CMU School of Drama


Monday, September 15, 2008

Dance Review: Audience chooses music for Pillow Project

PostGazette: "The final installment of The Pillow Project's Second Saturday series was supposed to be The Silent One. Mary Miller put her spin on that by doing a series of surprisingly aloof dance vignettes based on sign language with cellist Edouard Shvarts. LABCO stretched it, but stayed within bounds with a strong sneak preview of Ursula Payne's 'Under Lock and Key,' about the hidden nature of spousal abuse in the home. But juggler Mark simply did his own thing with Cirque-ish choreography, throwing nifty rhythmic routines with clubs, rings and balls."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is such a cool concept. I really love asl, it's a beautiful language and since I took classes for two years i think it would be fascinating to see how they incorporate asl into the dancing. My thought is they might elaborate on a hand shape? It is a very movement intense language, but your feet don't really move - so i am so curious to see how that would be incorporated. Also it has such a direct affect with the audience - I adore the hands on nature they get to take when viewing the show. Maybe it comes close to grasping for a hearing person the disillusionment of not hearing/not understanding all that's going on around you? maybe? There will be continuity issues between the music you play and the movement, so maybe it emulates the confusion experience. Just a thought.

Anonymous said...

I honestly dont understand why someone would conduct this type f experiment.. First off- you are losing the dance to your own music. Dance is suppose to be choreographed to a song, not some random song a s specific song. And then once losing the dance which is the main purpse for danc-ing, we get to listen to a song on our ipod which im sure weve listen to a million times before. GREAT. I dont know, for some reason I cant grasp this concept at all.. I understand it was an experiment and I am all for experiemental theatre and arts.. but this just seems like it was a bit vague with no real purpose, thats all.

Anonymous said...

Unlike Paige I like this idea. It makes perfect sense and while it might be rather ridiculous at times, it is a dance performance, and the dance is the only component. In addition to this the audience can explore the relationship between bodies in motion and music by juxtaposition. Additionally the encouragement to pick one's own music makes the entire show personal because some songs have certain connotations to specific people and that relationship is much more personal when you are in control of the association. As for the show being based on the structure of ASL, that's just cool. ASL is such a visual language and I'm curious to see how literal the dance interpretations are because even non-ASL Based dances tell stories sometimes.