The Creative Gesture - Collective Composition Lab for Music and Dance 2019

Program Overview

This residency is part of The Creative Gesture dance program. The residency, for choreographers, composers, and dancers, will focus on creativity through practices of collaboration, composition, and improvisation.

Moderated by internationally acclaimed faculty Michael Schumacher, Anne Bourne, Carla Kihlstedt, Ami Schulman and Program Director Emily Molnar, the Collective Composition Lab for Music and Dance will present a positive and concentrated research space. Choreographers and composers will explore the dialogue between dance and music, as well as exercise their research with the participating dancers.

What does the program offer?

Five choreographers and nine composer/performer/improviser/sound artists will have two weeks of studio time to deepen their experience of the relationship between dance and music; with facilitation to explore improvisation, listening, and place as compositional sources for gesture and sound. Each choreographer and composer/performer team will have daily time to workshop ideas, rough drafts, and perhaps even the beginnings of more concrete collaborations. Participating dancers will have time to work with choreographer and composer teams in smaller groups. 

The residency also offers time in faculty led sessions for all artists to exercise instant composition, listening, and sound improvisation. These sessions will include the study of the participants’ pre-existing methods of improvisation and composition, as well as exercises and tools to help develop new systems and modalities of their own techniques.

Who should apply?

We invite applications from dancers who are curious about improvisation, instant composition, and working in intimate, collaborative spaces with choreographers, composer/performers, and faculty. 

Choreographers who are interested in furthering their relationship to musical form and composition, to their own craft, and discovering new modalities are also encouraged to apply.

Composers, improvisers, and sound artists who perform their own work and are interested in collaborative process, discovering new starting points for composition, and engaging deeply with the aesthetics and practices of dance are welcome. 

Musical applicants should be able to realize their own compositions/improvisation without other musicians. While composer/performers will be paired, there may also be opportunities to work individually with a choreographer. Acoustic instrument, and electroacoustic or field recording composer/performers are welcome. 

Dates: July 29 - August 10, 2019