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I'm just curious about the practice habits of troupes out there ...
Do you get together on a regular basis or only as needed to perform?
Do you practice in someone's house or rent a space?
How often do you get together? How long are your rehearsals?
My troupe gets together every Monday for two hours, in a space we rent from another dancer in town.
Do you get together on a regular basis or only as needed to perform?
Do you practice in someone's house or rent a space?
How often do you get together? How long are your rehearsals?
My troupe gets together every Monday for two hours, in a space we rent from another dancer in town.
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Columbus
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, May 5, 2009 - 11:52 AMEvery Tuesday for 2 hours in a rented space. -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, May 5, 2009 - 11:58 AMMondays at a local elementary school gymnasium. We don't rent it but every once in a while we'll give them a donation. They're very great to us! Keeps it cheap and we have lots of practice space :)
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, May 5, 2009 - 11:59 AMOnce a week for 2 hours regardless of upcoming gigs. I used to do rehearsals with a group for one hour every other week - it was more of a fun/social thing than a real rehearsal. It's hard to actually make any progress and create cohesion if you're not meeting weekly. However, if you're just meeting to dance and have fun, every other week is fine. We either rent the school studio or use one dancer's studio space.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, May 5, 2009 - 12:46 PMEvery Saturday for 2 hours unless we have a lot going on. Then we might add an extra practice in there somewhere. We practice in one of the troupe member's basements...but it's huge and has a wall full of mirrors! So it works.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Wed, May 6, 2009 - 8:17 AMDuring Alternacirque season, on Mondays there's a full 2 hour circus practice (sometimes more, sometimes less), usually either in our city's subsidized studio space or in a back yard, depending on whether we're working on choreography or if we're doing full fire and sets runthroughs.
Delirium has a separate rehearsal on Wednesdays, usually for two hours (sometimes more, sometimes less) in our city's subsidized satellite studio space.
All dancers are expected to be working hard at home to fix whatever they're having trouble with and to get the choreography set and retained. If for some reason we're not quite done with a piece, or if a BIG IMPORTANT SHOW is barreling down on us, it's not unusual to hold extra rehearsals.
Following Art Bar shows, if time allows, I'll give the cirque and dance company the week off to rest and recharge. Cirque practices from March to October. Delirium practices year round.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Wed, May 6, 2009 - 9:17 AMWe rehearse 2 time per week, 2 hours each session. We rent space in a local dance studio so there is plenty of room and access to mirrors.
Typically, we're always working on refining and polishing existing choreography, or developing something new. We always do some warm up and drilling at the beginning, though, and then stretching at the end.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Wed, May 6, 2009 - 11:22 AMThanks for these responses. It really makes me happy to think about so many women taking time for themselves to dance on a regular basis, and to be creative with other people. :)
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Wed, May 6, 2009 - 12:47 PMIn addition to the two hour rehearsal, we also require everyone attend Level 3 class every week. So really we get 3 hours of dance practice each week. -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 7, 2009 - 10:17 AMWe do that, too. Our troupe dancers spend an hour in Advanced Class on Wednesday nights in addition to troupe rehearsal.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 7, 2009 - 11:44 AMAt this time we divide our time between two different locations. We have our instruction at Oatland Island Wildlife Center where we dance among the whale bones and insane cats. The building is very old and was once a hospital. It is known to be haunted.
Our drills class is held on Thursdays and we congregate at a (modern) hospital Physical Therapy Annex.
Both sessions run an hour and a half, give or take.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 7, 2009 - 6:16 PM"Aziff" get together every Thursday for advanced classes, which is mostly learning new choreos, we warm up and do a bit of improve first, in a rented Hall no mirrors, for 2 - 2 1/2 hours. Tuesdays is for Beginner and intermediate, with a mandatory attendance of at least once a month. Which helps the divide between the girls, 2 1/2 to 3 hours, in another rented hall with windows for mirrors,(but only in the winter).
Aziff will get together one or two Fridays a month for practice without the teacher at yet another hall, a gorgeous old dance school with mirrored walls, it's super cheap, 20 bucks for the whole night.....split between us. It's pretty relaxed, we drill new choreos, do a bit of improv, kindly critique each other. After, we will kick back in the kitchen over nibblies, and a chat, which we don't get to do elsewhere, lasts about 3-4 hours.
Considering 3 of us drive over 1 hour to get to class, and the others 30 to 45 min we are all flung far and wide, it's a pretty good effort.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 7, 2009 - 8:56 PMWe're another 2 hours on Tuesday night troupe, in a rented studio at a dance school in our city. I would love to get together twice a week but there is no way to schedule it, though we do add extra practices (usually in someone's home) if we need to brush up for a big show. I think the most was 4 times in a week. I'd like to have one practice a week just for dancing (getting that troupe connection going) and another for drilling, polishing, working on new moves, prop work, etc. I can be tough to get it all into one practice. We try to hang out outside of practice, too, in order to keep in touch socially.
Right now we have a yoga teacher dancing with us, so she leads us in some sun salutations after we warm/catch up, then we usually dance a little to synch up, then work on new moves/troubleshoot, then work on what's happening for our next performance or try some new songs or review, and we've been ending with 15 minutes of dancing with zills (they are new to us). I like very organized practices to keep the energy moving.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Fri, May 8, 2009 - 4:51 AMBlue Lotus Tribe rehearses for three hours every Sunday. If we have a big show coming up we add extra 2-3 hour rehearsals on some Fridays. We rent the dance studio that one of our girls teaches and and all but one of us have taken Egyptian classes at.
If we are choreographing a new piece, we sometimes work in teams, meeting at a dancer's house on a "free" evening to get the choreographing done. That way rehearsal time is spent teaching each other rather than trying to create new material together, which can take FORVEVER when you have six troupe members. -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Fri, May 8, 2009 - 5:24 AMThis is a good idea. Not something I expect to use for a while, but, all the same.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Sun, May 10, 2009 - 1:09 PMOur tribe (Wüstenrosen, in Vienna, Austria - means Desert Roses) has regular practice every Wendesday for 2 hours in a dance studio, with mirrors and everything. When we have an upcoming show, we meet more often, usually at somebody's place (we all have dance space at our homes, some even have wall mirrors!).
Each of us takes advanced classes, some are teaching, and we also meet in smaller groups to practise something specific like swords, or zills, or drills ... so we see each other at least twice a week in order to dance, and sometimes more often, to go out, have fun, talk or shop, sew...
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, May 12, 2009 - 10:56 AMWe're about the same as others. Regular practice is in our rented studio, usually once a week (when we aren't performing often, we'll sometimes cancel practice when life gets busy) for 2 hours. Sometimes practice is more planning oriented & sometimes there's more dance and music (musicians practice at the same time, sometimes with dancers & sometimes in our smaller room).
We tend to either plan a set in the car on the way there or do big performances that require a few extra rehearsals. We used to stay later, but that tends to make people grumpy, so we'll meet up at the studio more often during the couple of weeks before a big show.
Members of the group also use our studio space for smaller side projects, which are practiced outside core rehearsal time.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Sat, May 16, 2009 - 6:09 AMhow do you get a troupe to practice in the first place? -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Sat, May 16, 2009 - 7:46 AMLOL...good question Elle. You can't force people but the old standard...'no practice no performance' usually works well. If you have a dancer who feels they don't need to practice then they simply should not be performing...for the benefit of the troupe as well as any potential audience.
If you have a whole troupe that doesn't want to practice then perhaps its time to either...look for new members or change the dynamic to a group that just enjoys each others' company and loves to dance.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Fri, May 22, 2009 - 12:29 PMwe had a lot of trouble with varying levels of commitment among dancers for about the first three years of the troupe's existence. for us eventually it settled down kind of naturally, and now we have (luckily!) a committed group with shared vision and work ethic.
when i first started teaching and trying to run a troupe, i wanted to offer the chance to perform to everyone who wanted to dance with me. that good-hearted intention ended up creating a lot of trouble for us, with dancers taking the troupe for granted, putting it really low on their priority list, and some dancers thinking they didn't need to practice as much as others. now you have to work to be in the troupe, and that has helped even things out immensely. -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Fri, May 22, 2009 - 2:56 PMHi Angie,
Wow, you have a lot patience to have that sort of disharmony go on for three years! I'm curious, do you now have a couple set troupe rules? (MUST be at the rehearsal prior to a performance, for ex.) Is your 'shared vision' as formal as a written mission statement or more like a verbal agreement resulting from a group meeting?
Field -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, May 26, 2009 - 5:07 PMIt really wasn't so much patience as it was I had absolutely no idea how to change it. :)
We don't have set rules or a mission statement (though now that you mention it ...)
One of the big changes that seemed to bring about more troupe harmony was developing a policy of having to work your way up through classes before being invited into the troupe. Before that, my classes were less formal, so a less formal kind of participation was okay.
Also, every year the troupe performs at a local community festival, and I choreography a piece for the beginners to get a taste of performing. I require attendance at rehearsals and dress rehearsals and a complete costume for the performance. The flipside is that we get a taste of what it would be like to work with them in the future. If you watch someone throw fits about not wanting to wear a certain costume, or pick fights with other dancers, or complain about how hard every rehearsal is, you know you don't want them in the troupe. The performance is not a troupe tryout, but it helps me figure out who's in the running if we have a slot come open.
Maybe this opens another question ... how do you select new dancers for your troupes? -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Wed, May 27, 2009 - 4:32 AMHey, let's start a new thread! I'm totally interested in this.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Mon, May 25, 2009 - 3:31 PMOi...memories! I was in a troupe that formed but never practiced! I stuck it out for almost 6 months being the only one showing up (to our rented studio!) before finally leaving. I just didn't see the purpose of forming if we weren't going to work towards something, anything. I remember getting a lot of flack for that - "if it's too much like work, it's not any fun." Never understood that. I stuck it out with another troupe that only rehearsed every two weeks, and that was so noncommittal that eventually, it took my energy rather than fed it, so I only dance special occasions with them now. I think if a troupe (or any working group in any walk of life) is going to thrive, it needs constant energy from all members and needs to have some standards to guide it. Currently, I dance with a group of ladies whose primary interest is to innovate using ATS combos and to do small local gigs. That's fine for me! At least there's a common focus and we get a good workout every week that generates energy to feed our continuation. And it's work! And it's fun!!!! -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Wed, May 27, 2009 - 1:32 PMAh, the no fun thing. For me, the work is fun. Not like hanging out with friends, having a drink, maybe busting a move fun. It's different, and fulfilling in it's own way and I never understand that people don't think it's gratifying to work hard for something enjoyable.
Now, it can be no fun in others ways, if there is disharmony, and people don't get along or have the same vision. Then the work isn't fun because it's replaced by irritation, anger, etc.
For me, what's really no fun is getting up to dance in front of other people, as part of an unprepared group, and it looking like a hot mess. No fun at all. -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 28, 2009 - 6:50 AMOh my Kazoo! You have reached into my brain and pulled out my exact thoughts! -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 28, 2009 - 7:45 AMThanks, Kazoo; I agree completely. The work is the fun.
I'm a member of two troupes, one historical and one eclectic. Both troupes work hard and thankfully we all feel like doing so. One meets every Wednesday for two hours, one every Sunday for two hours, and both add extra rehearsals for upcoming performances.
I believe that most members of each troupe take other outside classes in dance, yoga and other disciplines, and some also teach students. The outside input helps to keep everything fresh and moving ahead. -
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Mon, September 7, 2009 - 12:15 PMMy troupe and i practice one night a week. Usually for 1.5-2.5hrs, depending on what we are working on. We add extra practices in before a show.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Thu, May 21, 2009 - 5:12 AMMy troupemates and I take an Advances class every Monday night with Valizan for 'an hour' which usually becomes more like 1 1/2 or even 2 because we'll just let the music run and dance for fun. We also get together for 2 hours (plus talk time!) on Thursday nights. We are allowed to use the studio we study at for rehearsing since we are the house student troupe and 90% of our performances are booked thru the studio to promote the studio and our instructor. Sometimes we'll throw an extra practice in before a big show. Valizan also hosts a Drill House every so often where all of his students from the numerous studios he teaches at all gather at one studio to dance together. It is great to occassionally dance with people you don't know. You soon discover how clear your cues really are or not when dancing with a stranger who's not familiar with your body language.
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Re: Tell me about your troupe practice
Tue, September 8, 2009 - 8:11 PMIn addition to once per week beginning/drill class in a studio we get together two nights per week for anywhere from 1.5 to 3 hours. It's as much a social time as dance time (unless we have a gig to work on). I think the fact that we spend so much time chatting and hanging out makes our connection stronger during dance and performances.
We go through long periods where we're all motivated and focused and we got a lot done, then we're all lazy and distracted and talk (or go out for Indian food). We're at that lazy point right now and I'm ready for a change!
Right now we're a troupe of 4 and we meet at one of the dancers houses, in the empty spare bedroom. Soon one of my intermediate students will be joining us once per week and we may decide that we need a bigger space.
