Viewing dancers on stage during a performance sometimes muddles our consciousness of their human qualities. We may forget that the performers too are people, just like us. As they move effortlessly on stage in rhythmic perfection, we forget that they too have flaws, that they can make mistakes and that they laugh and joke around too. It was such a luxury to be able to sit in on John Jasperse’s rehearsal for his upcoming performance in May.
During the hour long rehearsal, we watched the two dancers repeat sections of the piece that needed to be corrected and adjusted. Each need for a change in the dancers’ movements was foreshadowed by Jasperse’s flailing arm gestures in the corner. As the choreographer, Jasparse was very particular and precise about each little detail of the dance. While he was kneeling to my right, I noticed that he would let his arms sway to the movement of the dance, as if he was practicing the dance himself. For certain parts of the dance, he would lean forward, as if he was holding his breath in anticipation and go “Pah!” or mutter in French after the dancers had finished the specific part (depending on if he liked it or not). It was honestly entertaining to watch Jasperse himself during the rehearsal, not only because he was so mesmerized in each round of practice, but also because he held a connection with the dancers that the audience couldn’t break in to.
For most of the rehearsal, it seemed as if the dancers shared a special mindset with Jasperse that we, as the audience, could not understand. If Jasperse seemed bothered by a certain movement, the dancers would be able to provide alternate ways of doing the movement so that it would connect and flow better before Jasperse could make any full changes himself. Although Jasperse did have some moments when he seemed dissatisfied with what the dancers just did, he was always open to their suggestions and input on how to better the piece. After the rehearsal, Jasperse had said that he often wondered, “Is it possible to make something that looks like something I didn’t make?” He wanted to subvert his own influences and impulses and to make the piece a combination of random choices, but he admitted that he has the tendency to be very “didactic” with his dancers. As someone who rarely watches dance performances, the changes they made seemed so minute to my eyes but so grand of a change when Jasperse and the dancers discussed how they would fix the certain part.
This quality about Jasperse only taught me more about how much skill and effort that is required to finesse a finished dance or any other work of art. I learned from Simone and Stewart that although collaboration is needed to coordinate a dance, individual style and technique is also an essential part into really making the performance something of their own. With Simone’s more structured and fluid dance techniques (more like ballet) and Stewart’s heavier body frame, the partnering of the two individuals added an extra flair to the dance.
By watching the rehearsal, we got to see the dancers and choreographer in their most vulnerable stage. We saw when they were off pace from one another, we saw when they couldn’t seem to get the dance right and we saw when they all laughed together as they watched an old recording of them dancing. Being exposed to the dancers in this way made the rehearsal a performance itself, one in which we got to learn about the process and time it takes into creating a piece that stands as presentable to the choreographer, especially one like Jasperse who would probably not showcase a piece until it is perfect and exactly the way he and his dancers have finalized it to be.
-Winnie Yu (Blog A)
