Holy S#%T!!

Whoa does time fly in New York City. Especially when you're in between two places at once. As of today I will be in one place though and that is at my new place in Harlem. It's not what you've heard. It's actually an up and coming area and the deal I got was amazing. I just put up my Christmas tree today so I feel a little accomplished and settled. Now the holidays begin for me. I still need a bit for my apartment though so I can effectively store things away. Right now everything is kind of scattered about the room. It's a little unnerving to look at. I can't believe I have so much stuff and there is more to pull out in storage.

Auditions are beginning to quiet down for the time being. I went to 3 whoppers though. I decided to try going to some of the dance calls. It was at these calls I started gaining confidence again. Each call got harder as I went along, but I kept up with the sequence. I may have looked funny during some of it or couldn't execute a move, but I didn't stray from sequence and I performed the piece to my best ability. I felt I did well in most cases. The first was for Mamma Mia. It was a 10:00am call for the guys and even the choreographer noted that usually the guys are in the afternoon. My brain was not quite yet awake. She started right away with some pop-lock hip-hop style choreo. Whoa. I was thinking to myself that I was not ready for this and hip-hop is the hardest sequence for me to memorize. There are so many specifics with arms and accents that sometimes just trip me up AND it's funky. While learning it, I was kind of lost. I pulled it together though by the time we started breaking up the groups. I got the swing of it when I was called to the floor for the actual audition. I performed it and was sweating like mad. No one was called to sing that day since they were only seeing dancing. I felt I did very well and some of the guys couldn't get it down very well, so I felt uplifted. I felt that if it came down to a technical audition (ballet or jazz), these guys may dance circles around me, but I killed the sequence and I performed the moves no matter how funky. I just wonder how I looked doing them. The next one was for a new musical called First Wives Club. I truly had no idea what to expect since I couldn't see clips of the show on You Tube or anywhere else. I went and there were more guys there I just knew as dancers. Okay. I did fine at the Mamma Mia audition, I kept my chin up and went in with the first group. The choreography started off bluesy and sexy. It was very lyrical and flowed well. I could perform this. Then it got very technical with turns and jumps. So far nothing I couldn't accomplish. There was one jump that I had never executed so it was difficult for me to just find in my body and that one I didn't execute very well. I remembered the whole sequence though, had a blast, sweat hard, and didn't mess up the sequence. All I did was fall out of one turn that came after the jump that was new to me. So it was a technical audition and harder than the previous one. I still felt I did well. They called people back to sing, but I had already sung on a previous day. I'm sure they remembered that, or at least I hope they did. So the other day I auditioned for yet another new show, Spiderman the Musical. You read correctly. The show will feature aerial acts and heavy acrobatic choreography. I knew this going in. What I didn’t know was that I'd be dancing for Daniel Ezralow who choreographed the sequences in Across the Universe. This audition topped them all. I thought the last one was hard. Well this one was just flat out ridiculous. We started out in groups of 10 just on the floor doing 30 pushups to a slow count. Some were showing strength by clapping in their pushups or lifting a leg. I was just happy enough to get through the 30 'cause I almost didn't. I held my form though. I knew they were coming since the girls walking out from the morning audition said that was how their audition started and they did 20. Okay, so pushups were over, what next? The basic tumbling portion. We did across the floor in groups of 4 with a forward roll, back roll, jump from back on floor to feet, handstand and come down to stomach slowly, and then slides on the hips to the other side of the room. Okay, the rolls I could accomplish, but it was the jump from my back to my feet that I had trouble with and the slides I just didn't get. It was very "Spidey-like." The combo came next. It was a style of dance called crumping. It's a mixture of modern, hip-hop, and street jazz from what I experienced. It was VERY thrashy. Once again, I got through the sequence and the only thing I couldn't really do were the slides once again and this roll to the floor. It was very fast, fun, and just thrashy. The background behind it was that we were the bullies taunting Peter Parker, so a lot of the movement had fighting moves in it. I sweat like mad from that one and was just exhausted. Still I came out feeling good. If anything I just learned a new style of dance and met a big time choreographer. I googled some of his work later and realized that his style requires A LOT of strength and endurance. Hence the pushups at the start. I'm very interested to see this show now.

I've been training like mad since I've been here. I'm starting at the beginning so I can focus more on the stretching parts and the technique. Sometimes the sequences are boring and not challenging, but I can really focus on the technique in them. Sometimes a new dance move comes into my brain and I have to process it even at the beginner level. My tap class was like that tonight. Just when I was thinking last week I should step up a level and see what I could do, I was re-assured tonight that I should stay at my current level for now since there are still rhythms and patterns that challenge me. My voice lessons are getting better. My teacher is really opening up my voice to become a stronger instrument. The feeling is so weird though since I learned to sing in a children's choir that at the time didn't focus on singing healthy, just singing out. I never thought to get lessons since I was doing well with them and felt I didn't need them. Now while I'm trying to untrain my bad habits do I realize why I should've gotten an outside lesson in when I was young. I also blame the peer pressure of adolescence for quitting dance when I did. I lost SOO much flexibility, vocabulary of dance, and ease of sequence by leaving when I did. Oh well. We all make mistakes. All I can say is that I'm 35 and still dancing like a 20 y/o though as far as endurance. I'm determined to keep up.