my jazz class is on tuesdays at 8 pm. it's one of the highlights of my week. i love ballet with a passion but have to be extremely focused and concentrated during that class on mondays.
as in jazz, it's my fun class. the technique comes easy to me, thus I rarely have to think and I can just let go. the only time i'm thinking is when we're doing set ups during warm up and i feel like i'm dying.
jazz is very effortless to me and comes naturally. and after a particularly brutal week of work frustrations and not getting picked to be a finalist in the crazy 8 film competition (sure pick the script about the kid and his pet dog, whatever, GAH!), i wanted nothing more then to get to class and finally pour all my frustrations into class and DANCE IT THE FUCK OUT.
so i get there and some blonde model looking chick walks in and is all like:
"oh hai Laura is sick this week so i'm teaching her class. 'kay so i know this is jazz but i like lyrical more so we're gonna do lyrical, yay!"
entire class:
"..........."
lyrical. ugh.
lyrical is a mix of jazz and contemporay and looks retarded when not done right. why? because it's RANDOM MOVEMENTS. there is no structure to it. listen, i've seen some great lyrical pieces that do what they're supposed to do, make you feel the emotion of whatever the dancer is portraying. it can be very beautiful/intense/inspiring. but it's not ANY type of dance i'm interested in learning. i'm just not that kind of dancer. i was taught under severe rules and technique, it's hard for me to get into the mind set of free flowingdowhatyouwantthrowyourarmsaroundandjump. i only do that when:
a) i'm in da club after 5 rum and cokes and ac/dc comes on.
b) i'm drinking champagne at home with franz and we're dancing in the living room for no apparent reason.
lyrical is a state of mind, you either get it or you don't. i firmly believe it can't be taught. you can teach a dancer the steps of a lyrical piece, but they need to bring out those movements and expressions or else it falls flat.
jazz can have it's lyrical moments, but it's done subtely.
see crazy lyrical piece:
see jazz:
thus in my head i went "FUUUCCCKKK MY LIIIIIFEEE" when this little pixie stick decided to randomly change the class that PEOPLE HAD PAID FOR. we wanted jazz. and now we were stuck learning how to move our arms in a circle.
so she starts off with a BRUTAL warm up. i mean the girl beside me keeled over and had that "i'm gonna vomit from the pain" look. the teacher, named tara jean by the way (seriously?!), is all like "oh come on, 5 more minutes!". here's the thing, our jazz class is at level 1. which is either advanced beginners or dancers who have been out of it for awhile and need a refresher before we go to next level (myself). this chick was doing warm up for pro's and straight up, none of us had that strength or flexibility yet.
so after that was done and she assured us we were nice and loose, as in we're all keeled over with muscle spasms and cramps, the choreography started.
lyrical, ugh.
christ, it's this uber slow piece about heart break and the first minute i'm supposed to rub my face and then fall to the ground. it's like, come on. the whole time we're learning her piece she keeps saying "dance how you FEEL. just whatever's going on with you right now, dance that. let it out. that's what's it about"
all right i'll dance how i feel, which is pissed. fucking script about a DOG got picked instead of me. also, don't tell me "oh we loooooooooooooved your script, we feel kind of bad for not picking you". don't tell me that. tell why i didn't get picked so i can learn from this experience. if you loved it so much, but me in top 6 biatch.
needless to say my movements were a lot sharper, quicker, and stiff. then she kept looking at me like, you're not doing it right, feel the heart break.
BUT I'M NOT SAD I'M PISSED.
and there is my problem with lyrical. you're telling me to dance how i feel but then tell me how to really dance it, thus you are telling me how to feel, thus completely contradicting your theory of lyrical dance.
"dance how you FEEEEELLLL. no feel this way."
so my plan to dance it out failed, apparently i'm not allowed to dance angry in lyrical. only sad to sad emo songs. our jazz teacher better pump herself with meds and be back in full swing next week so i can go back to shaking my thang to M.I.A choreography and continuing to prep my skills to crush someone in a random dance battle. you never know when those things will pop up.
ta!
julia gulia
*** i'd just like to add that tara jean is a beautiful dancer and if i would have walked in with the knowledge that this was a lyrical class i would have enjoyed it more. but when you come into a class of people who are there for jazz, kind of hard to get them in that mind set. lesson learned tara jean.
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