Talking All Things Dance with Melissa Brading

Episode 8 of The Vocal Cue, with your host Hayden Browning, talks to Texas Tech University School of Theatre & Dance Assistant Professor of Practice in Dance, Melissa Brading. 

Professor Brading is a dancer, teacher and choreographer originally from Topeka, KS, holding a MFA in Dance from the University of Michigan and a BFA in Dance Education from the University of Central Oklahoma. Melissa began her performance career with Ad Deum Dance Company of Houston, TX, before moving to New York for twelve years serving as a teacher, dancer and choreographer, and then moving into higher education. Melissa has a passion for teaching movement and her research is focused on creating practices to keep students dancing longer and stronger. She believes the dance class should address all of the dancer—body, mind and soul, and is working to create safe spaces to explore the intricacies of the body.

Transcript

Speaker 0:00

Oh, welcome to The Vocal Cue. I'm your host, Hayden Browning. I'm here with Melissa Brading. She is assistant professor at Texas Tech University for Practice of Dance, as well as she's received her MFA in dance at the University of Michigan with a BFA in dance education from the University of Central Oklahoma. How are you doing today?

Speaker 2 0:25

I'm good. How are you?

Speaker 0:26

I'm doing great. I'm doing great. I'm excited to talk with you today.

Speaker 2 0:29

Yeah.

Speaker 0:30

You come from doing work with Ad Adam?

Speaker 2 0:33

It's um it's Adeum Dance Company. I'm not cursing in a a southern accent. It's Adeam, um, it it's a Latin word. Um but yeah, that was the first dance company I danced with um out of straight out of undergrad. So that was oh gosh, about 20 years ago.

Speaker 0:49

Wow.

Speaker 2 0:50

Yeah, so it was a long time ago.

Speaker 0:52

Um does that still sit with your brain at all? Do you still have like flashbacks or memories of your times?

Speaker 2 0:58

Honestly, I don't think about it that often, but now that I'm closer to Houston, I'm in more contact with people of that circle, um, and they're all doing different things. So I do think about it more. But I did, I think I learned a lot about performance with that because we got a lot of different guests, and that was the main thing I took from the company. Um, is that I got to work with a lot of different choreographers and had really good ballet training there, which is not normally my forte. Um, and we got to perform constantly, we got to travel a little bit. Um, we were well known in the Houston area, so it was a nice tight-knit community. I think I was there, I was there for three years. I was like an apprentice the first year, and then I was a company member for two years, and then I also taught, they had a second company, so I would teach classes and sometimes set work on them.

Speaker 1:42

Gotcha. So would people come in and then apply and then go to that agency and then you teach them from there, or how would that work?

Speaker 2 1:49

Um yeah, with that particular company, they have auditions I think once or twice a year, and I went to an intensive and they were holding auditions there. And it was between that company and this other company, I I did well at both auditions, and one was more kind of a palabolist style. I don't know if you've seen the company, but it's a lot of partnering and like making shapes with the body. Um and kind of I don't know how to say it, kind of make you see things that you're not sure that you see within the elements of the body. Very structural um and inventive, and then Audaium was a little bit more contemporary ballet at the time. I think now they're very much into Graham technique, very strong dancers. They're way stronger now than when I was there. Um, so they've gotten better over the years for sure. Um but yeah, that was my first like professional job.

Speaker 2:38

Well, how does that compare to being there compared to here at Texas Tech University?

Speaker 2 2:42

Well, gosh, so many things have happened since then. Um I was at University of Michigan as an adjunct before I got here, um, which I enjoyed. The students are the same age. I was teaching some of the same classes, but um it's very different there. It's a very large program. I think there's 80 to 100 majors in the dance department. Uh, and then here we have, I think usually around 40-ish, 50-ish, depending on the year. Um so it's a quite big difference. I know everybody's name. Um, I was also teaching at Michigan during the pandemic, so people had masks on and then they'd take them off, and I had no idea who anyone was. Um, so I feel really good being here and like having a good connection to my students. Uh, I'm teaching way more here. Um, I taught two classes a semester. I teach four classes a semester here. This semester I'm teaching five. Um, so I have a lot more uh FaceTime with the students than I did at that previous job. And then before that, I was in uh New York for 12 years working and dancing and living just doing life.

Speaker 3:45

So, what are the top three performances you've been a part of and who have you enjoyed working with within those performances?

Speaker 2 3:53

I don't know if I can pick well, yes, I can pick one. Um there's a choreographer I worked with named Chris Ferris, and her choreography was very challenging. There was not a lot of transitions until you were doing something else that was really large, so it was very taxing on the body, and but it's very satisfying to figure out how to do all of these things. And the pieces were very long, and we'd be dancing the whole time.

Speaker 1 4:14

Gosh.

Speaker 2 4:15

Um, and I think I liked those so much because at the end, you know, I sometimes I almost threw up. But like at the end, I'm like, at the I'm done, I'm drenched in sweat, and I'm like, wow, I really absolutely gave everything that I had, and um, that felt really good. So I think I I like those performances because it feels worth it. You know, it's like, oh, all that hard work, and then I was able to do it, you know, with my friends and peers who've come to watch it. And one I think of in particular with her, it was in a music hall in Brooklyn, and I'm blanking a roulette. It's a venue that usually has live music, but it's big, like a concert place, and dance has been showing up there. And she um collaborated with a cellist, a violin player, and there was one more musician who I'm blanking on. Um, and they moved in the space with us, which was really interesting, and they played live. Um, and then one of my really great mentors came to that show and it was the only time he saw me perform, and he died not too far after that. And I remember him saying, like, Oh, I'm so glad I got to see you dance. He was really impressed with the physicality of it, and like that he got to see me do something outside of his class because I would take weekly classes with him, so he saw me in a different capacity. Um, but yeah, so I remember that one distinctly because like it felt good to finish that show, and it was my last show with her, Chris Ferris. Um, and then he also came to it, so that was really nice.

Speaker 5:42

So transitions they're more slow and delicate because you have to weave them within each set of what what would they be called in dance? I know in music it's like you have the chorus, you have and and then you weave in transitions between like sets like on a set list from one song to another.

Speaker 2 6:00

Yeah.

Speaker 6:01

Based on key.

Speaker 2 6:02

She did do some of that. It depends on the artist and how they want to do the transitions. Um, she was kind of a movement all the time person.

Speaker 6:09

It sounds like burst of energy is what she was really going with.

Speaker 2 6:12

It can be difficult to view because if something is always moving in front of you, then your eye gets really used to it. And so then you can't actually see the details of what's happening.

Speaker 1 6:20

Okay.

Speaker 2 6:21

Um, so I do think that silence and like um stillness is really important within choreographic work. And she did have these moments where we would stop dancing and like the musicians would just play for a bit, or they would like kind of sweep across the floor, you know, playing the cellist who also is making music for um a piece that I'm setting here. Uh, he would like roll on the floor somehow and get up and play his cello. His wife was a dancer, so he was comfortable like doing stuff like that. So these little moments where your eye could kind of rest, um, so you're just not seeing this all the time. Because that can be hard. It's impressive at first, but then your brain's kind of like, okay, that's that's fine.

Speaker 7:01

Gotcha, gotcha. Wow. Well, I'm learning something.

Speaker 2 7:03

Oh, good.

Speaker 7:05

You've you've done some work benefiting women in prison systems.

Speaker 2 7:09

Yeah, um that company is called Avo Da. Um, we teach creative workshops within um women's prisons. So we don't necessarily like go in and teach them technique or how to dance, but we create performances with them.

Speaker 1 7:23

Wow.

Speaker 2 7:24

And so they make dance about their own stories or whatever the topic um for that particular residency is, and then we usually have a performance at the end where everyone in the facility can come and watch.

Speaker 7:35

What does that feel like?

Speaker 2 7:38

It's interesting. Um, I think it's important because I think in America our prison system is very heavy on punishment. And the truth is like most of those people are not lifers, which I don't wish life on anyone in prison, but they're coming back into society. So if we're looking at prison as a way to heal them and make them more whole so they can go back and actually contribute to society and have like a good, fulfilling life, then you know, rehabilitation is more important than like the punishment.

Speaker 8:09

Correct.

Speaker 2 8:09

But if we're just punishing, then you you you lose a lot of sense of humanity, which is not gonna be helpful when you go back out. But I think things like dance and music and like they have a lot of programs in prison with like um film editing, like all sorts of things, like those bring back a sense of like humanity to those people, and that then they can kind of start the process of finding themselves again, so when they get out, they can have you know more success. And so I think that stuff's really important. Did I ever think I'd be teaching in prison? No, my roommate did, and she was like, Oh, we have a spot open, would you be interested? And I auditioned and I didn't get it, uh, and then they called me back like a year later and asked if I was still interested. Um, because there's it's very much heavy on teaching, too. Um, and they kind of sprung this teaching thing on me in the audition and I didn't know. And so I was like, okay, let's do this, and like I had to kind of jump on it, and there was another person who I was auditioning with who was um very comfortable and prepared, but by the time they did call me back, I was totally ready. I'd been teaching a long time. Um, so it it was a good transition. I think I did that for a few years, and it was nice. And I've I've done some performances in the prisons for the for the women. Um yeah, I think it's really important, and I was really impressed with some of the work that they made. Uh, some of the choreography was really beautiful. Um I learned a lot through that through that process for sure.

Speaker 9:33

I was gonna ask you that. You you you must learn a lot from your students, and especially from doing something like that. I mean, you're getting out of your comfort zone, you're meeting new people, and you're even trying to help people that aren't in a bad situation.

Speaker 2 9:44

Yeah, and you realize, you know, when you're talking face to face and you're moving with them and dancing with them in community, um, you see you also see them as people, which maybe if you're on the outside and you're not thinking about them and they're behind these doors, like you don't really realize that they're there, and there's these whole people living lives, you know, behind bars. And and they and like there was a woman that looked like my mom, and I was like looking at her, and like she totally could be my mom because she got she was in for some kind of really strange reason, and that was a thing too. It's like hearing all their stories, which are technically we're not supposed to ask them what happened, but they like to tell us. And there were so many instances, I'm like, wow, like that was just a bad day that went really wrong. And you just there's so many reasons that you can find yourself in that situation, and so I I found a lot more empathy and understanding for human beings in general.

Speaker 10:36

It's a really beautiful thing.

Speaker 2 10:37

Just from doing that.

Speaker 10:38

I know a lot of people that look at the prison system and say, whoever's in there has to be an animal.

Speaker 2 10:43

Yeah, and it's it's just not true. And if it and I think it helps people to think that way, because then it removes them from a responsibility of helping these people re-enter society again. Because a lot of them re-enter society, they're not equipped for it, things don't go well, and they get back in, you know. And I do think that they find that with arts programs and things that they can work on, and some of them are in school, like earning degrees, all of these things um really help them like stabilize when they get out and find their communities and like continue to to move forward.

Speaker 11:14

That's awesome you've done that. That's so cool.

Speaker 2 11:16

Yeah.

Speaker 11:17

Um, are you working on any research right now?

Speaker 2 11:20

Yes, um, so I'm gonna plug dance tech. It's coming up, uh, it's the faculty concert, so all of us have work in it, and then we have one student work in there. Um, so uh Dr. Ali Duffy, Kyla Olson, myself, um Why Not, and we have a guest artist named Jamie Meek. Um, all have uh choreography in the show, so that's considered my research for right now. So I'm making a duet with two students, Anna Hale and um Hannah Coburn. And the composer is um Lauren Kayoshi Dempster, which he we made this piece together in 2017. Um, so I'm resetting it on the students, and then he's um redone the music for me as well. So it's really fresh sounding, it sounds really beautiful, and I'm excited. He's the cello player that was rolling around the floor.

Speaker 12:06

Was rolling around on the floor, yeah.

Speaker 2 12:08

Yeah, so I'm very excited about that. It's happening. I might say the date's wrong. I think it's 21st, 22nd. Nope. It's a the Wednesday of the 20 or 21st is the student preview, and then the Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and the evening are the performances.

Speaker 1 12:25

Okay.

Speaker 2 12:26

So like look that up if I'm wrong on the dates. But you should go. It's gonna be great.

Speaker 12:30

We did that perfectly. What are your top three favorite forms of dance?

Speaker 2 12:35

Huh. Well, I mean, I'll say contemporary because that's what I do, but that's also a very broad um genre of dance. I have a Lamone background, a Lamon technique, Jose Lamone, who's one of kind of a founding um member of like the modern dance canon. And so I kind of do a contemporary version of that in some ways. Um, as far as what I just enjoy watching, I really like hip hop and breaking, um, street dance forums are really fun to watch. I also like really percussive things, like I love tap, um, I love flamenco. There's a man named Israel Galvan and he does kind of contemporary flamenco, and I saw him perform in New York, and I've never seen anything like it. Uh so I'm really into kind of rhythmic type things. Is there a third? I have to think of the third genre. Well, no, that's three. Hip hop and then percussive things.

Speaker 13:32

Percussive things. My dad, he took a he took a dance class. Hero tech.

Speaker 2 13:37

What did he take?

Speaker 13:37

Hip hop.

Speaker 2 13:38

Did he?

Speaker 13:38

He knows how to break dance.

Speaker 2 13:39

Who did he take it from? Do you know?

Speaker 13:40

Uh I don't remember. It would be back in when the dinosaurs were around.

Speaker 2 13:46

We have a great hip-hop faculty member. He's like the best, so you should go check out his class. His name is Why Not. Um, he's out and about all the time performing all over the world, and then he comes back and teaches our awesome students here in West Texas. So why not? It's really good. Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 14:03

How long have you danced for?

Speaker 2 14:04

Oh gosh. Uh let's see. Well, I'm in my four well, I'm 41. I started dancing when I was seven, so a very long time. How many? I don't do math. What is it?

Speaker 14:17

By the way, I reacted facially to the since I was seven, not I'm 41, by the way. No, I don't it doesn't matter. Okay, it's fine. I want to make that explain. I won't be offended.

Speaker 2 14:24

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, so whatever seven minus forty-one is. Why can't I? 34 years. Great, thank you.

Speaker 14:35

Did you see yourself doing this at a young age?

Speaker 2 14:39

Or yeah. I mean, when I told my parents, like they asked me what I want to do, and I couldn't say one thing. I was like, oh, I want to be a dancing veterinarian that I can't remember what the third thing was. Um, which is very important to me, which is funny because I've literally held like a million jobs at all times my entire life. Um, but I really wanted to be a veterinarian, but then like I kind of got grossed out that I'd have to cut open animals and stuff. So we we left that. But I I started dancing at seven and um didn't know that you could go to college for it for a while, but once I found that out, I was like, oh well then yeah, I'm gonna do that. Um but I didn't have any expectations, but dance has been a part of my life even when I'm doing non-dance things. When I was in New York, my day job was a um office manager at the Joyce Theater, and the Joyce Theater is one of one of the most well-known dance theaters in in the world, uh, which has been great because I would sit at my desk and all of these like amazing famous choreographers and dancers from all over the world would come through the doors every day. Um so even when I was doing like non-dance work, I got to be around dance and learning about dance.

Speaker 15:43

Did you make good like connections there?

Speaker 2 15:46

Yeah, I mean more of like, I mean, no one I didn't get a job from it really. Um did I? I don't think so. Um but yeah, I got to talk to a lot of people, hear their perspective, see how they work. Um, of course, I'm also talking to the crew, so like I can hear kind of what's going on. We have faculty meeting or not faculty meetings, that's here. We'd have staff meetings and um we'd kind of hear how the company's running. They might say, Oh, this company needs lots of support, they only have like one person that's managing the company, or it'd be a giant company that has like you know, 50 people on staff that travel with them with all of these sets. Um so I learned a lot about how the dance world works uh with that job.

Speaker 16:24

Big and small, from what it sounds like.

Speaker 2 16:26

Yeah, yeah. I've and all like most of my jobs have been in like some kind of movement or or dance. Um or actually moving and dancing.

Speaker 16:37

Well, did anyone growing up in your family teach you how to dance, or did you just want to learn from school, or what did you do to get implemented into the world of dance?

Speaker 2 16:46

Um my mom danced when she was little, she did ballet but not very long. Um, and she told me that as a kid. But then we would go to the mall and we'd see these dancers perform in the middle of the mall, and I thought it was so cool. My mom thought it was terrible. Like she thought it was like the worst dancing she's ever seen, but I didn't know any better, and I thought it was really cool, and they had like sequins on, so I was on board. Um, she's like, Okay, fine, I'll put you in dance. So I started there, and I was just I was a good mover, like I have good coordination, but I struggled a lot with technique and like kind of learning that stuff because I'm I'm a tighter body and and flexibility didn't come really natural to me, so I had to work really hard to like get my body to do the things that it does now. Um and now it doesn't feel so hard because I've been doing it my whole life. Um, but I think I also like the challenge of that. I think if I was automatically really good, I would have gotten bored and probably didn't continue.

Speaker 17:40

Yeah, I completely agree. I think it's nice to struggle sometimes.

Speaker 2 17:43

Yeah.

Speaker 17:43

You learn a lot.

Speaker 2 17:44

And I've seen dancers do that, like they they're just so good and and they get really lazy because they know like, well, I don't have to really put much effort, I'm just naturally awesome. And I don't think that's really great for the artist's brain in general.

Speaker 17:58

It's really not. There's not much room for growth there. Yeah. Um so my brother, you mentioned your mentor. Um, my brother, he went to uh the old Globe Life Park in Arlington and he saw um Roger Waters and Paul McCartney live, and he's very interested in guitar. He's in a band now. Ever since then he's made money doing music. And um is there anyone you had growing up that you looked up to as a dancer that made a large impact to where you are today?

Speaker 2 18:31

I don't know. Because like I feel like I would see a dancer thought they were great and be inspired by it, but there wasn't someone that was like consistent that I kept thinking about. Um I think what really inspired me were like documentaries. Um, because every once in a while one would come out, and it's not like today where you can just I didn't have the internet in high school for like half of the high school. So it's not like you could just jump on and see things all the time. So if something came out, people got very excited. And I remember watching um Bill T. Jones documentary, and then a documentary from um Paul Taylor, and that was like a behind-the-scenes showing the company and their life and like their dancing and their process, and those things really inspired me. Like I got really excited about that. I'm like, oh, that's what I want to do, and like I want to have these conversations, I want to be backstage and all that stuff. So I think it was more of those than like a one person that I can think of as that as a dancer.

Speaker 19:27

So it's not necessarily just dance that keeps you going, it's the whole process of being with a group of people and coming up with this big production and then just finishing at the very end. That's the end result that you really look for.

Speaker 2 19:40

Yeah, I really enjoy the collaboration and like the community that you build while you're working on something. Um is very cool, and I think it's different than what most people experience, um, just like day-to-day at their work. I think people probably also experience this like in sports and stuff, and you're you're doing hard things with a group of people all the time, and then sometimes you have successes and sometimes you don't. Um and I really like that. I think it's fun.

Speaker 20:06

Well, that's a really cool aspect to enjoy um with your work. There's not many people that get to do that, mainly people that have a line of creativity with their work. Um whenever you were dancing, what made you want to sort of teach dance? What would changed your your aspects of hey, I want to learn dance, I want to teach dance, not only learning while I do it.

Speaker 2 20:27

Um, I mean, completely honest, it was a money thing. And most of the time if people find out that you dance and if you they think you're a good dancer, they always try to make you teach. And and they're and you're told that when you're going through undergrad, like, oh, you can teach to make money and do this, and so I just did that, but then I ended up feeling like I was kind of good at it and it was something that came naturally. Now I've learned a lot over the years, like if I saw a class that I taught when I was 20, and now I'd probably cringe quite a bit. Um, but I've had a lot of really good teaching mentors over the years. Um, and now I really enjoy like programming things to see if I can get someone to a certain spot by the end of the semester and do it without them like noticing. Like, that's more satisfying.

Speaker 21:10

If you saw one of your students fall, what would you say to them? Like, would you say, get back up, let's do it one more time, or what would you say?

Speaker 2 21:17

I mean, if they're not hurt, well, I mean, I ask them if they're okay.

Speaker 21:20

Of course, yeah. Get up, do it again.

Speaker 2 21:23

But yeah, usually they do. Like, you don't have to tell them to get up. I mean, it's not like men's basketball where they do a whole show and they lay on the floor and cry and like you know. Um, they usually get up immediately because it's embarrassing to them. And it's not embarrassing in reality. You should fall here and there because I actually we work off balance constantly. So if you're not actually moving in that direction, um, when you fall, you know you have some information, like, okay, I need to pull back here. Um so I like it when they actually fall without hurting themselves because it gives some information about you know how they can tweak things for the next time. But yeah, it's embarrassing, especially when you're you know a room full of people. And so they'll just jump up and usually you can't even tell that they fall.

Speaker 22:03

Well, that's so cool that they have the instant want to just get right back up and get right back to learning.

Speaker 2 22:08

I mean, and you have to do that on stage too, because like you will fall on stage sometimes and and again you can't like lay on the floor and be like, uh Well, they're experts at making it look like it was on purpose. Oh yeah. Yeah, that's the fun part too. Like I enjoy in the moment when something goes wrong, like trying to make a decision and be like, how can I make this look like we have this, you know, completely under control? Everything is okay.

Speaker 22:30

Is there a certain student you kind of like to toot the horn to that's maybe fallen and you see make trem tremendous strides?

Speaker 2 22:37

And I wouldn't say they've fallen. Oh, I'm gonna say two, because there's two of them that are in my cast for dance tech, and I I spend more time with them than the others. Um, but I had them um in Contemporary Four when I first got here, and then I have them in my piece, and the amount that they have changed and matured in their dancing, like they looked like college students, um, and they're both seniors, so but now they like they look like professional dancers, and it's really beautiful to see Hannah Coburn and Emma Hale. Um I was just looking at them warm up for my piece, and I was like, dang! I was like, you guys look so beautiful, and it seemed really effortless in their body, and they're really mature, like you know, with the getting feedback and all that stuff can be really overwhelming and a lot to deal with, and they work really hard and try to understand what I'm saying, and it and they have a curiosity that I think um is really helpful in that kind of situation.

Speaker 23:31

So yeah. Well, that's so cool. Uh what what do you think is the best thing about witnessing a college student come to tech and then you watch them grow for four to eight years or however long they're here for, yeah. And they just become this entrepreneur, like there's a per there's a person that's a professional at the end of the day.

Speaker 2 23:51

Yeah, I mean I think what's really cool, well what excites me is when I can witness their curiosity grow, because that's the most important part. They're all gonna grow as dancers because they're training and technique every day. Um, but once you stop being curious about things, it it kind of gets flat, and it's something that you have to reignite in yourself throughout your entire life, especially if you want to be an artist, because you're gonna get burnt out real quick. I think with any job, really, you're gonna get burnt out if you don't have a sense of curiosity. But seeing them think before I say something or think of an idea, or um, especially in choreography class is really fun when a student that is kind of quiet creates something that you never thought would come from them. Uh so it's these moments where I can see that they're taking the initiative and feel confident in sharing their ideas and like what they've been thinking about and things like that, that it actually goes beyond their dancing and their technique. Like those are my more bigger wins because that's gonna carry them way longer than doing like a perfect leap or something.

Speaker 24:51

Do you still have students coming to you after they graduate saying thank you for teaching me all this and that?

Speaker 2 24:56

Well, I don't have many, well, because I don't have any of gradu well last year I had two that graduated, so they're very new, and I've seen them at some shows, so um, but I haven't been teaching in higher education long enough um to actually to be far away from them for them to come back.

Speaker 25:14

Well, I'm sure they'll come back.

Speaker 2 25:16

Yeah, I mean there's no doubt. Yeah, I stay in contact with quite a few of them because you know once they're not students anymore, you tend to connect on social media so you can see what they're up to and all the great stuff that they're doing. Um so I do stay connected to them in most ways. And I feel good if I have a student that I didn't know that well, but I had them for a while, and then they add me and I'm like, oh So you liked me.

Speaker 25:38

Um if you didn't teach dance, what would you be teaching or doing right now?

Speaker 2 25:41

I've never done anything else. I remember having conversations where I'm like, so I just hear a lot of dance. Is there anything else? I'm like, no.

Speaker 25:50

There's nothing wrong with having that one really big interest, you know.

Speaker 2 25:54

Yeah, I don't know. I think just a something that I can like kind of problem solve each day. Like, I I'm not really sure what I would be doing because I just like what I'm doing so much. I've had so many side jobs that I'm trying to think of one of those I'd want to do full-time. Because as a dancer, you're always doing weird things on the side to make enough money. Um, like I taught yoga, I worked in a box office, um I did all sorts of things. I performed at someone's birthday party, which is very weird. Um, there's all these like random stuff. I like helped run a little studio for a while that for artists to use for rehearsal space. Um so I think I would still somehow have to be connected to supporting artists in some way, but then maybe more in a um admin kind of role.

Speaker 26:38

A management way.

Speaker 2 26:39

Yeah, I like doing admin work, like because it's clear-cut, like this needs to be done, and you do it. Like I like things that are like that.

Speaker 26:48

Me, I'm like, I like to, you know, weave around.

Speaker 2 26:52

That makes sense.

Speaker 26:53

Um what is it about working for tech that you love the most?

Speaker 2 26:58

Hmm. I think I do like that it's a small department. I mean, I'm sure in recruiting they don't like that. But uh, it's really nice that I do know everyone there. Um, even the students I don't have in class, I know who they are at least. Um so it oh my stomach's growling. It seems like a uh a very small knit community, and but then with something affects one student, it does affect the whole community. But it's easy to kind of bring people together and talk through things that may happen. Um but I do that's like my favorite thing. I love the faculty. Um we all get along really well, and I enjoy working with them, and I think they're great, and we all have something unique to offer, and I think we're uh creating something that's really diverse in what we're able to offer them because we have such great faculty. So that's important to me. Um yeah, and I like that I get to make work and and dance tech and things like that. So I get to be creative, but I also get to do office work and then I get to work with students, so I'm kind of spread all over the place, which is good for my brain.

Speaker 27:59

You're are you scatter brained? You like to be everywhere?

Speaker 2 28:02

I don't like to, but I am. Like um my brain just kind of goes like this all the time. I'm constantly being like, wait, what was I doing? Um but I do like have several things going at once. It's kind of fun.

Speaker 28:16

Well, um, when's the last time in a performance you've taken a risk?

Speaker 2 28:20

The last time, I there's two things I'm thinking of. The last time was for my thesis performance. Um I had to create it during COVID, and most people deferred their graduation until after, and I was older than everyone else, and I was like, I really just need to go out and get a job. Like, I want to finish this. So we did a um traveling performance that started in an old freight house, and it moved through this park and over this river. Um, so I had dancers kind of stationed every dancers in the river, which is risky for them more than me. Um, and we were dancing, none of the places we were dancing were like dance floors, so that was also hard. We had a lot of splinters from being in the um the freight house, and then we would move the audience out to go on the walk, and then I would have crew come in and wipe everyone's seat down, rearrange all the chairs, and open like the big they had these big kind of barn door things that slid up um to air it out so when they came back, you know, because we were so nervous because that time we just didn't have a lot of information. Um, I don't know if we ever really got a lot of information during that process, uh, but we're doing everything that we could to like keep it clean and safe for people. But we could only have 30 people at each performance. Uh, but it went really well. Everything went the way it was supposed to. We brought lights into the freight house, which was a new thing.

Speaker 29:39

Um interactive.

Speaker 2 29:41

We tried to bring smoke and set the fire alarm off, and the fire department showed up, so then we couldn't do that. There were just a lot of trial and error things that could have everything could have fallen apart. Um, and we actually never all rehearsed together at the same time until the first night of the show.

Speaker 1 29:57

Wow.

Speaker 2 29:58

Because I was rehearsing half online, some people couldn't come, like it was so scattered. So that felt very risky to me. I'm like, well, is this gonna work? And it was great. We had two shows, I think, and they went really well.

Speaker 30:10

What about the second one?

Speaker 2 30:11

The other one was I actually performed this. I made this piece based on my time working with the women in prison, but I also performed it there. But there was like over two hundred, it was like close to three hundred dominoes that I had to set up, and it took me 30 minutes to set up, and they were in this like square and a spiral thing, and I had a dance inside of this little square, and it was risky to me because if I hit something, I ruined the whole dance. And my cat would come by and like swing her tail when I'm practicing, and I'd have to reset the whole thing up. But it took 30 minutes to set up, and then the the piece was only five minutes long, so it was a lot of work for a very short amount of time. Um, so I'd get very nervous every time I performed it, and I would have to, you know, the all of them were sitting around me. Uh and that felt very risky to me, because I'm like, well, if I hit something, it ruins the piece and it's not effective at all. But I didn't in in performing, I managed to get through the piece without messing things up.

Speaker 31:05

Unless if the cat was around, of course.

Speaker 2 31:07

Yeah. Well, she doesn't like me doing things that aren't involved with her, and she would like pat fans and swing her tail, and so it wasn't very conducive for making that dance.

Speaker 31:17

Classic cat stuff.

Speaker 2 31:19

Yeah.

Speaker 31:19

Um, how much creative expression do you get when you have your performances?

Speaker 2 31:24

Like performances I'm creating. Oh, I can do whatever I want. Really?

Speaker 31:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2 31:31

Yeah. They can do whatever you want as long as we have like the facility or the resources for them to do it. Um, I always ask them to think out of the box. Um, sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. Um, but yeah, they can, you know, I'll support them to do an idea that hasn't been done before as long as it doesn't hurt anyone, you know, um, or isn't it wildly inappropriate or something like that? Of course. Um that even that depends, you know, it's like that's a form of self-expression too. It's like, let's think about this. Um, but yeah, I have total freedom that I give them total freedom. We generally have total freedom as you know, faculty too. It's like we you you don't get a faculty job and they're like, well, this is how you teach this course. Um you can follow some things that people have done before you, but you get to design every course that you teach exactly how you want to do it. Um and that's a lot of freedom there, but it's also you know a lot of work, and you want to think like, oh, I I have to teach them everything they should ever know about dance and dance history and all of this stuff, and that's not possible either, so it can be a little overwhelming. But but yeah, you really get to infuse your interests into your classes and what you want to share with the students.

Speaker 32:40

So well, sometimes just you know, nudging the students towards a direction to where they can learn on their own is just enough. You know? How do you constructively criticize your students?

Speaker 2 32:52

Huh. Yeah, I try, I mean, I I wouldn't necessarily think of me as criticizing them, but yeah, I tell them what I notice about what they're doing, and I I try not to use words like good or bad, and I try to get them to not say that either way, oh yeah, I have a bad left leg. I'm like, no, you don't. Um, so I try not to let that be in the space because that's also not helpful, because then you start to think that you have a bad left leg, and then your legs don't work as well because your brain thinks you have a bad left leg. Um so I really just try to show them what I'm noticing in their body, and we talk about mechanics of their particular bones and their body, not my body, because we all look different and have different lengths and widths, and um, so I try to look at corrections and technique as problem solving and not you're doing this wrong.

Speaker 1 33:39

Gotcha.

Speaker 2 33:40

Um, but we're actually just trying to find more fluidity and functionality. So generally, once they do that, they feel better, so it's not like you're doing it wrong. It's like, here, let me help you have a little bit more space while you're moving.

Speaker 1 33:51

Gotcha.

Speaker 2 33:52

So it's more of a problem-solving thing. But I think our students are really gracious here and they handle it well. I'm not mean about it, but um, I try to also get them to think for themselves in the process, or or if they're just kind of moving because I'm telling them to I'm like, Do you know what I mean? And sometimes they'll be like, oh no, I don't, and then we can have a deeper conversation. Um, because when a teacher is talking to you, you're just trying to move and like please them, you may not actually be thinking about what you're doing and where the change is happening. Um, so sometimes I'll stop if I see that and like, do you know what I mean? Or is this not making sense? And then we can have a conversation. I can choose different words if the ones I say aren't resonating, or or if I had some imagery that doesn't work for them, I can think of something else.

Speaker 34:33

Do you ever pick up on like when they're they go, Yeah, I I know what you mean? And they don't actually know what you mean.

Speaker 2 34:38

Oh, yeah, all the time. Yeah, yeah, and that's okay. Like also, you know, if you're introducing a concept, you can't always fix it because you have a habit in your body, so you just kind of notice it, and the next time you can kind of do it a little bit more. So yeah, I don't expect them to immediately change um unless it's something simple like, oh, you should look to the left on that. Well, obviously they can do that. We don't need to work on that for weeks, but um, but yeah, it's I mean it's a learning process, and I'm I do try to um like they're the big part of the learning process. I'm there to kind of help and guide them, but like they have to be able to propel themselves to want to learn and try to figure things out for their body because no one else is in their body, so they need to be really aware about what they're doing and how they're moving, um, because they're the expert on their body. I'm not, you know, I can offer helpful things, but I don't know what it's like to be inside their particular body.

Speaker 35:30

But well, you talked about learning and how they learn. Do you remember any specific interaction you have with a student where you learn something from them?

Speaker 2 35:41

I mean, I know there are things, I'm just my brain is blank right now.

Speaker 35:44

That's fine. Don't worry about that. Don't worry about that. As long as you've learned something, you know. I know that I have, but you've taught so much you might as well get the luxury of learning from your students as well.

Speaker 2 35:55

And I also learn about how to teach by watching them and how they, you know, react. Like if they look confused, then I'm like, okay, well, I'm not being clear, obviously, because it's not all on them, you know. Um, it might be the words that I'm choosing that make no sense to them, but they make complete sense to me because that's how I think about things. So I do watch their faces and like see how they react to stuff. Um, and then I change my words based on that. Like, if I want them to lengthen into something, but I'm saying hold, they're gonna hold and they're actually not gonna lengthen. So using the word hold isn't really helpful. Um, and I can see it in their body, like that my words affect what's happening in their body. So that's the main thing that I learned is by watching how they they react, I can then adjust my language. So that's awesome.

Speaker 36:40

That's uh that's uh uh what's it called, uh um subconscious cue or uh the cues of the subconscious mind that you kind of pick up on.

Speaker 2 36:53

Yeah, yeah. I mean words matter.

Speaker 36:56

Um what's the most fun you ever had on a dance set?

Speaker 2 36:59

There was a dance or a show that was called 60 by 60 in New York that happened every year, and they would pair up 60 composers with 60 choreographers, and they would make a 60-second dance, and they would run all the dances back to back and you'd have an hour show, and it was really quick.

Speaker 37:12

That's so cool.

Speaker 2 37:13

It is really cool, and someone asked me, because they were short on dancers, like, oh, would you want to do something? And I was like, and this is just when those T-Rex costumes started coming out. Like, no one really had one yet, but I saw one on YouTube or something, and I bought one because I just thought it was really funny. That was the best $50 I ever spent. But um, I said, I'll do it. I was like, if I can wear this T-Rex costume, and she was like, uh, let me check. So she went and asked the the people that were in charge. She's like, Yeah, they said it's totally fine. I'm like, cool. And they found this, or I was listening to the composers because they had some leftover that I choose from. And one was like this weird kind of almost like someone's narrating a comic book or something. So there's like some sound, but this guy's like talking about this um person named Lois who was Godzilla's sister, and she was working out to avenge his death. So I was like, oh, this is great. So I put on little like workout clothes and my T-Rex cost, like little pink ones, and I had little pink shoes, and I got one of those like um aerobic steps, and I did like a whole little aerobic dinosaur dance um for a minute, and it was like the best thing I ever made, and it was so annoying because I had so many friends who've seen me dance a million times over the years, and they came to that show and it was like 60 seconds, they were like, it was literally the best work I've ever seen you do. That is so upsetting, but also it was very fun. Like I had the best time getting it done.

Speaker 38:37

That's so funny. Yeah. Um, does your job ever feel like a collaboration with your students?

Speaker 2 38:42

Yeah, I mean it has to be. Like, I don't they don't really hire me to tell them exactly how to dance, like I'm here to help them become artists, and like I'm actually not very effective at all if the two teacher or the student just shows up and stands there and expects me to tell them what to do. Like, we usually don't have that great of a relationship because I'm like, well, you're not bringing anything into the table for me to like work with. Um so we both have to work together in order to get to the goal that we both have, and we both have different goals for the most part, depending. And we talk about that at the beginning of the semester too, about what their goals are for themselves. Um, but yeah, I work best with students who are already asking questions, who are already kind of adjusting themselves because I can see that their brain is like ready to learn. Um, this is students that kind of sit back that I don't get much done with because there's not this going back and forth. It's just me talking at them and they'll nod at me, but then they don't try anything out in their body, so that the information isn't going anywhere, and they're just like, yeah. And then they do it again exactly the same way. Um, so when the students are able to collaborate with me and talk to me, ask me questions, uh, it goes so much better. And and they learn more doing that when they have the freedom to talk. I had one class, they didn't know me very well, and it was pretty silent the whole first half of the semester. And at midterms, I was like, hey, I was like, first of all, this is terrible for me. I was like, I'm just here talking to a room of void. I was like, but I was like, I want you to ask questions. And they started asking questions that got really comfortable, and we got way more work done, they started dancing way better, there was a better morale in the space. Um, so very much I need input from the students in order to be effective at what I do.

Speaker 40:21

Well, that's crazy because I never imagined that every day would feel like that. I figured, you know, performance to performance, yeah, but every day feels like a collaboration for you.

Speaker 2 40:30

Yeah.

Speaker 40:31

Wow.

Speaker 2 40:31

Yeah, I mean, especially, you know, if I'm creating performance on students, I'm it's always a collaboration. It's not just me putting my work on them because some things don't work for certain bodies, and I need to adjust. Like I would never want someone to get injured because something I do hurts their body and it doesn't hurt mine. Um, so there's a lot of adjustment and figuring out what works for them. Choreography class, like we're collaborating all through that, and they're collaborating with each other. Um, technique, definitely collaboration. Um dance history, a little bit. I mean, it's online, so I I don't have as much interaction as I would like, but they collaborate quite a bit um with each other through that. But yeah, I think everything that's a very important part. And in our his our our choreography class right now, each of the choreographers are paired up with a composer from the music department, um, so they're collaborating together to make something. Um so I think that that's very important in general in the arts, no matter what you're doing, that there's some outside collaboration because you shouldn't have to come up with all the great ideas. Like the great ideas come when when two people with really good ideas like come together, two or more, I suppose. So yeah, I think collaboration is important.

Speaker 41:37

Well that that's really cool that you get to spend every day collaborating with people.

Speaker 2 41:41

I mean yeah, it is really cool.

Speaker 41:43

Um who are some dance pioneers who have made an impact in the world of dance?

Speaker 2 41:49

Hmm. I mean, I feel like I have to say Jose Lamone, because that's the person that um I've studied his work for a long time. He's no longer living, he's a Mexican-American um choreographer, and he um Doris Humphrey is considered one of the you know founding mothers of modern dance, and she was his artistic director of his company. He works with a lot of concepts and not necessarily um strict movements, which I think can translate across all sorts of genres, and so I look for works that can do that. So it's not like oh I'm a Lamone dancer or I'm a gram dancer, but you can use what you're learning these things to apply to other types of dance, and I think that his technique does that. Uh and a lot of people have carried his technique down and made it their own and gone in different directions with it, but I really resonate with um Lamone principles of movement. So I think that was the first person I would think of.

Speaker 42:45

That's awesome. Yeah. I I need to research him.

Speaker 2 42:48

Yeah. Jose Lamon.

Speaker 42:50

I was actually gonna ask you if if if I wanted to learn how to dance, would you teach me? Like, as a private Let's just say, like, let's just say I I walked up to you, right? Just me.

Speaker 2 43:01

I would make you an enroll in a class. We have intro to dance. If you've never danced before, the dance program set has intro to dance, and it'll give you a little snippet of ballet, jazz, and modern, and then after that you can enroll in a level one of something that you in what way have those pioneers made an impact in how you dance today? Yeah, so I think um, like when I was talking about these Lamon principles, I use all of those in my movement no matter what I'm doing. So I think that has changed my dancing quite a bit and how I approach movement that's not familiar to me. And I might uh, for example, I don't know, opposition. It's like, well, I'm having trouble balancing here, so I can oppose two things away and I can find more stability no matter what the shape is. So it can be something I'm familiar with or not. Um so I think following we won't we don't have to go through all the principles, but these little movement principles, uh, it's an easy way for me to access movement that's not familiar. To my body, which also helps when you're like in audition settings and things like that. Um, so that's how I think he's impact impacted me the most. And then I also teach counter technique, which uh has a whole set of tools that kind of does the same thing that you can use these tools in any place that you're dancing, or in auditions when you're nervous, when you're tired, and all of these things. Um, so you can actually do your best no matter what the situation is.

Speaker 44:23

Oh, well, thank you so much. I have one more question before you get going, and it's actually a hypothetical uh so imagine this camera right here is a student, and if they wanted to come to school for dance, what would you say to them right now?

Speaker 2 44:36

How would I say that? Yeah, I would just say to jump in and enjoy all the stuff, figure out where all the um resources are in school and use everything to its fullest capacity. I think often we get really busy in undergrad um and we don't collaborate with people, we don't meet people in other departments, um, maybe we don't go use the wellness center. I don't think that's a proper name, but you know what I'm talking about. No, that was the right name. Is it?

Speaker 44:59

Oh Student Wellness Center. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 45:00

Okay. Go there. Um, there's just so many opportunities to connect with people and to do work, and I would just say to dive into that. Um and also know that whatever you think that you're going to do after school can change over time and it's okay. Um if you thought you were gonna be a professional dancer and then you're like, oh, I'm actually interested in admin, these are equal things. Um so I think letting your your mind wander and go towards the things that actually interest you and have that trajectory in the back of your head. But if that's keeping you from going towards something that you're interested in, um, I would maybe rethink that. So move towards your interests, I think is my my main advice.

Speaker 45:38

Awesome. That's all the time we have for the vocal cube. Thank you so much to Professor Brading for her time. I hope you have a great day.

Speaker 1 45:44

Thank you.

Speaker 45:44

Of course.