148 views on our youtube slide show so far!! SculptMotion dance watched it together yesterday....
Fan mail for George,
"it is a beautiful video!
There are wonderful spacial qualities in image composition affirmed by George’s fluid, organic sounds and all extremely sensitively rendered. Warmth, fragility, joy…a real essence of Shallal, well done! "
Jamie Mills
Last night Jamie, George and Oli met for pre Back Lane West chat, and yesterday we had a full production style meeting with new member to the team John Keys, on art /production, we will need his skills and overview as we miss lovely Rory - who will still drop in when he can, but is not in Cornwall enough to be fully with us.
George is also a new member on our team, not to Shallal, but to production, background work and we look forward to it.
Shallal is easier to work with if you know it already!
So next week we take the teenagers to Godolphin House and as i write this i am thinking i have forgotten someone who i must ask Zoe Osmond.
Zoe is in Shallal 2 and would like to join the main co, but is studying A'levels at present, the trip is so we can work with Anna and Skye who are unavailable in term time as now at college.....
PDSW
http://www.pdsw.org.uk/ just asked for an article and Zoe kindly said i may use her writing. I have just done our evaluation for Shallal Shared and used the writing of participants, they say it better then i do and most of the article is from Zoe's evaluation.
PDSW Coinvestment is supporting the dancers between 16 and 25 in the company for a year on our new Doorways project. *
In the summer Shallal had the opportunity for their first ever residency, Shallal Shared which was hosted by AMATA Falmouth University. It was highly successful with new and established performers taking part and exploring Shallal's new improvisation style in music and dance performance.
Feedback from Zoe Osmond, 17 a dancer who attended 3.5 days out of 5 days and participated in dance, art and music.
Has it been helpful? For your own creative development:
"The residency was hugely helpful for me! It was so inspirational to be in a nurturing creative space, with wonderful people, making brand new and exciting work. The week gave me inspiration and clarity about what I want to go on to do after my A levels, and in my broader future. I can’t describe what a freeing creative environment the residency was for me. One of the many reasons I love Shallal is the fact that there is absolutely no judgment; I find that the atmosphere is always so profoundly positive and nurturing for everybody. It felt wonderful that the residency brought all branches of Shallal together; allowing us all to spend intensive time together, whilst all creatively and emotionally gaining from this wonderful environment. I feel like ShallaI gives me the security to be nothing but myself, and I can creatively expressive myself without holding back. When given the space and time to enjoy this over the whole week of the residency I found that I was able to push myself over a creative edge, letting go completely and finding a new freedom of expression in my dancing. I can’t really describe it but In short, it was incredible!
Working with other participants and Working with Live improvised music:
"Having the opportunity to work with people from all branches from Shallal was brilliant. It was brilliant to bounce off each other’s ideas and personalities as they came out in our dancing. I felt there were times in the residency when we took our open improvisations to a whole new level! We all felt really in tune with each other. I think this came about from having George there, creating amazing live improvised music for us. Something so special is created when both the music and dancing is improvised; George could bounce of our movements and we did the same with his music. I think we all related to both the music and each other quite differently. It felt new, different and incredibly exciting."
The style of work from the residency will be embedded in The Cornish Doorways Project and although some of the established younger dancers who were educated outside school are now in college on Fridays when we rehearse, they continue to meet in the holidays and be part of the project, and new young dancers have recently joined the company after college, and so the open, fluid yet stable structure of an inclusive community dance theatre company continues!
*Cornish Doorways is a three year intergenerational project enabling Shallal’s inclusive dance company to explore their local heritage, develop arts based skills and produce creative responses to share with the wider community resulting in a variety of accessible site specific performances and exhibitions across Cornwall.
New audiences will discover and experience inclusive arts, which encourages people to participate in Shallal’s future projects.
