 by Riviere and has performed at national and international venues and festivals. He has received funding from DanceXchange and Arts Council England to create company works Decalage and See which toured as a double bill. The company have been continuing to build their name through collaborations with artists such as Jonzi D, and were supported by The Place to create Appel as part of Choreodrome and BreakinPoint. In 2010 Company Decalage will perform at British Dance Edition, Birmingham.

Workshops will need between seven and 30 young people, a large heated flat‐floored hall, theatre or sports centre (a wooden, sprung floor is preferable) and a CD player, as well as a teacher or member of staff to be present at all times.

Fees: Workshops of 2hrs/half-day – £175, full day – £350, two full days – £650 (travel from Birmingham additional fee).

To book education work with Company Decalage, please contact Hannah Sharpe on 0121 689 1090 or email Hannah.sharpe@dancexchange.org.uk

A dancer from Sonia Sabri Dance Company at Brindley Place. Photo: Tim Ellis

We’ve caught wind of an opportunity for students to be part of a choreographic research and development project with Sonia Sabri in January 2010, working title KathakBox.

Sonia Sabri is currently exploring the innate parallels between movement, rhythm and spoken word between the age old art of Kathak and the modern culture of Hip Hop. Sonia is opening up the second phase of the project out to young people by offering workshops to schools and universities, providing the chance to gain insight and learn the techniques of a collaboration between different disciplines from a world-class dance company.

The first phase of this research took place as part of Choreodrome at The Place, London, in August. Sonia was selected out of 300 choreographers to look into the dialogue between the two cultures, with choreographer Richard Alston mentoring the two week process. Sonia worked with two dancers from contemporary, flamenco, African, kathak and hip hop disciplines, a spoken word artist, and an Indian percussionist and poet, and presented the findings of the research using three showcase platforms.

Currently in the second phase of a research project, which involves is further exploration and development of the initial ideas, Sonia is focusing on choreographic possibilities using dancers and other collaborating artists. The aim is to broaden and challenge the perceptions of old and modern artforms and to investigate what happens when they are taken out of their usual contexts – seeing what emerges.

These workshops are suitable for students of dance, music, drama, physical theatre, and any other curious types. The workshops are delivered by dancers from the company and can be anything from a half-day to a week-long residency at your venue depending on your funding. At least one (or only one) workshop must take place in January 2010.

If participants enjoy performing, there is an opportunity for those who wish to develop a segment of work from the workshop(s) to present it at The Drum Arts Centre in Birmingham on Friday 29 January 2010 alongside the professional artists.

The fee is £150 per artist for half-day or £250 per artist for a full day inclusive of travel. If you would like more artists or would like more than one workshop, the fee is negotiable.

For more information contact: Sonia Sabri, Artistic Director
Sonia Sabri Company, The Dance Workshop, 132 Alcester Road, Birmingham B13 8EE UK, sonia@ssco.org.uk, 0121 442 6742, www.ssco.org.uk

Dance Active is a four-day programme which allows dance and health professionals to come together and discuss ways of delivering specific health results through dance. Here’s more:

Dance Active is a four day training course delivered by PAN West Midlands on behalf of The Department of Health and DanceXchange in partnership with Youth Dance England. The course is aimed at providing professional dance artists and commissioning health professionals with the knowledge and skills to effectively work together to deliver specific health outcomes through the use of dance.

The course will cover national and regional strategic health priorities, consider best practice through the use of case studies and develop a clear understanding of the commissioning process from both dance artist and health professional perspectives. The programme will also include a practical day where dance artists will consolidate their knowledge and develop creative tools and dance workshop plans that are appropriate to creatively delivering specific health outcomes. Dance artists will also be given support in developing their CVs to include a targeted portfolio for dance and health work.

The course takes place on 5/12/19/26 March 2010 at Birmingham Hippodrome and cost of training, including refreshments and lunch, is £30.

Application forms are available to download on the DanceXchange website (http://www.dancexchange.org.uk/default.asp?Id=380&sC=page55) For more information contact Toby Norman-Wright, Youth Dance Strategy Manager, West Midlands at DanceXchange on 0121 689 3167 or email toby.norman-wright@dancexchange.org.uk.

YDE Stride! is an annual dance programme for 14-19 year olds (up to 24 years for disabled applicants) which offers the chance to obtain a range of non-performance based skills such as leading and managing dance projects and activities.

The programme is run by Youth Dance England and is looking for applicants for next year’s Stride! It’s a great way to kick start a career in dance leadership and learn more about what’s out there. Here’s what they said:

Youth Dance England is offering this fantastic opportunity with its national mentoring and residential programme YDE Stride!

YDE Stride! is back on a national scale and we are now looking for young people with an entrepreneurial spirit and creative problem-solving skills to apply for this programme.

Successful applicants will be provided with a mentor and will participate in an action-packed residential with one of the YDE Stride! hosts (Dance4, Dance South West or East London Dance with Sadler’s Wells) followed by a placement to help develop skills and experience essential to building a career in dance.

You can download an application from the Youth Dance England website from 2 December 2009 and the deadline for applications for the programme will be 15 January 2010.

Photo: Ferdinand Thomas

Young dancers who are nurtured to become promising talent are let down by lack of provision to help them find work in the region, a leading agency has said.

Jenni Sutherland, director of Riven Productions, a commercial dance agency which helps dancers from London and the West Midlands find work, said the region needs to do more to showcase the dance talent available to clients, which would in turn bring more work back to the area.

Sutherland set up the agency in 1998 to help organise work for dancers in night clubs and music videos. Now the dancers on her books do more fashion and corporate events, alongside teaching and running classes.

Frustrated by the lack of support from local authorities, Sutherland feels more could be done to make sure young dancers are not left feeling like they cannot make their passion a profession. She said:

“People do their dance classes and dance GCSEs and then their Mums and Dads tell them they should study to get a proper job. What we’re saying is, yes study, but if you love dancing there is work there you just need to know where and how to find it.

“In London it’s known where you go to get work, but there’s no such system here in Birmingham – it’s all just word of mouth and you need the contacts. It’s the young ones who don’t know where to go.”

Compared to the capital there are few purely commercial dance agencies in the region. Which means those who want to pursue a career often move to London, or give up their aspirations altogether. Sutherland believes a group effort is needed among companies to make sure local dance stays in the Birmingham area.

“If we all pull together to say to the next generation ‘Stay here’ and at the same time we try to pull more clients into the region, then things will get better,” she said. “It is a constant battle to show dancers why to stay and attract the clientelle as well.”

Her Birmingham-based company helps between 20-30 dancers from the West Midlands, and she takes on dancers based on auditions, showreels and CVs. But Sutherland says many of those in the area are migrating to London because that’s where they think the work is – she is keen to point out that in this competative atmosphere they are less likely to get work, and often have to take up a part time jobs just to survive. She said:

“Birmingham is the second city, but everyone is moving out of it.

“There are more opportunities in London and more agencies there, so it attracts more dancers. But in my eyes they should stay away from there because there will be more dancers fighting for the same jobs.

“We need to let dancers know that they do not necessarily need to go to London to get assistance.”

But Julie Kavanagh, founder and creative director of JK Dance Productions, says dancers need to go to London to get the experience of what working in the industry is actually like. She said:

“When you’re cocooned in the region, you don’t realise the calibre and the pace you’re working at is so much slower than those in London. I find the regional dancers take a lot longer to pick up routines for television and camera – which means they fall flat on their face at big auditions.”

Kavanagh believes training facilities in the Birmingham area are not suited to commercial dance – with more of a focus on hip hop and theatre styles instead of producing all-rounders who can quickly learn any choreography. She said West Midlands-based dancers in the agency had moved to London because the bigger jobs are there, but they are always eager to work back home when they can. Kavanagh thinks if the dance schools in the region were training the right thing, dancers could make a lot more money.

“The experience of working in the commercial industry isn’t being offered in Birmingham,” she said. “But if you know what you are doing you can make thousands of pounds from commercial dance.”

Both Kavanagh and Sutherland cite the NEC as a lucrative venue for commercial work. But Sutherland says if dancers move away from the regions, there is less incentive for clients to seek out dancers from the area. As a former professional dancer, Sutherland also says dancers need help finding teaching work to sustain them inbetween jobs.

“There are two types of dancer: the ones who want to be famous and on TV who think it is easy,” she said. “And the ones who love dancing and will do anything for it. Dance has become a lot bigger because of reality TV and some people think it’s glitz and glamour. But those dancers won’t last long. There are plenty of strong and talented dancers in the area who just need someone to help them get on the ladder.”

Photo: Ferdinand Thomas

Birmingham has a wealth of dance activity and the tripartite dance house on Hurst Street – Birmingham Royal Ballet, Birmingham Hippodrome and DanceXchange – provides world class dance performances, classes and workshops. DanceXchange also has a professional development programme which allows dancers to contact them with questions and to find out information about how to be a successful freelance dance artist. The organisation will also deal with companies looking to employ dance artists – but has no particular focus on helping commercial dancers.

Josie Slaymaker, choreographer for Impact dance group – a company of commercial dancers – says it is easier now more than ever for her dancers to find out where the work is and when auditions are. She said:

“It used to be that you’d just wait to see when auditions were in the Stage newspaper. But now with the web dancers can look for auditions online”

Slaymaker said the two best websites to search for commercial dance work were EntsWeb and DancersPro, although these are both nationwide sites, and do not give easy access to region-based jobs and auditions. But Slaymaker said Impact dance group members often find work in pantomimes and cruise ships, and Julie Kavanagh said dancers should realise the amount and variety of commercial work on offer. She said:

“Dancers can make thousands of pounds for one days work doing commercial work, but they are not getting the right provision in the West Midlands and that is a shame.”

One Night Only by Foot in Hand. Photo: Tim Cross

A new set of dance workshops creating a space for disabled and non-disabled dancers to network and collaborate together in movement are being launched at DanceXchange.

Green Coffee workshops will run quarterly on four Sundays – with the first one being held on 29 November 2009. They will be facilitated by Louise Katerega – creative director of dance company Foot in Hand and founder of The Green Coffee Group – a practical thinktank which aims to provide a pool of expertise for those working in disabled dance. Miss Katerega said:

“There’s no training of how to teach disabled dance, and dance for disabled people. Those of us used to working in disabled dance do not need a lesson every week, but it’s great to meet other people working in the some area.”

With foundations in contemporary dance, a range of dance styles and disciplines are brough to sessions which vary each time. It is a place for dance professionals and experience disabled dancers to come together and break boundaries in what is already being done in dance technique, choreography and new creative work. The workshops are not planned, allowing dancers to bounce ideas off each other.

“It is an open dialogue between disabled and non-disabled dancers,” said Louise. “If you throw a group of interesting people into the same space, it just happens. You don’t need to plan it all out.”

Louise is a trained life coach but has rich experience working with dance professionals and experience disabled dancers – after running the workshops in East London which have been highly successful. One workshop, for example, looked at how to translate a Cunningham exercise for wheelchair users. She said creating The Green Coffee Group was partly a response to people saying they needed something where they could go in and experience and discuss together.

The workhops are all free and will take place between 1pm and 5pm on Sunday 29 November 2009, Sunday 7 February 2010, Sunday 16 May 2010, Sunday 12 September 2010. They are the only Green Coffe workshops taking in the UK after sessions in London finished earlier this year.

Project manager for access and inclusion at DanceXchange, Kate DeRight, said:

“DanceXchange is really pleased to be able to host this opportunity. It gves people interested in this kind of work a chance to further their own interests in developing their own practises and means if we have a great pool of talent in this area for the future.”

Often you need an invite to attend Green Coffee sessions, but on these workshops you can book a place by calling Louise on 07971 441 749. You can also find out more information by reading The Green Coffee Manifesto.

According to Foot in Hand’s manifesto, the workshops are called ‘Green Coffee’ because this the first stage of the coffee bean before it can be prepared for roasting – needed nurturing to reach its full potential. Foot in Hand also showcased some of the work from sessions in the Midlands area – heralding standing ovations on the one-night performance.

Dancing is arguably one of the best ways exercising and looking after your body’s health – just look at how many of the celebs on Strictly Come Dancing end up honed, toned and healthier at the end of the competition. And what’s more, it’s an enjoyable way to get fit too.

The government tells us at least 30 minutes a day of moderate physical exercise, on five days a week, is needed for adults to maintain a healthy lifestyle (60 minutes for children and young people). In 2006 the Department of Health outlined in a document called “Dance and Health: the benefits for all people” the health benefits of dance.

On Monday 9 November at The Patrick Centre, DanceXchange, a conference will take place for all dance practicioners to highlight how dance can be used to meet these health targets, and is open to anyone working in dance wanting to make better connections with the health sector and find out how dance has been used to highlight health issues.

The day has been set up by Youth Dance England, in conjunction with the Department of Health and the Arts Council, and runs from 9am to 4.30pm. A number of prolific speakers have been invited to add to the discussion, including Jan Burkhardt, Health Improvement Specialist Leeds PCT, Suzanne Gardner, Regional Physical Activity and Sport Coordinator, Toby Norman-Wright, Youth Dance Strategy Manager, West Midlands (in partnership with Youth Dance England) and Jade Moulden, National Delivery Manager, Exercise Movement and Dance Partnership.

There will also be a Ten Green Bottles performance from the Arcane Dance Company, as well as a number of workshops in the afternoon covering topics such as how to engage with adults and young people with learning difficulties, using dance to explore the issue of obesity and body image, and how to connect with older people through dance. The conference will also see the launch of the Dance Active initiative for dance artists.

To book a place on the conference – download the flyer below, fill in the form below and send to Erica.rogers@pan-wm.org.uk or post to:

Erica Rogers
PAN-WM Coordinator C/o Trident Care and Support
Fairlie House
Trident Close
Erdington
Birmingham
B23 5TB

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