Full Company Rehearsals

I know that Paolo is working on an updated calendar. But I wanted to
send out the new full company rehearsal dates as a reminder. We will
be at the Shakespeare Festival for all of these. Some days, we will be
in the blue room - where we were on Saturday and as we get closer to
the show, we will be in the Studio.

Thanks all for your excellent work. Soo soo excited!
I will have flyers for you this Saturday.

Much Love,
Alison

Sat. April 1st 3:00 - 7:00
Sun April 9th 2:00 - 5:00
Thu April 13th 6:30 arrive, 7:00 go, til 9:30
Sat April 15th 3:00 - 7:00
Wed April 19th 6:30 arrive, 7:00 go til 9:30 or till we are done -
since this is the night before we open.

postcard changes again

we are still evolving the postcards.

as we look at the timelines- we need to get them done and in artists' hands and available for the outreach teams.

we will however have an emailable copy for you to send to your mailing lists by 3/17.

more soon

images by azul

in talking with phloe, she had this idea of looking at some of the images of l.a. that azul had taken.

she and he put together a set of images and they showed them to wendell and i. they are now the basis for the flyer. and is capturing essences of l.a. that i'm excited to grab.

i'm also thinking about how to use them as transitions during the show.

i also need to finalize and give stuff to lakan so that he can pull some stuff together.

i will be adding images soon.

current show order

below is the current sequence of the show. i will be spending time finalizing a couple of things this weekend - so this may change. we are still looking at the flow of the show - i will set things so that when we come together on saturday, march 25th there is a clearer picture.


current sequence: where you stay?


WATER GODDESS
music: alma on violin,
alison, dulce, roger dancing w/ watergoddess puppet.

TWO BOIS
dialogue scene w/ claudia and alison


lomita
monologue scene w/ alison

first la rain
dialogue with words, sonic text and dance
w/ alison, charles, rani and jesson


FIRE GODDESS
music: roque on ?? we'll know next week
dulce dancing w/ headdress and fans


HOLLYWOOD
monologue w/ alison

SEEDS OF FIRE
dialogue with words and sonic text
w/ alison, rani and jesson


EARTH GODDESS
music: ferdinand? - i'll confirm this on monday
roger dancing w/ soft body puppet and deer hind quarters

CHINATOWN
monologue w/ alison

BUYING A HOUSE IN GARDENA
dialogue scene
w/ alison and claudia

ELDER EARTH
dialogue with words and sonic text
w/ alison, rani and jesson


AIR GODDESS
music: recorded breath tracks
roger, dulce and alison
with air costumes and air goddess dropping down

LAX
monologue w/ alison

OCEAN VIEW
dialogue with words and sonic text
w/ alison, rani and jesson

REVIST OF WATER GODDESS?

tech sides

Ok -

I talked with a potential lighting designer last week. i need to follow up with him.

I also have to put that final call out to someone for stage management. I will do this tomorrow so that we have someone for the 25th.

I am also still looking for some additional production support. I think we could actually use a producer. But not sure who this could be.

Paolo is going to be handling prop lists for us and Adele has already started prop lists for the dancing goddess sequences.

postcards w/ Wendell 03/16/06

Wendell and I have been working on the postcards for the last week now. They - like so many other elements of this show are revealing themselves to us. Although, like so many other elements of the show - are also under a deadline.

we are looking at creating a 4' by 9' flyer. As Wendell says, we are going for a unique feel and look to the flyer to help communicate what is happening in the show.

i have been researching a couple of different printer options - and got another lead today on another company. but since the size is unique - it has the potential to be expensive. we will finish something tonight and hopefully get on a run and have them soon.

however - once the postcards are designed we can start the online campaign - complete with email, my space and webpage.

once we received the actual cards - wee have support for outreach from all of the artists and an outreach team comprised of folks from Tribe of the Diasporas and Naya'hri S.

beautiful beautiful

Air and Fire Mock Ups 031506

Met with Phloe and she shared with me the new drawings for Air and Fire. (see the Elements rather than Goddess posting regarding the shift in perspective on them).

She presented two versions of Air - and we talked through some of the details.

She then shared Fire and we talked through some of that.

This of course came from the rehearsal meeting that we had had last week. I just need to make sure that Adele is able to get a hold of them. Of course, Dulce and Roger will get a hold of them too!

Fire looks amazing. She's got a head piece which is gonna just be beautiful. And Dulce is gonna move with the Fans! exciting!!!!

Air as well - with her fabric and color possiblities. And that combine with the sounds that we recorded with Chris the sound engineer on Tuesday is gonna come alive in an amazing way.

element focus more than goddess

as this piece has developed, i am struck by a number of differnt things.

as many folks know, the whole concept for dancing goddesses came up when seeing a drawing of phloe's of Iemanja - the portuguese water goddess. in trying to bring her and other goddessses to life on stage, i have been able to collaborate with dulce, roger, adele, and alma. i also have been talking with roque to bring him on board as a percussionist for the fire goddess.

originally i thought we would just recreate an ode to these dieties. but as we have started to talk through how to approach the fire goddess, it has become clear that really what we are interested in representing artistically on stage is the essence of the element rather than a specific goddess (and all of the things that we would need to to do in a traditionalist sort of sense to evoke and appease her).

this seems like the best solution so that all of us can contribute artistically while at the same time not evoke spirits and energies unintentionally. this also doesnot affect costumes... it is more about how we are approaching the dances and how we list them in the programs.

narratively it also opens up room to allow audience members an opportunity to call the element goddess whatever name they might know her as. i.e., Iemanja is water, but some know water as Yemaya.

Dancing Goddesses Rehearsal 03/14/06

met with roger and dulce. we went and recorded breath sounds for chris the sound designer. we recorded a series of our own breaths - different variations - then did a 3 min. 9 second improv together.

after ward we were able to listen to it - it was really exciting. chris is going to go away and build a 3 and a half minute piece for us to move to.

air is the final element - and so it will be exciting to see what occurs.

we then went back to the studio on reno and ran through our piece for the water goddess. unfortunately, we missed alma (doh! we got there at 530). i'm so sorry we missed you. alma called to let me know that she has been working at home in her studio and will come prepared to share what she has been working on. beautiful~!!

We ran through the piece and will be ready for rehearsal next tuesday, 3/21.
alma we even have a proposal for how you and i enter the scene!!!
we are also going to try and work some stuff with air i think.

individual rehearsals for fire and earth will probably begin next week too.

adele and i also checked in over the phone over the weekend about puppets and costumes. i hear that she is working on assembling the rear-end of earth goddess which is soo exciting. its gonna be amazing!!!

two bois rehearsal 3/15/06

met with claudia and chris. we read through the new pages of the two bois piece.

starting with her poem to yemaya and then working through the convention of the piece and how movement, voice overs and live silence will be shaping this piece.

chris also found a lot of humor in the piece - and it will be interesting to see how it comes together. claudia has written a great piece to start from built in with an inherant conflict between me wanting to get some information from her - and her not wanting to tell it to me. the piece is also a good testimony to the ocean - and how each of us loves her in our own way.

claudia is editing the scrip again and i will add a couple of lines.

the goal for the show has always been to not make it about me... but that its about a larger thing - l.a.

more soon.

First LA Rain Rehearsal 03/16/06

Tonight met with the First LA Rain fellas - Rani, Charles, Jesson. We worked through some things thing Chris came through and Paolo (and Ivy) joined us.

We reworked the first half of the piece. We had already been working through conventions for how the text will work with sonic elements (music and found sounds). We also worked through movement conventions as well.

The piece is going to be an interesting dialogue on stage between the movement, the musicians and me.

we will meet again next thursday and run through more of the piece.

this piece continues to evolve as my love poem to l.a.

welcome to where you stay

welcome to the blog for the company creating where you stay.
i have been working with many folks in teams and the show isn't quite full circle yet. i am excited for us to meet on the 25th and share work with each other.

i will begin posting and hopefully folks will find it useful.

much love,
alison