22 days to go

Part of today was spent meeting with Dance Consortium about the Ailey II performance at Pavilion Theatre in March next year. It’s an exciting programme including the legendary Revelations. Ailey aficionados will know it while newcomers need to see it as it’ll be an indelible dance memory. Master classes, workshops and open rehearsals will be offered. I hope the company realises what a plus this is for a venue that’s taking a punt on contemporary dance large-scale for the first time for a while. We are hoping that it’ll draw in audiences from far and wide.
Next – signed off the print for our new programme of courses and classes, over sixty options throughout the week ranging from Krumping through Waacking to Afro-Cuban for Tots. We’re bringing significant employment for artists and teachers locally and further afield. Regional artists and companies are also benefitting from commissioning and performance opportunities. We’ve tried not to duplicate the offer already available in the conurbation, firstly in the interests of not literally or metaphorically speaking – treading on toes, but also in offering something different for refresh those who are already dancing as well as enticing newcomers.
Shannon is with us this week and next on work experience. She started off on the Stride project – a Youth Dance England initiative we hosted at Dartington this year aimed at developing young dance entrepreneurs. She’s been helping Programme Manager, Ian Abbott, set up the Pavilion Dance Young Dancers Performance Group – an open audition process for young people who will create and run their own company in whatever style of dance they choose.
I’ve also been working on the schedule for the DanSCe Dialogues EU Interreg programme which runs from September to April. The call for promoters and artists to take part in the scheme will go out early September.
We also have the auditors in this week, and one of the accountants told me the story of the Italian fishermen who, at the start of every fishing season, pour a liberal amount of good local wine down the throat of the first fish they take from the net and then throw it back into the sea, while watching and waiting for more fish to flood into the net.
While not taking this completely literally (although Pavilion Dance is on the coast) we are offering our first weekend of classes absolutely free to first-comers, as well as some free performances by local companies. So we hope that after that, dancers will be lining up on the seafront for the regular programme!

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