SPCP JOURNAL

SPCP JOURNAL
bondo

Saturday, November 22, 2008

November 22, 2008

Good Morning Everyone.
I haven't written in some time now. I've been healing as I said earlier. And, well, the days have been full and time has been short. And so finally recently I've been carving out moments to work and practice again. It is a good feeling to get back to it. And like anything else, time away can certainly impact positively how something is progressing. I think of listening to a scientist talk about how learning something is assisted by going to sleep. And later you realize that you know the thing you learned, a musical notation, a movement sequence, a memorized text much better - because in the "down time" or sleep or "away from ness" the mind has cleared away the extra chatter that is accumulated during the day which tends to cloud or impede one's ability to concentrate and learn. But actually, the brain is learning even when you are not consciously TRYING to learn something.
All by way of saying or forgiving myself for having taken time off to heal. Brother.

And so now I am in Chicago with SITI company performing RADIO MACBETH for the month of November at the Court Theater in Hyde Park on the south side. You ALL know Hyde Park now because it is the home of Barack Obama and his family. It is a lovely neighborhood full of really HAPPY people right now. We (the company) arrived the day before the election and witnessed and continue to experience the hangover bliss of that Tuesday night. One I will not forget to be certain.

And now we are well into the run and audiences have been fun and lovely. The theater has been incredibly supportive. We've (SITI) been workshopping at the same time a new adaptation of THE SEAGULL by our friend and playwright Michael West who came over from his home in Dublin to be with us for 10 days. So it has been very busy here.

I just received this link from one of the '08 commissioning project dancers Tania Soubry. It is an interview with Layard Thompson who has done 4 solo adaptations it seems. Here he is being interviewed about the work and about Deborah.

http://dancetech.ning.com/video/video/show?id=1462368%3AVideo%3A23958

I don't know Layard Thompson but I imagine many of you do. Perhaps this will be interesting to you.

Okay, going to get this body going and find time to do some work before the 2 RADIO MACBETH performances today. I'll practice either before, or in between the matinee and the evening show.

Best wishes to all of you and gratitude for your good wishes to me.

Bondo

Poem of the day (or whenever I change it)

"Odysseus"
Always the setting forth was the same,
Same sea, same dangers waiting for him
As though he had got nowhere but older.
Behind him on the receding shore
The identical reproaches, and somewhere
Out before him, the unravelling patience
He was wedded to. There were the islands
Each with its woman and twining welcome
To be navigated, and one to call ``home.''
The knowledge of all that he betrayed
Grew till it was the same whether he stayed
Or went. Therefore he went. And what wonder
If sometimes he could not remember
Which was the one who wished on his departure
Perils that he could never sail through,
And which, improbable, remote, and true,
Was the one he kept sailing home to?


By: W.S.Merwin