Nottdance2011: Checking in… and out!

Hey guys, I’m Katie… probably the one and only Intern in Dance4’s history to not drink tea!

So… now the festival has been and gone here are just some of my first experiences, thoughts and reflections of the past 10 incredible weeks I have had here at Dance4.

First Day: Was quite daunting… Meeting the team, being given my own desk and to then discover that I would actually be managing my own projects, not just assisting! Looking back however I wouldn’t have had it any other way. The experience I have gained from being given the opportunity to get stuck in, use my own initiative and develop my skills has been invaluable, and from this insight I can gladly confirm that working in this field is something I could happily do for a long time to come.

First Month: Bumping in to the Youth Strategy Manager and the Artistic Director of the company on a night out in Nottingham in your first few weeks probably isn’t the recommended way to make your first impressions! However it was reassuring to know that the team all party too! &Everyone does leave the office to let their hair down, no matter how much the work is piling on! It has also been fantastic to have Radojka and Ben here in the same position, so we were all thrown in together and experiencing the same responsibilities and stresses (not that we were ever stressed, obviously!).

First Nottdance Event: The Launch Party. Some top quality entertainment went down at Antenna from swing band Benny Lee and The Whistle Stop Five accompanied by a swing dance demo from Hayley Guest and Terry Hallett, which after a few ‘Nottdance Cocktails’ got everyone up exhibiting their best lindy-hopping moves on the dance floor!

Behind the scenes...

• Confirming a venue
• Listening to numerous band demos to find someone to fit the bill!
• Hardcore negotiating skills to stick to the budget
• By far the most strenuous job of them all… sampling Champagne, Cocktails and Canapés in preparation for the evening… somebody had to go and make the difficult decision!
• Being reversed down the steps outside the Dance4 Office by a taxi driver with a car full of equipment after the launch party was definitely an experience too!
• One event down… 3 to go!

Glorious, Rajni Shah Projects: A simply inspiring performance from Rajni and her team, as their sumptuous new musical ‘Glorious’ took to the stage at The Nottingham Arts Theatre, Involving 12 local performers and musicians who in just days committed to performing in the project and assisted in making it the success it was.

Behind the scenes...

• Finding Musicians!
• Transporting the team to Nottingham
• Creating awareness, promoting and advertising the interventions happening in The Meadows, set to aid Rajni and team to scout the perfect performers to get involved in the show!
• Arranging a preview… of the preview of Glorious! At The Walk for Light Night
• Liaising with the most encouraging and Glorious team of artists, Rajni, Helena, Suzie, Karen and Lucille, to bring this show to Nottingham!

Street Martial: An open public event within The Broadmarsh Shopping Centre including performances from Ali Fekih, CDO Capoeira, Fresh 101: Sleaford Boys, Leicester Parkour and Paul Russ himself with the new ‘Spirit Dance’ set to take over Nottingham!

Behind the scenes...

• Enquiring with body-builders about the possibility of hiring a Boxing Ring
• Confirming acts and groups to perform
• Compiling risk assessments and contracts
• Transporting equipment and (trying my very hardest to be useful) setting-up the performance space!

The Closing Party: Having not overspent on the Launch Party (Wheeeeey!) …this permitted the Closing Party (Wooooop!). An evening of merriment occurred in La Gitane in which the Dance4 team, artistes &friends (minus Claire who was greatly missed!) partied in to the early hours to celebrate and bid farewell to Nottdance 2011!

Behind the scenes...

• Eating the delicious Mediterranean style buffet
• Drinking wine and definitely not ordering Jager-cokes with Radojka and Ben on ‘Paul’s tab’ (Definitely Ben’s idea Paul!)
• Throwing some shapes on the dance floor whilst admiring the shapes being thrown by others!
• Wrapping up the festival and beginning this blog with a slightly sore head the next day!

In my time here at Dance4 and over the festival I have met some truly genuine, talented artistes, and being able to help them out and make sure their work takes to the stage has been an absolute pleasure! As a result of everyone’s hard work I also had the opportunity to see some fantastic performances across the festival, which have just been inspiring!

I would be here all day listing the fantastic times I have had, therefore I will stop there! Keep checking the website to hear further blogs and to keep up-to-date with the latest and greatest events Dance4 have to offer across Nottingham and the East Midlands, and as I thank the Dance4 team for this amazing opportunity, I bid farewell… for now!

Katie Shipp

Nottdance Intern 2011

Intern's Choice

‘What exactly does a Nottdance Intern do?’ I hear you ask. OK, well maybe not you specifically, but let me enlighten you anyway!
This year Dance4 has taken on two extra people – myself and Katie – to specifically help support the regular producing team in the months running up to and during the festival as there is so much extra work involved in a condensed period of time. We have both been given our own events to project manage (much to our pleasant surprise!), and have had to organise components such as our artist’s travel and technical requirements whilst liaising with the venues… as well as lots of other random prep-ing tasks along the way.
What’s so great (and scary) about being the Nottdance Intern is the fact that Dance4 trust us with the responsibility to produce events ourselves – even though neither of us has ever produced anything on this scale before! It’s like being thrown in at the deep end to see how you cope: you push yourself to deal with things you might have wimped out of before (who else is going to make that deadline?!), though it’s not a problem as I feel as though I’ve have had great support from everyone at Dance4 all the way through. What a journey it’s been :-)

Anyway, I don’t want to write too much about what I’ve been up too (Katie’s going to fill you in about some Intern-related assignments) so I thought I’d just tell you about a couple of my favourite pieces in the festival…

This year Nottdance has worked in association with the Cultural Exchanges Festival in Leicester to programme a talk with acclaimed choreographer Lea Anderson. This stood out as a brilliant event to me as the personable and informal discussion/screening gave me a great introduction into her work with The Cholmondeleys and The Featherstonehaughs – I had only heard the Anderson name banded around in various texts relating dance and film but never actually seen her work (apparently ‘Flesh and Blood’ was focused on in the A level Dance syllabus). Likewise, I think that for the audience who did know a lot about Anderson, the discussion allowed an insight into her inspiration and working process. As someone who focused her university studies into dance on film I found this to be an inspiring perspective into thinking about film in dance.
Now trying to locate videos of Lea Anderson’s work! Any ideas?

Samir Akika/Unusual Symptoms brought ‘Extended Teenage Era’ to Lakeside in the final week of the festival. Well, where do I even begin?! The mixture of break dance, contemporary choreography, observational comedy, pop cultural references and mouse-trap-esque scenery arranging was a pleasure to watch! I feel it safe to say that everyone who saw this show came out with a huge smile on their face and I am so keen to watch it again as there was a myriad of goings-on to take in. If you have the chance to see this show, I strongly recommend that you do.

Finally, I have to mention Simon Ellis’ ‘Leaving’ which was one of the festival’s closing events on Sunday 13th. This was one of my projects and one of my favourites to watch too. On the surface, the participants (most of them never having performed before) were randomly hugging and waving goodbyes around Nottingham train station, but take a step back and you began to notice little ‘performances’ taking place everywhere in the station. Which of the couples in extended hugs were part of the project and which were just leaving a loved one to board a train? It was even hard for me to tell the difference. The subtleness of ‘Leaving’ within the station provided an unobtrusive and beautiful insight into the moment of departing (and, in a way, greeting too), and the sunny-ness of the Sunday afternoon framed it perfectly.

And so now it’s back to the Dance4 office, post-Nottdance Festival 2011, where the atmosphere is oddly still. Where are the artists running up to us with requests? Why is the phone not ringing off the hook? What happened to everyone wearing our brand colours of black and orange? It’s strange to think that I’ll be leaving at the end of this week (but not before a cake party on Friday afternoon in aid of Comic Relief!). I’ve had a blast working in the team on Nottdance and this short stint in event management has spurred me on to continue on this path – what a fantastic opportunity!

Thanks and much love to all at Dance4. I can’t wait to see what you bring out for the next Nottdance Festival!

Radojka x