Neophilia Weblog

Woman

Hello All

Just thought we'd write again to update you on Neophilia's recent news.
As most of you know, we held an open, professional ballet class on the 3rd
of December. We promised that this would be no ordinary ballet class, and
indeed it wasn't! We carried out our desire of putting a slightly edgy
ballet class to cool and funky music teamed with professional lighting and
an audience and much to our surprise it really worked! Beth taught the
class and Poppy ( the fabulous DJ) dished out the tracks. Among our
audience were Bruce and Chris Hampson (who disappointed us by not donning
tights and strutting his stuff - that man's got feet and legs that most
female dancers would kill for!) . The feedback we received was positive and
a good night was had by all, we even managed to 'spark' some interest for
our show at Resolution. It was refreshing for people to see the blood,
sweat and tears that constitutes 'the ballet class!' Talking of blood and
tears, we had an incident a couple of rehearsals back with Gaby (one of our
dancers) who managed to launch herself into the air and land on her knee.
We heard the scream and prayed that she hadn't done some serious damage or
dislocated the joint. Fortunately she hadn't, but it was slightly worrying.
'Doctor' David located an ice pack and Beth finally got to write something
in the incident book! Let's pray that we don't have to use it again.

Back to the class though. It was a new adventure for us all and something
that we may expand upon in the future. Ultimately it may be the way forward
in relation to funding. We are still adamant that going to 'The Arts
Council' may not be the best option, for starters, if a dance
company/troupe is in demand surely it should function as a business, as
apposed to a charity. Open classes would help Neophilia to build a solid
following and provide a steady income (that would then be used to pay our
free-lance dancers.) It's a thought and something that we'd like to offer
people as an alternative form of exercise, from beginners level to
professional. We've already had some interest in hosting a regular class
and it looks set to become our next project after our show at The Place.

Oh yeah!, about that? Rehearsals are going well and we are quite excited!
We appear to be fairly on top of our schedule and everyone's getting on
really well. It's a big project and we'd be liars if we said that
organising everything wasn't stressful. We have a wonderful bunch of
dancers, Morgan (who trained at Central and has danced with ENB and Cork
City Ballet) Gaby (Ex ENB School and Central has danced with Vienna
Festival Ballet) Sheena (Ex RBS and has danced with Mavin Khoo) Tom (
Trained at Central has danced with so many companies we lose track!) and
Benny (Once again a dancer in demand - credits include Random and Mavin
Khoo, not to mention Beverly Knights new video!) so it's a fairly
impressive bunch of talented (and not to mention) good looking people! We
are privileged to work with all of them. We all know that our crunch time
will come in the new year. We foresee stress, panic more tears and tantrums
on a Elton John scale! We've just updated our website www.neophilia.co.uk ,
which details how you can get tickets and have just had our promotional
leaflet designed. See below.

Sunday rehearsals are taking their toll, it's difficult when you work all
week and the temptation to stay in bed is always there. Oh, for the love of
dance! Rehearsing on the side of a 50 hour week is tough, but rewarding in
a funny kind of way. We'll get there though, it just better be worth the
trip!

On a final note, we must also add how nice it was to see some of you at The
Christmas Meal. We apologise now on Beth's' behalf for showing Tamara Rojo
up by standing in front of her picture (Beth swears she was only on the
mineral water all night.) A big thank you to Bruce (and Mandy) for a
wonderful night. All of your support and faith continues to spur us all on.

We hope you all had a fantastic Christmas and here's to a fabulous (and
prosperous) 2005!

Signing off, The Three of us!

Posted by Poppy Ben-David at December 28, 2004 03:40 PM