some thoughts on the final evening

We're about to meet at D. Hay's house for a final night party. Our
man Karl who works for BodySurf Scotland who really runs the day to
day and helps us out is bringing some of the local single malt. I am
awfully excited about that. I haven't had any yet - and some of you
will drop a jaw to hear that. But it's true.

Today we saw 6 solos. Marielle, Celine, Shelly, Brenden, Melissa,
Fiona Bryant. Couldn't be more different. And couldn't be better
examples of just how MUCH progress has been made in 10 short days. I
don't know how it's happened and I only hope that I have been able to
make such progress too. Really just impressive performances - better
yet instances of how each of the dancers has opened over the days.

Now I'm disappointed that I didn't get to go again, but we did do a
final group practice "without the shape" as Deborah H. says, meaning
not practicing I'LL CRANE FOR YOU. And then we did a practice "with
shape." As we were working she paused us and asked us to do it as a
group dance - not simply 20 people doing their own version, but that
we worked together to create a group dance. It was fantastic. All
doing the same choreography, all doing a completely different
adaptation in the moment, all at the same time. One feels finally that
when we are released to our own worlds, our own lives, our own
rhythms, our own solitary practices, we will always have the feeling
of not actually being alone in the practice, but that we have the
other 19 moving all around us to inspire the movement. It's quite
moving actually. And we'll also understand that the 19 others and
Deborah as well will be finding some moment, some time, some space,
some stolen opportunity during the day, each day, to do a practice for
1/2 hour, or 20 minutes, or 1 hour of I'LL CRANE FOR YOU. And each
will be finishing the practice sometimes mystified, sometimes
disappointed, sometimes frustrated, sometimes no doubt just elated,
and thinking about their "frame" for the piece and about when in fact
they will do their first public performance - not before 3 months time
of daily practice. It'll be a laugh to think that we'll be spread all
over the world, finding time to do the same thing. And then I think
of other Solo Performance Commissioning Project dancers living the
same rhythm with their own dances all over the world - some 140 of
them - and suddenly the world seems an even smaller and even
friendlier place.

Okay, I'm getting a little sentimental and I apologize (and I haven't
even had any of the scotch yet) but I cannot help but think about it.

Remember my friends, my patrons, and collaborators that you've made
this possible - not simply so that Bondo could go and do something
exotic and cool, but that all of the spcp'ers could go out and make
something unique, to keep Deborah Hay in the world (which is very
important) and to make art.

I'll leave you with a quote Deborah gave us early on - from where it
comes I don't remember:

"The purpose of art is to make life more interesting than art." [Deborah reminds me that this is a quote from Robert Fillou. Thank you Deborah.]

Not bad. Okay, off for a snort.

Good night and see you all very soon.

Best,

Bondo