Digital Analogue

small letters period

That was the name of the informal dance concert I went to tonight. As usual, it was sort of hit-or-miss, but there's so much variety at the informals that I think any given person is pretty much guaranteed to like some and dislike others (with the "some" and "others" varying from person to person). There was a tap dance to "Singing in the Rain", which was sort of unpolished but a lot of fun. Unfortunately, having to tap on the marley really subtracted something; I hope that if there's more tap dancing performances they figure out something to do about that.

Some of the pieces were essentially conventional modern dance, except that the dancers focussed more on working with the music than on trying very hard to make it meaningful. That's good, because if you have to pick just one and you go with "imbue meaning", well, it's a lot harder to watch and doesn't really convey much anyway. I wish more dancers would spend time in the fluff pieces first, polish the skills, and then move on to the interpretive dance. At least that way the intermediate stage is fun to watch!

The best piece of the evening was without a doubt the Mother Africa bit. It was not really a skit in the theatre sense, but a lot more than just dancing; there was a script and a story to tell. And the live drummer was awesome (both meaning "great to listen to" and "great for the piece").

There were some clinkers too, but I'm not going to dwell on them. Too much negativity lately. Overall, nice show!

"Two facts: He loved us. And we killed Him." --Nicholas Patricca, The fifth sun (Anne)