Cathy Marston, Multi-tasking...
	Photograph by Clare Park Anybody who saw the Royal Ballet Dance Bites tours (reviews link) will probably remember Cathy Marston's work - its invention and freshness particularly. While other choreographers perhaps waxed and waned Cathy always seemed to deliver a goodie for Dance Bites. Having danced and choreographed in Europe for much of the 1990's she returned home this summer (2000) and, charming woman that she is, agreed to write a diary for us with hardly any arm twisting whatsoever! Link to the previous column.     Link to later column Marston diary index I think I'm rather late with this diary so it'll be two months all in one I'm afraid. Mind you, I think Bruce is late with his mag too - which is hardly surprising as I think I've seen almost as much of him in my rehearsals for Cohabitants as I did of my dancers! I'm not really sure with what to start so I'll go in a very logical way through the different projects I'm involved in - I'm having to 'muli-task' quite a bit at the moment so I'm getting used to it... London Children's Ballet - starting The Ballet Shoes Straight back from celebrating New Year's Eve with an old friend - Nicole Tongue - and I had to start serious planning for my first full-length story ballet. Actually I have been working on it for months as it comes with a commissioned score by Raymond Warren and fifty children, the auditioning of whom I think I've already described in a previous diary... anyway, the time had come to start choreographing. Today, eight weeks later I'm happy to say I've finished the first act - all forty-five minutes of it. I think that's pretty good going although I won't comment as to exactly what state it's in. I've realised that I really don't like mime; it just seems to break up all the momentum and atmosphere you get going with the actual dance, but it does seem necessary at certain moments to actually move the plot along. I also had quite a shock when I had to start calling everyone for the bigger scenes; firstly you can never quite imagine what fifty bodies look like but even worse I just didn't anticipate how difficult it would be to keep my voice alive as well as the attention of all the children after five hours of rehearsals. Henri Oguike Dance Company - performing! Work has become quite intense with Henri over the last two months. We premiered our new programme in January at the Studio Theatre in Westminster. Anyone of the eighty people in the audience will testify that it was somewhat on the squashed side, but nevertheless, the show went down very well (it did! Ed). We'd actually only completed the new ballets in the last moments of rehearsals so we were pretty nervous about it all. Now, we've had more time to Henri Oguike reviews polish in between the various performances around England and things are really tightening up. The other dancers laugh at me calling them ballets - we are, after all, officially a contemporary company. Old habits die-hard though, and in the case of the new Piazolla piece I think I'm quite justified; the choreography is almost entirely below the waist line and works the metatarsals like nothing I've danced in years! Actually I really like it; Henri has an approach to the music that I find very interesting; while the score is constantly in his hand he's not a slave to every note and rhythm but is rather looking to create his own musical line in the rhythms of the feet. I found this intellectually stimulating while we were creating the work but didn't anticipate enjoying the performance aspect as much as I do - there's just something about all those seemingly abstract shifts and patterns that can be interpreted differently in every performance but are always so satisfying. Cohabitants - all over now... Wow - what a work! From things you imagined you'd have to deal with to the completely unexpected... putting on a show is no small matter! Thank goodness for a brilliant administrator - Philip Mosley and wonderful dancers who just pull themselves together. It was during the two weeks leading up to the premiere with Henri when I just couldn't get to the Opera House to rehearse that I realised how lucky I was; all of the dancers were working by themselves - even doing interviews with the press for me when I couldn't be there! Cathy and Tom busy preparing Cohabitants... Photograph by Clare Park The whole event, aside from the stress, was completely exhilarating. I didn't imagine we would receive such interest and enthusiasm - from the public, press and other dancers. The best moment was after the general rehearsal. Tom and I had not seen each other's work at all until that point; in fact, I'd not seen my own piece properly. Suddenly, with Cohabitants reviews lights, costumes and atmosphere from all the friends who had come along for a sneak preview I saw what had been brewing in my head for the last six months. I think both Tom and I were immensely proud of what we'd achieved with the dancers - a 'proper' evening of new choreography with fantastic performances that had been able to happen because we all wanted it to. A few days after it was all over I had a bit of a downer; post creation depression - or something like that. Anyway it's on to the next thing and with a deep breadth in I started on two new works - within a week... National Youth Dance Company, Images of Dance and Constant Lambert A few days after the last show of Cohabitants I had my Linbury Studio Theatre premiere - with the National Youth Dance Company. I'd actually made the piece in August and hadn't had much chance to re-rehearse so I felt rather detached as I watched it. It's an interesting experience, watching a premiere of your own choreography six months after you 'gave birth' to it. I felt able to assess myself in a way I have never done before but didn't really enjoy doing it surrounded by members of the public! It was good to see how much the dancers had personally improved though in the last few months of their training - you forget how much those months count when you're at college. I won't get too into describing these new projects as I've only just started them. The first is a creation for Images of Dance - London Studio Centre's classical company, directed by Margaret Barbieri. It's a piece to Faure, for a cast of sixteen girls and three boys. I think it'll be something of a contemporary-white-ballet, possibly based on the characters of Hamlet and Ophelia but I'll confirm that nearer the time! The second project is for an evening celebrating the life and work of Constant Lambert which will be held in the Clore Studio Upstairs on the 8th and 9th April. As time is rather limited I'm just doing a short pas de deux for Tamara Rojo and Brian Maloney to Lambert's 'Trois Pieces Negre Pour Les Touches Blanches.' It's great music - and I'm sure I need say nothing about the dancers; I'm really looking forward to getting my teeth into it. As a last note I'd just like to thank everyone who showed such support for Cohabitants. We all really appreciated it. Enough said.
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