"Flock"- Crafting Authentic Dance

I can't remember the last time I choreographed a contemporary ensemble work for the stage. In the fall of 2022, I was offered a commission to choreograph for a Bay Area-based company, but I turned it down due to personal reasons. Prior to that, my last full-length work (15 minutes) was in 2008 for Thodos Dance Chicago. I've choreographed several ensemble pieces since then, but they were all for competitions. That's actually why I stopped choreographing ensemble work.

Choreographing for competitions can be extremely lucrative. In the dance industry, there's always work for choreographers, especially for classical-based competitions. However, it comes with many strings attached. Firstly, the work needs to fit the mold of what a winning piece looks like. Most of the time, it’s a bunch of tricks, unison, lacking in layers, and dare I say, “a bit lame.” The purpose of these pieces is to win. There is no room for innovation or exploration, as the stakes are too high. By "stakes," I mean the financial investment in the work through tuition and fees that often go unrecognized. Studios have favorites, and specific dancers need to be cast front and center. Ideas are confined to safe ones, as the audience tends to have a fairly classical and conservative palette. Not my cup of tea. Why re-create something that’s already been done thousands of times? Most stick to the same rubric down to the counts, because why fix something that always places?

Another reason I no longer choreograph ensembles for competitions is that the art loses its integrity. It boils down to how extreme and entertaining a “routine” is. What if a routine is not extreme, does not entertain, but emotes? Leaves the audience questioning? Half the time, the judges’ palettes are not cultivated enough to subjectively adjudicate a piece of work that doesn’t fall under Kylian or Balanchine. Side note: professionals should never stop attending performances, museums, and other art-related shows just because they retired from the stage. My biggest pet peeve. How can one be trusted with adjudicating competitions without inclusive experience in the arts? But it doesn't matter, as like everything else, results are rigged.

Choreography is not about winning awards, though receiving proper recognition for quality and worthy works is encouraged. How “good” a choreographer is, is not dependent on how many kids they have at competition finals. That only reflects that they are a good choreographer for that specific industry and niche. Sometimes their affiliation with an organization "earns" them trust as a choreographer, without work that proves their skills. There is some beautiful work and ideas out there that celebrate the beauty and resilience of the art form, but these self-proclaimed “choreographers” often lack substance, transitions, and movement quality in their work, and the movement tends to be underdeveloped for the dancer and/or the stage. I've seen some choreographers restage work they choreographed a decade ago, plagiarize an entire section of choreography, or steal concept and costume ideas. But that's for another day.

I'm probably the worst choreographer for competitions, as I place higher importance on bringing out a dancer's potential through the piece than sticking to the rules and "what wins." These unspoken "winning" guidelines are a suggestion, not the law.

Every single piece of choreography is extremely precious and sacred to me. It comes from a place of experience, lineage, and respect for the art form. Drawing from stories, events that impact the present, down to things that matter, is what makes choreography so special to me. I limit the number of works I produce each year to ensure that each piece of choreography is autonomous. Therefore, I can say that my work belongs in very specific programs for an audience interested in dance as an art form rather than entertainment.

I visited San Diego in June and spent some time at Ocean Beach. I initially went because I was told there are a lot of dogs on the beach. However, I ended up staying for the waves and the birds. I was fascinated by how low the birds flew that afternoon and how seamlessly they transitioned formations depending on the direction they were traveling. Then you have the stray birds trailing or some that chose to fly alone. The whole scene at the beach is nature’s choreography. Nothing pretentious, simply existing.

One day, I was at the studio drafting solo choreography for the season and came across a piece of music that started off with birds. “Confirmation!” I thought. I quickly drafted the work, drawing from Ocean Beach, and within ten minutes had three sections, adjectives, and ideas of what other tracks I could use. I collect music and have a choreography notebook with me at all times. I’m old school. I write down ideas to explore when the opportunity arises.

The studio’s summer intensive was happening in a few weeks, and I thought it would be a good idea to brainstorm and create this draft on students, as the piece requires many dancers. I also wanted a challenge to try new things, because I get bored really easily without a plan (thanks, Gemini moon and Virgo rising sign). Not knowing what I signed up for, I was ready for the challenge.

“You never know how far you’ve come until you get there” is how I would describe the process of choreographing “Flock,” a 5-minute, 30-second work on 16 students (ranging from ages 10 to 15) in 9 hours over 4 weeks. All students are classically trained, with some having little to no contemporary training. Going through my roles as a dancer, choreographer, teacher, and rehearsal director, I observed how my gradual transition through these roles benefits me in a room working with dancers of varying technical backgrounds. These young dancers also surprised me at how fast they were able to pick up choreography that involves specific musicality and directional changes. But what really impressed me was their ability to move as one over the course of 4 weeks.

There are two rules I have in the studio under my leadership:

1. No drama.

2. There is no hierarchy in ensemble work. Everyone learns each other’s roles. There is no room for individualism. Teamwork makes the dream work.

The joke I kept repeating is, “Birds fly in a flock. Don’t be the one struggling in the back.” There was, in fact, one or two birds struggling in the back on Ocean Beach, which I deliberately kept in the work as an ode.

One of the ideas I was able to work with was the idea of positive and negative space with 16 dancers. Directions and level changes also yielded some interesting visuals. I LOVE when dancers make mistakes in the process, as I more than likely add it into the work. The next idea was to see what movement translates best onto completely different sets of bodies. Working with professionals is very different from pre-professionals and students. I learned sometimes the most complex movement might not be the most visually pleasing as an ensemble. Evoking an emotion watching from the front can be as simple as arm movements in an even canon with level changes. The last idea, which was more of an experiment, was to see how well the students respond to ambient sounds that start the work. No beats, just sounds. This proved to be the most challenging and time-consuming process, which was extremely valuable information to me. I ended up layering a heartbeat sound effect track over the ambient sound for a meter. Deviated from my original work, but the final version for the cast is just as effective.

The choreographic process had its moments of stress, but mainly for the work to visually align with what I had in mind rather than to please a panel of judges. I think it’s important for dancers in training to experience movement as an artistic expression and understand its potential beyond numbers and rankings. This is the beauty of working in the studio for a piece performed live. The craft is beyond technique. It is communication between bodies, with the music, in space. Connecting with the audience, with each other, through our bodies. Silicon Valley is not the kindest to arts and culture when it comes to its cultural value, but we do our best to do what we can.

As we wrap up my summer teaching tomorrow with the summer intensive show, where "Flock" will premiere, I look forward to expanding my choreographic opportunities beyond solos if they align with my artistic values. Very artiste of me, I know. A self-choreographed solo is looonnnnnggg overdue, but I have no plans at the moment with several projects to wrap up and launch. But I will keep everyone posted when it is in the works.

In the end, my ultimate goal is to create pieces that resonate on a deeper level. Each movement, each formation, and each pause is thoughtfully crafted to evoke an emotional response. I hope that people who watch my works will walk away feeling something profound, whether it’s joy, contemplation, or a newfound appreciation for the art of dance. My wish is for the audience to experience the beauty, complexity, and raw emotion that I pour into every choreography, and to leave the theater with a sense of connection and a spark of inspiration that stays with them.

S.

Photography by Pedro Martinez