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21st March

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21st March

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21st March

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21st March

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21st March

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We have started studying the style of Martha Graham.  I find this style extremely hard but I am really interested in it. I find the contracting very hard for the agony part of her extesy and agony exercise. I feel I am rather good at the contactions in first position however I feel I need to work a lot harder on the contractions in second pisition. We also did contractions in attitude I found this very hard however I gave it my best and feel that through the lesson I progressed a lot. The felt the hardest exercise was when we had to do the contractions on our knees, I need to work a lot harder on this in my own time to be able to perfect it. Overall, I feel my progression through the lesson was good and I feel I worked hard at everything.

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I Thursday 21st March

Today we started the lesson with doing all of the Martha Graham exercises. I feel I performed well in all of these however I feel I need to work on remembering them more as I wasn’t confident while doing them. I need to work on the exercise on me knees and the exercise on my back as I feel my contractions aren’t correct and I need to make sure when my back is meant to be straight that it is straight. However, I feel my contractions in first, parallel and second are good and I feel my contractions are very strong.

Sit up 2 minute challenge

30

Press up 2 minute challenge

50

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Everything you need to know about Contemporary Dance.

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From the 31st of January we were off timetable to rehearse all of the different pieces for our gala. We spent rather a lot of time on this piece to ensure the spacing and entrances and exits of the piece suited the space we had on the stage. Through these rehearsals I realised I needed to warm my feet up a lot more before dancing as my feet weren’t pointed enough during the piece. I also realised that I needed to straighten my legs during the handstand. I worked very hard on correcting these things for the final performance of the show and I feel by the performance my feet were pointed and my legs were a lot straighter during the handstand. Over all, I am happy with my performance of this piece during the show as I feel I flowed through my movement and made the most of the space I was given on stage. I also feel I stayed focussed during the piece and my body language was always alive. I feel I have majorly improved in this unit of contemporary dance since the beginning of the year as my movements have become slicker and cleaner and I am becoming more confident with trying new things. I have always been a very musical theatre style dancer and contemporary can be very different. Since the beginning of the year I have tried to get rid of certain habits like standing in “musical theatre stance” rather than in parallel. I am still finding it hard now but the difference between the beginning of the year and now is that I realise where I am going wrong and I can correct it.

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Friday 25th of February
Today we showed our piece to Lecturer Beth as part of a milestone project. Our space was limited in the studio as it was a different rehearsal studio and I found that effected my performance in some ways. However, I feel I gave an emotive performance. I feel my movements could have been more stretched out and flowing whereas I was doing them a little bit marked. However this was because the space was hard to work in with others. Beth’s feedback was very positive and she thoroughly enjoyed the piece. She stayed that it was “emotive”, “touching” and “beautiful”. I am happy with this feedback as I feel our work from yesterday game together today in this performance.

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23rd of January
Today we joined the second years lesson to set the middle piece that will join both of our pieces together. Saydi’s Vision of this piece is that we will all be walking by and although we all stop small duets and sections of dance still continue. While doing the piece I could feel saydi’s vision flowing through my movements. But the end of this lesson I believe I securely had the movement and that I was clearly creating saydi’s vision.

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24th of January
In today’s lesson we did a dress rehearsal, with the second years, of all of the three pieces put together. When fitting the three pieces together I began to clearly see the story of relationships being told through the whole piece. I’ve worked hard on making my movements in the middle piece more pedestrian and you can clearly see that through my movement. The costume I have chosen worked very well and allowed me to do all the movements I was required to do. The piece is clearly coming together now and I now feel like I have to routine planted in my head and I’m making it stronger and stronger each time we run it.

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17th of january

In today’s lesson we run through the routine multiple times to add emotion and connection throughout our piece, I found this very useful as I have built a connection when walking in with Sophie and I feel mine and Sophie’s duet of the routine is beginning to look nicer as our connection is growing stronger. We then finished the routine.
After finishing the routine we did an improv circle. I found this very hard as we had to use the negative space and I have never really done that before, however, I gave it my best try and I came out with some very nice movements. I worked with most people in this improv circle and I feel the person I naturally worked best with was Rosie and we used eachothers negative space a lot. To finish the lesson we partnered up with someone we had never done a duet with before and created a short 1 minute piece. I was partners with Rosie and I feel we worked very well together however our piece was too dance based so we need to work on making our piece more natural and pedestrian.

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10th of January

Today we did our warm up and then began to do hand work. I believe I created my handwork well and the work I created was visually nice. We then went into partners and did our hand sequence together and amended our sequences to fit eachother’s and make a small duet. I worked with Bethan on this and we worked very well and through our small duet we have a small section where I don’t touch Beth but with my actions I push her away and then she pushes me back which is a very nice part of our duet.
We then used the routine we have been learning since the beginning of the year and our small diets to create the routine for our GALA. I believe during the routine I make very good eye contact with the people I am dancing with and I believe I link all of my movements nicely into eachother .

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18th of october

In this lesson we learnt triplets. I feel I understood the timing very well and I kept in time nicely. I found it hard to turn out my foot during them however this is something I can work on! We also went over the routine again and I can clearly see I have become more confident doing the routine you can see this through my swing back of my leg before the spin being confident and also I feel I have gained much more control over the routine! Also I noticed I was using the wrong arm to swing around at the beginning of the routine so I corrected that and it’s improved that section a lot I feel like it flows much better than last week!

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4th of October second routine video

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4th of October
Routine videos
By looking at both videos I can clearly reflect on the differences and you can see that even in today’s lesson I have improved however I still have very far to go! I need to keep my legs straight during the handstand and I need to swing my leg back more just before the spin as I am clearly showing I am too scared to really try! However in the second video you can clearly see the improvement in my control and squeeze of the first movement and you can clearly see that I am making it large to squeeze it down the being small! I also keep my head down at all times!

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4th of October swings warm up video

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27th of september

In today’s lesson lesson I feel I improved by keeping my hands down at all times through the warm up and through the routine. For example, during the warmup when we do downwards dog I kept my hands flat on the floor and I also kept them flat during the split handstand move in the routine. I am happy with my improvement however I would like to maintain this!

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20th of September
We also started today's lesson of with a stretch routine and run.

When doing the stretch routine today I tried to keep both of my bum bones on the floor. When extending my left leg I managed to keep both on the floor however on the right I am still struggling. When doing the leg swings on the floor I kept my feet on the floor so that was an improvement from last week. During the routine I worked on my balance when extending my left leg before going to the floor, even though my balance still needs work it was better than last week. However, I am still  struggling to keep my legs straight when extending my right leg to come up from the floor.

We learnt some more of the routine this lesson and I am happy with my effort as I tried a lot of things I was nervous to do. For example the handstand after the turn is done on our left leg and I struggle with that so I was afraid that I would fall but I still tried. However, when doing the handstand I need to work on my hands being flat. I also need to work on the shoulder stand as I need to fully get up and I haven’t done that yet.

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13th of September
To start the lesson of we ran around the room with short sprints back into a jog.

We then warmed up with a short stretch routine.

To warm up we also did some corner work and leg swings.

Then, we learnt the beginning of a contemporary dance routine.

When doing the stretch warm up I could clearly see that I need to work on my downwards dog position and work on driving my heels to the floor more. Also when extending one leg I need to ensure both of my bum bones are resting on the floor.Also, when doing the leg swings on the floor I need to ensure my foot doesn’t come off the floor.

Through the routine I believe I did the beginning part nicely, for example when we rise up and drop down I did that nicely and emphasised the stretch up and drop down. However when we had to extend the left leg to then glide down to the floor I need to work on my balance. Also, when extending the right leg to swing around and up off the floor I need to make sure my legs are straight.