On a two-hour train ride from Paddington to Bristol Temple-Meads with no Internet connection, clearly the thing to do is update the old web-log. This train ride concludes my visit to London for half-term break, to do the standard tourist things with my dad. It has been a relaxing and reparative four days, especially since the London city air ironically seems to have done a great service to my growing cough over the last couple weeks. It is also nice to be see some family again, and not have to cook.
The week began with my journey to Canterbury to retake the Physics GRE. Somehow, I managed to make almost every conceivable mistake in getting there and back, I can only hope that this offsets any stupid mistakes on the exam itself. Three trains – Bristol to Paddington, King's Cross to Ashford International, Ashford to Canterbury West – with a tube ride in the middle and a taxi at the end got me to the hostel nearly an hour later than I meant to be there. I also tried to save 5 pounds or so by finding the hostel on foot, and failed, which introduced further delay. Fortunately, the staff were perfectly welcoming and helpful. I then managed to get lost trying to find the test center the next day, only to find it had been moved to another location, and arrived just in time to find out they had no record of me. It seems my confirmation from ETS that they would "take care of everything on [their] end" was false, and it wasn't until I had shown the less-than-pleasant administrator there my email correspondence with ETS that he would let me sit the test.
Oh, also, I didn't have a chance to get #2 pencils before leaving Bristol, so I had to use souvenir pencils from the Ashford station with union jacks on them. Classy.
After finally completing the exam, I was promptly lost in the beautiful, historic city of Canterbury, in the rain, with no umbrella. A couple hours of wandering later, I found the train station and bought the wrong ticket to get to London, costing me a few extra pounds on board to actually make it. To top it off, I had forgotten the name of my dad's hotel and had to find a way to check my email to look it up again – I managed this only by using a display iPhone at a vodaphone store at Paddington. All was fine when, at last, I made it to my dad's hotel and found him.
Over the week, we visited Bristol (sadly, no one was around to introduce), the London Eye (to my acrophobic father's nervousness), the Churchill War Rooms, the British Museum's Shakespeare exhibit, Covent Garden, and a West End show. The highlight was certainly seeing Twelfth Night at the Apollo theatre, produced by the Globe theatre. We managed to pick up the tickets last-minute from a store across from the British Museum, for a pretty good price. When we got to our seats the actors were finalizing their makeup and costumes on stage, showing how male actors were dressing as the Countess, Viola, etc., as musicians onstage played traditional Victorian instruments – in what I understand to be the first time they'd been used in a show on Shaftsbury Ave in centuries. We were also more than pleasantly surprised to find that Stephen Fry, of whom my dad and I are big fans, was playing Malvolio. He did not disappoint in his cross-gartered yellow stockings.
Though I had hoped to find a physical theatre or contemporary circus show to take my dad, a couple of street performers at Covent Garden at least gave a sense of it. The street performance style, as one of the performers commented, is honest and pure. The routines themselves were incredibly simple, as far as tricks were concerned – one did an escape act from a bunch of chains, another did a slack rope walk while juggling knives – but each filled easily 15 - 20 minutes of time just building up to it. I hope to get a chance to read Bim's book on street performance. It's unfortunate that I won't be around in the spring, when there is a big street performance intensive, culminating in presentations in Bath. It is something I have a little amateur experience with, but there is a science to it – conjuring a crowd and keeping its attention, pushing volunteers' comfort limits, improvising with – that takes experience and practice to learn.
Now, as my train pulls into Temple Meads Station, I can close by saying that it has been an enjoyable break. I've gotten to see some of the sights and some of the performance England is famous for, and much of the countryside from train windows, and the Physics GRE is, at last, behind me. I look forward to resuming training without that worry anymore.
Wednesday, 14 November 2012
Monday, 5 November 2012
E&M Presentation: The Thieving Magpie
It was a long week leading up to this. The 34 of us each had to write a routine to the same song, and a challenging song to write to. This means that each class and practice consisted of nonstop repetitions of the Thieving Magpie, featured in this video. In addition, we each had to pick one non-juggling object to study and manipulate.
Some feedback suggests that I was 'taking the piss' out of the assignment. Perhaps I was, if unintentionally... Truth be told, considering I had two weeks with a brand new prop, I think it turned out pretty well.
The result is this – my blanket manipulation!
Tuesday, 30 October 2012
Monday, 29 October 2012
Presentations in Acrobalance and Trapeze!
At last, I've acquired and uploaded the videos from the Friday presentations. I've included the names of each trick in the descriptions, along with the assignment.
I hope my group mates don't mind my sharing this (if any of you do, please let me know and I'll remove your information from it). The assignment was simply to construct a routine using the tricks we'd been taught in tumbling and acro, with neutral character and no music. The neutral aspect was especially challenging, but
I am not an aerialist. Despite this fact, I think I managed to pull off a decent routine. A few nicely difficult tricks in there (handstand, forward roll, hanging beat into front balance, drop to angel). I did not manage a barrel roll or consistent toe hang, as I'd hoped, and though I managed to get a pop-off (dropping backwards to pike from sitting) there was nowhere to fit in the routine. My apologies for the lighting, this is how South Wing is set up. I also needed to use this particular trapeze so I'd have enough space on the ropes and above the floor.
As I mentioned on Facebook, there are some really talented students in the class. I was thoroughly impressed with many of my classmates, and with the clever transitions they managed to pull through some very difficult tricks. Wish I could show them all here...
I hope my group mates don't mind my sharing this (if any of you do, please let me know and I'll remove your information from it). The assignment was simply to construct a routine using the tricks we'd been taught in tumbling and acro, with neutral character and no music. The neutral aspect was especially challenging, but
I am not an aerialist. Despite this fact, I think I managed to pull off a decent routine. A few nicely difficult tricks in there (handstand, forward roll, hanging beat into front balance, drop to angel). I did not manage a barrel roll or consistent toe hang, as I'd hoped, and though I managed to get a pop-off (dropping backwards to pike from sitting) there was nowhere to fit in the routine. My apologies for the lighting, this is how South Wing is set up. I also needed to use this particular trapeze so I'd have enough space on the ropes and above the floor.
As I mentioned on Facebook, there are some really talented students in the class. I was thoroughly impressed with many of my classmates, and with the clever transitions they managed to pull through some very difficult tricks. Wish I could show them all here...
Saturday, 20 October 2012
Reflections on Weeks Two and Three
Things seem to be picking up and going smoothly as everyone settles into routines. Each week has been more or less structured as the first was in terms of classes, with classwork of varying difficulty, especially in areas of aerial and acrobatics. I went to see a show in Cardiff last Friday by the Australian company C!rca. I've already posted a short video of theirs sampling the show, but I owe a longer post on it. Otherwise, I've continued preparation for the Physics GRE, tried to keep a high protein diet, discovered the joys of tights and dumpster-diving for food, gotten to better know the fascinating people who chose circus school of all things, and posted about it all here.
Aerial
As much as I have enjoyed learning the trapeze, I know that I am not an aerialist at heart. It is like how I approach the unicycle – something I can do, and have enjoyed doing, but not something that inspires me the way manipulation, physics, physical theatre, or acrobatics can. I'll continue conditioning and practicing what aerial I've learned. At the very least it's excellent training in building strength, flexibility, and pain tolerance, and it pushes me well out of my comfort zones.
We've recently covered tricks such as drop-to-angel, gallopettes (forward and back), millwheels, hanging beats to front balance, and hock beats. All of these are what I call dynamic tricks: those that involve some sort of drop, slide, or balance, rather than simply forming a shape. These are especially challenging because I have to put myself briefly beyond muscle control, and trust form and grip to keep me safe. So far, no falls, but my forearms get sore from instinctively gripping too hard on these.
A fear of heights is really just a fear of the possibility of falling, as your mind considers all available options at any given moment and you realize that letting go is one of them. Your brain is aware that you have the option of falling, and though of course you'd never take it the fact it's there makes it more prominent than holding on. It's like trying not to think of elephants when someone tells you not to. You should focus on the narrow path but all you see is the cliff beside it. Then, of course, the dynamic tricks ask you to jump to a lower ledge, and you know you can make it there but you can't look away from the possible mistakes.
For next Friday, we each have to compose a brief presentation of aerial to music of our choice. I've decided to fit some of these dynamic patterns into my routine, as well as front balance (which I have yet to master, to much frustration and lower-ab bruising), to force myself to train harder and conquer this fear. As I try with juggling routines – write it, then learn to do it.
Acrobatics
My handstands have been getting much more solid. I even managed to tuck-up into handstand the other day without assistance. Not bragging or anything...
We've gotten into some harder tumbling, and a couple harder positions. Shoulder stand on feet, which is pretty much an inverted two-high, is a fun one, if harder to get into and balance. We've been working toward headsprings in tumbling, which is to the headstand what the handspring is to the handstand. Cartwheel on knees, despite kicking a friend in the face while doing it, has gotten better. I'm certain I'm going to try to specialize in acro.
I'll say more about last Friday's group presentations when I have the video from it available. Long story short – my group wore tights and A-shirts and was well-received. We played it safe with patterns, sticking to the simple ones we had solid, but the end result was a clean, 'dropless,' routine.
Physical Theatre
[I've combined the performance, play in performance, creative movement, and movement tech courses into this category for now.]
For creative movement, we've continued with choreographic work and have started to include concepts of stillness and repetition to movements. We wrote pieces by assigning random numbers to body parts and points in space, then using our phone numbers to define a sequence of "part-direction." These we then tweaked in pairs, adapted by finding moments of stillness and repetition, and went to town. Always fun to explore new ways to move.
In movement tech, we've finally gotten into some miming – specifically, Lecoq mime techniques. There's a 9-step sequence we've learned, the purpose of which has yet to be revealed, and we've also learned some basic mime skills – pushing/pulling, fixed points, climbing a short wall, invisible walls, suitcases, etc. The use of impact and impulse, opposing ways of distributing effort, creates much of the illusion. Last Friday, we worked with our eyes a bit too and I learned to do this.
We had our first introduction to mime on Friday of last week (the 12th), and then immediately had to put together presentations using it for our Friday devising/presentation session. The task was to create a "mystery house," which in many cases was a haunted house but sometimes got more abstract. My group's wound up, accidentally, being pretty close to the Doctor Who episode "Blink," complete with weeping angels and a creepy house.
In Performance, over the last week we've begun working with neutral masks. They look pretty close to the ones here. True to the Jacques Lecoq method (apparently, our instructor Bim Mason studied at the Lecoq institute), the purpose of the neutral mask is, not nightmare fuel, but to drop all facial expression and move all focus to the body language. For the first exercise, groups of four classmates would put the masks on while facing away, then turn around and stand to face the class. As we discussed their body languages, something incredible happened – I no longer felt as though my classmates were in the room. Something foreign stood across the room from us, watching, listening, as we discussed them like sculptures or lab mice.
Creepy? Yes, but incredible!
Equilibristics and Manipulation
New props have been introduced, as well as more specific types of manipulation! Classes are starting to look like a cross between the first few weeks of Strong Jugglers practice (i.e., introducing all available props) and festival workshops (i.e., teaching a specific skill to a big group). This offers something for everyone – beginners get to play with more, while more experienced jugglers broaden their skill range and learn more intricate manipulation ideas. We've gotten into various body throws and rolls, as well as club rolling/balancing and 3-club manipulation.
Other props that have been introduced include cigar boxes, hats, poles (balancing), diabolo, bounce juggling, and ball spinning. I've actually picked up a bit of cigar boxes, something I've never really tried before. Bounce is frustrating, of course, because it depends so much on the surface and any error will send you sprinting across the room. I've gotten some advice on working toward a chin balance while juggling, and with longer poles I've managed to get close to a seal position.
The instructors – Seb and Rod – have distinct juggling styles that show a great range to the students. Each instructor's approach has its advantages.. Seb does a lot with clubs, from what I've heard and seen, in a modern artistic style. Seb has run classes on body throws, and getting creative with a simple 423-esque pattern [actually, (2x,2)2(2,2x)2, essentially 423 but without throwing the 4] by mixing up where throws go – behind the back, neck, under the leg, etc. He also ran a neat class on club rolling and balancing, and how to mix collects and multiplexes into a three-club routine.
Rod is best known for his more classical, comedic ping pong juggling act, and he holds the world record for ping pong balls juggled in mouth (10). So far, his classes have been practical introductions to the different props with advice on tricks to develop. This has been useful for me for those areas that are new to me, like ball spinning, head bouncing, or cigar boxes. I've also gotten good practice advice from him.
Though I wouldn't call this the best school for E&M, it is certainly good for jugglers looking to expand their repertoire, add some performance quality, and develop their own unique style.
Rumor is that our first presentations will involve picking a random everyday object to manipulate. Perhaps it's time to revive my underpants plate-spinning idea from pre-high school days...
Aerial
As much as I have enjoyed learning the trapeze, I know that I am not an aerialist at heart. It is like how I approach the unicycle – something I can do, and have enjoyed doing, but not something that inspires me the way manipulation, physics, physical theatre, or acrobatics can. I'll continue conditioning and practicing what aerial I've learned. At the very least it's excellent training in building strength, flexibility, and pain tolerance, and it pushes me well out of my comfort zones.
We've recently covered tricks such as drop-to-angel, gallopettes (forward and back), millwheels, hanging beats to front balance, and hock beats. All of these are what I call dynamic tricks: those that involve some sort of drop, slide, or balance, rather than simply forming a shape. These are especially challenging because I have to put myself briefly beyond muscle control, and trust form and grip to keep me safe. So far, no falls, but my forearms get sore from instinctively gripping too hard on these.
A fear of heights is really just a fear of the possibility of falling, as your mind considers all available options at any given moment and you realize that letting go is one of them. Your brain is aware that you have the option of falling, and though of course you'd never take it the fact it's there makes it more prominent than holding on. It's like trying not to think of elephants when someone tells you not to. You should focus on the narrow path but all you see is the cliff beside it. Then, of course, the dynamic tricks ask you to jump to a lower ledge, and you know you can make it there but you can't look away from the possible mistakes.
For next Friday, we each have to compose a brief presentation of aerial to music of our choice. I've decided to fit some of these dynamic patterns into my routine, as well as front balance (which I have yet to master, to much frustration and lower-ab bruising), to force myself to train harder and conquer this fear. As I try with juggling routines – write it, then learn to do it.
Acrobatics
My handstands have been getting much more solid. I even managed to tuck-up into handstand the other day without assistance. Not bragging or anything...
We've gotten into some harder tumbling, and a couple harder positions. Shoulder stand on feet, which is pretty much an inverted two-high, is a fun one, if harder to get into and balance. We've been working toward headsprings in tumbling, which is to the headstand what the handspring is to the handstand. Cartwheel on knees, despite kicking a friend in the face while doing it, has gotten better. I'm certain I'm going to try to specialize in acro.
I'll say more about last Friday's group presentations when I have the video from it available. Long story short – my group wore tights and A-shirts and was well-received. We played it safe with patterns, sticking to the simple ones we had solid, but the end result was a clean, 'dropless,' routine.
Physical Theatre
[I've combined the performance, play in performance, creative movement, and movement tech courses into this category for now.]
For creative movement, we've continued with choreographic work and have started to include concepts of stillness and repetition to movements. We wrote pieces by assigning random numbers to body parts and points in space, then using our phone numbers to define a sequence of "part-direction." These we then tweaked in pairs, adapted by finding moments of stillness and repetition, and went to town. Always fun to explore new ways to move.
In movement tech, we've finally gotten into some miming – specifically, Lecoq mime techniques. There's a 9-step sequence we've learned, the purpose of which has yet to be revealed, and we've also learned some basic mime skills – pushing/pulling, fixed points, climbing a short wall, invisible walls, suitcases, etc. The use of impact and impulse, opposing ways of distributing effort, creates much of the illusion. Last Friday, we worked with our eyes a bit too and I learned to do this.
We had our first introduction to mime on Friday of last week (the 12th), and then immediately had to put together presentations using it for our Friday devising/presentation session. The task was to create a "mystery house," which in many cases was a haunted house but sometimes got more abstract. My group's wound up, accidentally, being pretty close to the Doctor Who episode "Blink," complete with weeping angels and a creepy house.
In Performance, over the last week we've begun working with neutral masks. They look pretty close to the ones here. True to the Jacques Lecoq method (apparently, our instructor Bim Mason studied at the Lecoq institute), the purpose of the neutral mask is, not nightmare fuel, but to drop all facial expression and move all focus to the body language. For the first exercise, groups of four classmates would put the masks on while facing away, then turn around and stand to face the class. As we discussed their body languages, something incredible happened – I no longer felt as though my classmates were in the room. Something foreign stood across the room from us, watching, listening, as we discussed them like sculptures or lab mice.
Creepy? Yes, but incredible!
Equilibristics and Manipulation
New props have been introduced, as well as more specific types of manipulation! Classes are starting to look like a cross between the first few weeks of Strong Jugglers practice (i.e., introducing all available props) and festival workshops (i.e., teaching a specific skill to a big group). This offers something for everyone – beginners get to play with more, while more experienced jugglers broaden their skill range and learn more intricate manipulation ideas. We've gotten into various body throws and rolls, as well as club rolling/balancing and 3-club manipulation.
Other props that have been introduced include cigar boxes, hats, poles (balancing), diabolo, bounce juggling, and ball spinning. I've actually picked up a bit of cigar boxes, something I've never really tried before. Bounce is frustrating, of course, because it depends so much on the surface and any error will send you sprinting across the room. I've gotten some advice on working toward a chin balance while juggling, and with longer poles I've managed to get close to a seal position.
The instructors – Seb and Rod – have distinct juggling styles that show a great range to the students. Each instructor's approach has its advantages.. Seb does a lot with clubs, from what I've heard and seen, in a modern artistic style. Seb has run classes on body throws, and getting creative with a simple 423-esque pattern [actually, (2x,2)2(2,2x)2, essentially 423 but without throwing the 4] by mixing up where throws go – behind the back, neck, under the leg, etc. He also ran a neat class on club rolling and balancing, and how to mix collects and multiplexes into a three-club routine.
Rod is best known for his more classical, comedic ping pong juggling act, and he holds the world record for ping pong balls juggled in mouth (10). So far, his classes have been practical introductions to the different props with advice on tricks to develop. This has been useful for me for those areas that are new to me, like ball spinning, head bouncing, or cigar boxes. I've also gotten good practice advice from him.
Though I wouldn't call this the best school for E&M, it is certainly good for jugglers looking to expand their repertoire, add some performance quality, and develop their own unique style.
Rumor is that our first presentations will involve picking a random everyday object to manipulate. Perhaps it's time to revive my underpants plate-spinning idea from pre-high school days...
Friday, 19 October 2012
C!rca presents – Wunderkammer
I went to see this in Cardiff last Friday and was completely blown away! I'll say more about it later, but for now, check out this video sample of the show:
Wunderkammer (5 minute version) from Circa on Vimeo.
Wunderkammer (5 minute version) from Circa on Vimeo.
Wednesday, 17 October 2012
Performance class – Choral Work
[I put this on Facebook originally, but decided it was better off here. I may have already mentioned the choral work, but I think this sums it up better]
Possibly the strangest theatre game I've ever played. Called "choral work," we stand in clumps and all try to follow each other. Nobody leads. If someone coughs, it's amplified into a mass coughing fit. Someone laughs, and everyone bursts into hysterics. A scratch turns into everyone fiercely itching, then scratching each other, then tickling each other.
I've been part of groups that start m
Possibly the strangest theatre game I've ever played. Called "choral work," we stand in clumps and all try to follow each other. Nobody leads. If someone coughs, it's amplified into a mass coughing fit. Someone laughs, and everyone bursts into hysterics. A scratch turns into everyone fiercely itching, then scratching each other, then tickling each other.
I've been part of groups that start m
arching, bowing and chanting, turn to mosh pits, crawling and rolling. Today, my group howled like wolves and hooted like owls.
Now, take that, and add concepts of space: 'near' (not touching), 'skin' distance (touching), and 'bone' distance (a kind of boiling motion of everyone stacking on top of each other and falling to support others). Within the group, everyone tumbles over and around each other, losing sense of self into a mob of motion and contact.
Now, take that, and add concepts of space: 'near' (not touching), 'skin' distance (touching), and 'bone' distance (a kind of boiling motion of everyone stacking on top of each other and falling to support others). Within the group, everyone tumbles over and around each other, losing sense of self into a mob of motion and contact.
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