International
training - Dance, drumming, percussion & song with Danza Libre, Guantanamo,
CUBA
29th
March – 12th April 2002
My Cuban
training experience turned out to be very different to my initialexpectations. Guantanamo is
quite a sleepy place with not that much going on. I had imagined my evenings would be
filled with music and dancing - this was not to be. Guantanamo is quite a poor
place, hence people cannot afford to 'go out much in the evenings and as there is
little or no tourism, entertainment is only really available at weekends. Consequently my
evenings were spent desperately trying to learn Spanish, as few people spoke any
English. Dance and music are not such
an integral force in the community as I had imagined. However, dance and music are
a celebratory pursuit and are a major part of social activity. Not so much the
traditional/folkloric dances, but certainly Salsa, which is popular with both the young
and old.My days were very busy. As I
was the only person on the course my training wasquite intense. The company I was training
with (Danza Libre) also have a very intense day, beginning at 8.30a.m with a
contemporary class, followed immediately by a folkloric class. For the rest on their
day (up until mid-late afternoon) they work on company repertoire. The dancers work
extremely hard, are very fit & are very skilled technicians, they always
dance with great energy, even in rehearsals -I never saw any movements being 'marked'.
As well as the dancers, there
are also several musicians, who are full-time company members. They play and sing
for classes, rehearsals and of course Performances - they are an integral part of
Danza Libre whose roles are equally as important as the dancers. Members of Danza Libre
getwages from the government, and
funding wise that'sabout it! The dancers all pay
(out of their own wages) into a 'syndicate'. This money is for costumes, props, tours
etc. I found this quite shocking especially as their wages are only equivalent to
about $I9 (U.S.) per month.One of Danza Libre's main
objectives is to keep tradition and culture alive, thrivingand accessible. One of the
things they do to achieve this is to give a free performance in Guantanamo every Friday
night. These performances are full of people from the local community. They also
offer evening and weekend classes for both adults and young people.'Community dance' as we know
it does not seem exist in the same way as it does in England. I observed a few of
the community classes at Danza Libre and found the teaching style was very
didactic. There was no creative element to the classes, themain theme of the sessions
was learning steps & technique.The contemporary classes the dancers undertake are Graham
based; they have a set class, which varies little
each day. The style of the Contemporary repertoire/choreography, I
felt was quite obvious and predictable and in my opinionquite dated. Whilst I was
interested in their contemporary work I did not opt for thisas part of my training.In my first folkloric class
(led my the co. director) we studied Gaga. Gaga is fromHaiti, it is a strong, happy
dance, sometimes used in the context of a carnival. I really enjoyed it and picked the
movements up quickly, but 'getting' the style was a different story! I felt like
a robot compared to the Cuban dancers. The class structure consisted of a warm up, centre work, traveling and partner workAfter this I had a private
gaga lesson with one of the female dancers, where I gotchance to learn the movements
slowly and in more detail. She also watched me a lot and gave me corrections. It
was really useful to just give it a go in the company class ('in at the deep end') and
then break it down afterwards, as I got the feel of the atmosphere with the other
dancers and live music in class.Each day I also had a one to
one drumming/percussion lesson with one of thecompany musicians for 2 hours
(in the 2nd week the last hour was spent on singing lessons). As with the dance I
just chose a few styles and it made sense to work on the same music as dances.My first music lesson was
also Gaga, I learned 4 rhythms (& playing techniques) on different instruments and
learned how they each fit together. My teacher made sure I worked really hard playing
the rhythms over and over again, even the next day - pretty exhausting! After a
few days he then introduced the next style - Vodu. I was taught 3 Vodu rhythms one of
which I struggled with, 'Legate', (it was played on the Conga with sticks). I could
play it slowly but I found it difficult to play at therequired speed, which was
extremely fast.My final class each day was
Salsa and for this I was lucky enough to have twoteachers (one male & one
female dancer), all to myself! We went over the basicmoves - my teachers were real
sticklers for detail (& rightly so), nevertheless it was great fun! Cuban Salsa is
danced with bent knees & is very low, the hips, ribs and shoulders are always moving.Initially it felt like trying
to spin plates, I’d get certain parts of my body moving andothers would stop! These
sessions were my favourite, as they somehow seemed more light-hearted, probably
because Salsa is a social dance. Over the first few classes I began to link some of the
moves and then went onto partner work.The following day folkloric
class with the company introduced me to a new style -Vodu. Vodu again is a strong
Haitian dance and is highly energetic, I found this day much more difficult and felt
my movements looked incredibly stiff next to theothers. There are some truly
amazing dancers in the company who move withstunning speed and agility.This class ended in a circle
with different dancers (soloists) coming into the middleand improvising with the Vodu
moves we'd done in class. They worked togetherwith a drummer who
accompanied their moves, this improvisation also had acompetitive edge with dancers
dancing one another out of the circle, they werebrilliant and I felt that no
amount of training would ever get me to that standard - but hey, it was only day 2!In the folkloric styles,
which have mostly Haitian routes, I felt an African influencestrongly coming through. The
movements are nearly always grounded with emphasis toward the earth and are
almost tribal. Much of the folkloric choreography is based around stories, which are
often religious.During my stay in Guantanamo
I saw Danza Libre perform several times and either in performance or rehearsal saw
most of their repertoire. My general opinion is that they are stunning dancers as
individuals but do not perform well as an ensemble - most of the pieces are far from
'together' and never seemed 'slick' enough.Choreography is usually done
'in-house' often by the director, but on occasions some Of the dancers have this
opportunity. On the whole I felt the choreography was weak, especially in the
contemporary work.It was very interesting for
me to see the styles I had been working on in aperformance context. I very
much enjoyed watching the folkloric/traditional pieces as the dancers perform these
with great joy, they are really 'in' the dance and it feels very real.Sharen Wray from Birmingham's
Jazz Exchange choreographed one of the pieces'Rhythm in time'. This was
one of the stronger pieces. It was in the style of 'tapdogs'/'Stomp' and was quite
an obvious piece, but nevertheless good fun & far tighter than some of the other works.I was initially keen to learn
all the Cuban styles, but soon decided that this was not realistic and not the best
use of the time I had. I was a little disappointed but I knew it would be more
beneficial to
focus on fewer styles in more depth.My fírst day was spent
observing classes and rep & finally the performance in theevening for the locals. My
first lesson was after the performance in the culturalcentre, where there was
traditional live music. This was probably a good place tostart, as after a few glasses
of Cuban rum, I was much more relaxed!Cuban salsa is different to
the 'tasters' of salsa I’ve had before. I initially found ithard to pick up/hear the
rhythms they were dancing to. One of the dancers told me afterwards that Cuban salsa
is often danced over/across the music - this is probably why I couldn't feel a clear
rhythm.At first I was very concerned
about the language difference being a problem, as only one member of the company
spoke good English. It all worked out well though and we managed to communicate -I
guess that’s one of the brilliant things about dance, we can say what we need to
say through our bodies! There were only a few occasions when I wanted to ask my
teachers questions about the finer details of my studies, where I felt verbal
communication was needed.Every day I took part in the
company folkloric class the main styles I focused on were Gaga and Vodu, whoever was
leading the class asked me to were one of thetraditíonal skirts, as these
are used with the movement.My private folkloric class
was now with an ex- company member, who was myfolkloric teacher for the
rest of the course. He went over the Vodu moves in moredetail and again corrected me
- he even donned a skirt to show me the way thewomen dance it.This was all a very different
way of moving for me and a great deal of co-ordinationis needed for all the dances
I was learning (head patting & tummy rubbing style). i.e. shoulders circling, ribs
going forward and back and hips moving side to side - not to mention what the arms and
legs are doing.After the first few company
folkloric classes we began to include both Vodu & Gaga. I was still finding the steps
easy but the style very difficult. The atmosphere in these classes was
fantastic; the
dancers throw themselves into every movement and even in the class perform with great
energy and enthusiasm.I began to enjoy these
classes more and more. The private sessions also began tocover both Vodu & Gaga
and really moved me on, I was starting to feel that I wasgrasping the style. I felt
like I relaxed into it more as I became more familiar with my surroundings and became more
settled.As the days went by I began
to enjoy the folkloric styles more & more and felt Iwas really getting into the
style. It is more than apparent that the dancers andmusicians in Danza Libre take
great pleasure from these classes too.In the drumming and
percussion sessions I recapped Gaga and continued working on Vodu, learning more new
rhythms, which were very challenging. I felt that I neededto keep them slow until I got
more familiar with them, but the teacher wasencouraging me to go faster
and faster, At times this became frustrating and this was a time where the language
barrier came into play. I also would have liked more corrections and more focus on
my technique, sometimes I wasn’t sure if I was playing correctly.The next percussion &
drum class felt much better. We recapped and rehearsed all the rhythms & I felt like
I had established them a lot more - both Jose (the teacher) & I felt
satisfied and
relieved. Over the following few days we moved onto 'Son', a traditional Cuban rhythm
similar to Salsa I began with just one rhythm, it was very complex, but I gradually
developed more patterns. I was keen to play Salsa, but Jose thought I needed to learn Son
first.In my final few sessions with
Jose I got a little irritated by him playing and not really teaching me, I couldn't even
join in as he was playing much too fast for me. I wanted to talk to him about this,
but with my limited Spanish, I found it difficult tocommunicate my learning
needs.The Salsa classes were going
really well, each day I was building on a solo section and the partner work. I loved
the partner work, but was not very good at letting the man lead, I had a great time
being whirled, swirled and twisted around! I needed to relax a lot more with this
style, especially in my shoulders.At one point during my training
I began to wish the classes would move forward alittle faster, this was
possibly impatience but I was getting a little bored and frustrated by the same material. On
reflection this way of working was more useful, as I feel I developed stronger
foundations.In the second week of the
training I began the lessons in song. The first class wasvery challenging as the
teacher spent a lot of time talking (in Spanish). Despite meconstantly telling her I
didn't understand! I learned a Haitian song (again gaga tocomplement my other areas of
study). I later asked one the dancers who spokeEnglish to explain that a
more useful approach may be for her to just sing and for me to repeat.The subsequent singing
lessons were much better - less talking and more action! I had soon learnt two songs and
knew them well unaccompanied, but when I sang with the percussion it totally threw
me. It was a very tricky rhythm but I found it a big help to practice the song whilst
doing the basic Gaga step. By the end of the week I felt much more confident with the
singing, but I still needed a lot of concentration when accompanied by the
instruments.The feedback I was getting
from my teachers and other company members was good, I was told I move "like
a Cuban, not an English" (I was very flattered by this). The director asked me if I would
perform with the company at the end of the week, I was delighted and of course
accepted, but felt very nervous at this prospect!So now with the performance
looming, all my lessons were focused on this. I hadbegun to feel much more
comfortable with the style & was really enjoying it. At thebeginning of the course I had
thought I would never feel at ease with the style.The company also asked if I
would teach the company a contemporary class one day, again I was nervous, but
agreed. I didn't have any appropriate music with me, but I did have the live musicians
available. I was a little apprehensive about using them as this was a new way of working
for me. Despite my nerves the class was very well received.The dancers are used to a
very strict Graham class and I wasn't sure what they would think about my eclectic mix
of techniques. I only used a little recorded music as it was fantastic having the
musicians there - a real joy, they were brilliant!I was surprised that they
found some of my class difficult especially some of the more 'released' styles of work.
The dancers are all technically brilliant, however at times could be a little 'wooden'
when executing cotemporary movements. They are also very serious and found it
amusing that I keep reminding them to relax their faces.The language difference was
only an issue when it came to corrections and feedback, I found I couldn't just 'chip
in' in the usual manner. I had someone translating, but it was very time consuming.The final few days of the
course were spent preparing for the performance. Ipracticed with the rest of
the company, putting the pieces I had learned into thecontext of their 'show'.I was to do 2 duets in the
folkloric styles, Vodu & Gaga and a Salsa piece with therest of company. I also sang
the two songs I had learnt including some solo parts. I only played drums and
percussion a little in the performance as I wasn't quiteproficient enough to play at
the required speed for the dances. I was extremely nervous and
felt like my head was full of all the things I had to remember, which I had only
learnt in the last four days.My last day at Danza Libre
was the day of the performance. I was kitted out withcostume and we had a dress
rehearsal. I made a few mistakes, which heightened my nerves.Soon it was the real thing, I
was very anxious. The performance went very well and I enjoyed every moment of my
'guest appearance'. I got much cheering and applause and at the end a
representative from U.N.E.A.C (the National Union of Cuban artists and writers) came up on stage
and presented me with a certificate (see attached) for taking part in the course. It
was a brilliant way to end!During my training I compiled
a video of all the rhythms and movements I learnt. Ialso filmed several classes
and performances. Including the dress rehearsal of thepieces I had performed. Once
I have transposed these tapes they will be an extremely valuable resource. I also
kept a 'learning log' and took many photographs (some of which are attached).I am maintaining contact with
Danza Libre with possible links for the future. I havealready begun using the songs
and dances I have learnt. I am currently using recorded music as I do not feel
'fluent’ enough to play live. But I am continuing to practice and hope to integrate live
music when I gain more confidence and speed with the rhythms. Further development
of this work will hopefully take form through fusion of styles.This course and cultural
experience has been a highly valuable experience, which will be fully utilized in my work
& will stay with me for years to come.Kathryn Brant12th June 2002Dear LUTSF SecretaryLisa Ullmann Travelling
Scholarship FundPlease find enclosed 2 copies
of my report on recent international training involvingtwo weeks intensive studying
of dance, drumming, percussion and song. Theaforementioned training took
place 29th March – 12th April in Guantanamo, Cuba.I have achieved the aims of
this project through developing my dance training andchallenging my body to a
different way of moving. I feel refreshed and have newinspiration. I have also
gained a lot of new teaching material and a realistic insightinto Cuban culture.I have already begun
disseminating my new skills through primary education andintend to further this
through in-service training. I will be informing North West andYorkshire dance agencies of
my recent training and will make my contact detailsavailable for any artists
wishing to share these skills. I also intend to transpose and edit my video to make this
available as a resource.Future awardees planning to
undertake training in Cuba should get a student visa as opposed to a tourist visa, to
avoid a lot of unnecessary bureaucratic hassle. Also knowledge of the Spanish
language would be advantageous. I would also advise awardees with a limited
timescale to focus on covering smaller learning areas in depth as opposed to trying to cover
too much.Thank you and all involved in
the L.U.T.S.F once again for your support, it has been hugely valuable and greatly
appreciated!Yours sincerelyKathryn BrantDance Artist