Conferences

Freedom to ACT: 2012
The Conference on Acting and the Alexander Technique
January 13-15, 2012

Shetler Studios & Theatres
244 West 54th Street, suite 1206
New York, NY, 10019

This workshop is developed by Teva Bjerken, Belinda Mello and Ann Rodiger and is presented by the Balance Arts Center.

Come join us for the Freedom to Act: Acting and Alexander Technique Conference.

This conference is designed for actors, theater and film professionals as well as Alexander Technique teachers.

Explore how the Alexander Technique accelerates the actor’s process in training, rehearsal, and performance. Freedom to move and breathe is at the heart of this Technique and why so many actors and performers use it as a fundamental aspect of their work and life.

Discover how an actor’s ability to recognize choices of action increases when bringing the Alexander Technique into the acting process; the connection of thought, sensation and expression is revitalized.

Experience the foundational role that the Alexander Technique plays in breathing, voice, movement and transformation for the actor.

All the conference presenters have extensive experience teaching the Alexander Technique to actors in universities, conservatories, in theater productions, or in film –some are performing artists and many have had extensive performance experience.

The variety of workshops offered speaks to how fundamental and vital the principles of the Alexander Technique are today, in all aspects of preparation and performance in theater and film.

Come join us and share in the experience!

Click HERE for the full conference schedule.

Click HERE to pay for the conference.

After you pay, you will receive an email to register for specific classes.

CONFERENCE ARCHIVE

Freedom to Move 2011: Dance and the Alexander Technique

May 20th, 21st, 22nd, 2011
Location:
Pearl Studios NYC
500 8th Ave., 4th Floor
btw 35th/36th St.
New York, NY 10018
www.pearlstudiosnyc.com

REGISTRATION

Registration by May 1st: $170
Registration after May 1st: $185 register for full conference here
Pay-by-session: $30/session register for pay-by-session here
Performance/Discussion (for Pay-by-Session students only): $20

Come join us for the second Freedom to Move Dance and Alexander Technique conference.

We will continue to explore how the Alexander Technique supports and complements dance technique and performance.

Movement freedom, ease, and coordination can be enhanced and taught through concepts and principles of Alexander Technique. The conference provides experiences and exploration of many ways the Alexander Technique can be applied to dance – from tango to composition to research to performance.

You will also have time to share and exchange ideas as we work together.

All the conference presenters have had extensive experience both in teaching the Alexander Technique and in dance. The Alexander Technique has greatly influenced their thinking and approach to movement, how they teach, and how they create work. The variety of workshops speaks to the fundamental all-encompassing nature of the Alexander Technique and how the concepts are permeating many corners of the dance world.

Come join us and explore!

SCHEDULE OVERVIEW*:

Friday May 20
7:00-9:00pm Opening Event
Introductions and Awareness Activities

Saturday May 21
8:45-10:45am: SESSION 1
A. Core Emptiness, Spatial Support: Deepening the Practice and the Conversation – Shelley Senter
B. Exploring the Missing Link: Ballet and Modern Dance Technique – Rebecca Nettl-Fiol, Luc Vanier
C. Releasing with Balls – June Ekman
D. Intention, Initiation and Manifestation – Daria Fain

11:00am-1:00pm: SESSION 2
A. Reciprocity – Eva Karczag
B. Suspended Support and the Alexander Technique – Carol Boggs
C. Alexander Technique and Classical Ballet – Thomas Baird
D. Using the Alexander Technique in Creating Movement – Emily Faulkner

1:00-2:30pm: BAG LUNCH/GATHERING
Option to purchase bag lunch for an additional $10

2:30-4:30pm: SESSION 3
A. Alexander Technique and Argentine Tango – Katherine Mitchell
B. Hawkins Vocabulary and the Alexander Technique – Cynthia Reynolds
C. Floundering, Flubbing and Faltering – Another ‘Indirect Procedure’ – Glenna Batson

4:30-5:00pm: BREAK

5:00-7:00pm: SESSION 4
A. Performance/Discussion

Sunday May 22
9:00-11:00am: SESSION 5
A. Exploring the Missing Link: Ballet and Modern Dance Technique – Rebecca Nettl-Fiol, Luc Vanier
B. Speaking, Singing and Making Sound: Voice for Dancers – Ann Rodiger

11:15am-12:45pm: SESSION 6
Research Presentations:
The Implications of the Alexander Technique in Dance Teaching: Strategies, Challenges and Transformations
Raquel Cavalcanti
A Teachers’ Insights on Dancers’ Application of the Alexander Technique
Fernande Girarde

1:00-2:00pm: CLOSING SESSION
A. Open Group Improvisation/Ending Comments

*The final schedule will reflect registration.

REGISTRATION

Registration by May 1st: $170 register for full conference here
Registration after May 1st: $185
Pay-by-session: $30/session register for pay-by-session here
Performance/Discussion (for Pay-by-Session students only): $20

Registration includes attendance at Opening Event, Bag Lunch/Gathering, and one workshop in each session. Note that Opening Event and Closing Session are free to both conference registrants and pay-by-session studentes.

Register for the full conference on our website. Once you have registered for the conference you will receive an email asking you to chose which workshop (A, B, C or D) in sessions 1, 2, 3, or 5 you will attend. Priority registration will be on a first-come basis. Schedule is based on participant registration and is subject to change.

You can also pay for the conference by check. Email Ann Rodiger to register, and then make check out to Balance Arts Center.

Contact:
info@balanceartscenter.com
vm: 212-439-5248

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS AND PRESENTER BIOS (in alpha by teacher)

Alexander Technique and Classical Ballet
Thomas Baird
This class will explore the classical ballet vocabulary from barre to center incorporating the principles of the Alexander Technique. The style of ballet taught has been handed down through Cecchetti/Craske/Tudor/Corvino.

Thomas Baird is co-director of New York City-based Baroque dance and music ensemble Apollo’s Banquet; 1998-2008 director of East Coast Baroque Dance Workshop at Rutgers University; teaches regular Baroque Dance master classes at The Juilliard School, Manhattan School of Music; faculty member of Opera Division at the State University of New York at Purchase; Period Movement Coach for recent Broadway productions of “A Touch of the Poet”, Lincoln Center Theater’s “The Rivals”; choreographer for Metropolitan Opera production of “Cyrano de Bergerac”; teaches Historical Dance at the Gelsey Kirkland Academy of Classical Ballet, NYC; choreographed and performed for five seasons for the New York Philharmonic’s Young People’s Concerts; certified teacher of the Alexander Technique; teaches the Alexander Technique in the Dance Division at the Juilliard School.

Floundering, Flubbing and Faltering – Another ‘Indirect Procedure’
Glenna Batson
A hallmark of the Alexander Technique lies in finding poised support through indirect procedures. Although Alexander teachers know that the primary control is not a fixture, students can get caught in end-gaining trying to get it “right.” This workshop offers the chance to practice error. In the spirit of play, we’ll explore balance through coordination conundrums and idiosyncratic relationships. We’ll play on the edge of near-miss variability in finding primary control. Let the power of the imperfect help illuminate the Alexander principles while avoiding self-imposed constraints. Come shake up the familiar – all you have to lose is habit!

Glenna Batson is an internationally recognized teacher of the Alexander Technique (certified 1989) and a teacher of somatic approaches to movement. Over the last three decades, she has designed and taught embodied approaches to understanding the art and science of the moving body. She believes in the power of movement education as a means of meeting and transforming the challenges present in our world today. A former dancer, Glenna has been faculty of the American Dance Festival since 1986, currently teaching Contemporary Body Practices for the Hollins/ADF M.F.A. program. She retires from the Winston-Salem State University Physical Therapy program as Professor Emeritus in March 2011. She thanks her first teachers, Bruce Fertman and Martha Hansen, for fostering an atmosphere of deep acceptance during those many periods of suspended belief and confusion.

Suspended Support and the Alexander Technique
Carol Boggs
Experiment with a variety of ideas about how we support ourselves in relation to gravity. Investigate how spatial thinking influences support and mobility; it matters what you think and what beliefs stand behind your thoughts. Build a tensegrity model and learn to apply the principles of Biotensegrity to the use of your self no matter what the activity.

Carol is an Alexander Technique teacher, Laban Movement Analyst, and Massage Therapist with B.S. and M.A. degrees in Dance. She has a private practice in greater Washington D.C, has offered AT classses for both the Vocal Studies and Dance Departments at George Mason University, and has joined faculties teaching for AT residential courses in the USA, Japan and the Caribbean. In 2003 and 2005 respectively, she completed the AT postgraduate courses,”The Art of Breathing” with Jessica Wolf and “The Carrington Way of Working” with John Nicholls. She has also studied “The Art of Swimming” developed by AT teacher, Steven Shaw. Carol has a strong movement and dance background including Continuum, Tai Chi and Aikido, and a keen interest in the interface between Biotensegrity and the AT. She has been teaching the Alexander Technique since 1980.

The Alexander Technique as a Creative Strategy to Approach Dance Training
Raquel Cavalcanti
In this presentation I will be sharing the results of my research: A way of thinking: The implication of the Alexander Technique in dance teaching, where the experiences of two Alexander Technique teachers applying Alexander’s principles in their dance classes were studied. During the presentation I will be seeking to answer the following questions based on my findings: (a) How does the Alexander Technique inform the teaching experiences of two dance teachers applying the Alexander Technique principles in their dance classes? (b) From the perspective of these teachers, how do the principles of the Alexander Technique enhance or affect dance teaching? (b) What are the main challenges in that interaction? My aim is to discuss the relevance of the Alexander Technique in dance education from a teaching perspective. By exploring the experiences of teachers using the principles of the Alexander Technique in relation to dance teaching, I hope to shed light on the technique’s effectiveness as a tool fordance teachers and to offer alternative ways to approach dance training. This presentation could be of interest to any teacher interested in applying somatic techniques to dance training, as well as teachers interested in an interdisciplinary approach to their classes.

Raquel Cavalcanti, MA, BA, has been dancing, teaching, and choreographing for more than 15 years. She started her professional career at Primeiro Ato Grupo de Dança in Brazil, in 1987. From 1988 to 1994, she performed and taught workshops with the company throughout Brazil, South America, and Europe. Raquel became a certified Alexander Technique Teacher at IRDEAT – Institute for Research, Development, and Education in the Alexander Technique, in New York, with a full scholarship from the Brazilian Ministry of Culture. She assisted Ann Matthews at Tisch School for the Arts, teaching the Alexander Technique for theater graduate students. She also assisted Cindy Reynolds at Fordham University and June Ekman at Sarah Lawrence College, teaching the Alexander Technique for undergraduate dance students. In 2008, she concluded her BA in Liberal Arts at Adelphi University. Raquel has been part of several conferences discussing the impact of the Alexander Technique in dance training. Recently, she taught the Alexander Technique as a guest teacher at Movement Research, in NY. Raquel was awarded a scholarship from Steinhardt School at New York University to pursue her Master’s degree in Dance Education, which was concluded in May 2010.

Releasing With Balls
June Ekman
This workshop will deal with ‘site-specific’ areas of the body, using small rubber balls. The purpose is to help deepen one’s proprioceptive awareness of the joints, and take this sensory information into movement in space.

June Ekman came to NYC from Chicago in 1953 to study with Martha Graham. She went on to perform with many early Modern Dance Companies and to participate and perform at Judson Memorial Church. She has been a certified ACAT Alexander Teacher since 1979, and has taught in the theater and dance department at Sarah Lawrence College for the past 21 years. Her main focus and interest is in working with dancers to help them to understand and use the basic principles of the Alexander Technique, to enable them to be more conscious and ease-ful with their bodies. In June of 2009, the American Center for the Alexander Technique honored her for her teaching and service.

Intention, Initiation and Manifestation
Daria Fain
The focus of the workshop will be using the Alexander Technique and the principal of INHIBITION to observe in action the way movement manifests between INTENTION, INITIATION and MANIFESTATION. Wether improvising or interpreting a set choreography dancers constantly experience these 3 simple stages of movement. These stages are not a linear process. They are relative to one’s personal experience as dancer and audience member. We will look the ways in which these stages are intertwined and how the INHIBITION principal can be used as a resource to observe how physical, emotional, energetic and intellectual impulses play their roles in the various stages.

Daria Faïn’s choreography has been presented in New York at The Kitchen, Danspace Project, Movement Research and the 92nd Street Y, among other venues. Faïn founded her company Human Behavior Explorers in 2000, and, with architect- poet Robert Kocik, founded the non-profit organization Universal Coverage, Inc., in 2008. Faïn’s work is based on two decades of practice in the Asian philosophy of the body, American dance training, and the study of architecture. Faïn’s research on impaired senses has led her to work with patients in the fields of neurology, psychology and with blind-deaf individuals, leading to a complex understanding of the body as a resource of knowledge. Her website is www.prosodicbody.org.

Using the Alexander Technique in Creating Movement
Emily Faulkner
In this workshop we will explore how we can use the Alexander technique to unleash our creativity and physicality in order to invent movement and ultimately choreograph dances. We often use the Alexander technique to polish movement – to learn to dance more fluidly and efficiently – but what if we took that heightened state of awareness and coordination, and used it specifically and consciously to create movement? We will start with a group warm up and some simple hands on to get moving, and then we will work in groups and pairs as we explore and refine. If you’re already working on something, feel free to bring it in and work on it. If you’ve got nothing up your sleeve, this is the place to find it! At the end, we will show our work – which could be a set piece of movement or a structured improvisation.

A dancer, choreographer and improviser, Emily Faulkner founded Emily Faulkner/Wind-Up Dances to share with audiences her love of acceleration and suspension – the way movement ripples through the body and create the illusion of floating – and her love of improvisation in performance. Faulkner’s dances are known for being rigorously structured and for their combination of delicate movement, deadpan wit and physical ferocity. Faulkner’s work has been presented by Dixon Place, DanceNOW(NYC), Conversations at the Flea, Hatch, WaxWorks, Washington Square Church, the American Center for the Alexander Technique, and the Philadelphia Fringe Festival. She is honored to have presented work and performed many times at Movement Research at the Judson Church as well as at the Joyce Soho through New Dance Alliance. She performed in the works of many ground breaking choreographers, including Yvonne Meier (with whom she per- formed in the Bessie Award Winning, The Shining in 1995), Jennifer Lacey and D.D. Dorvillier. Faulkner will participate in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival as part of the Booking Dance Festival this August. In addition to choreographing and dancing, for the past 12 years Faulkner has hosted and curated, in collaboration with Jody Sperling, Tea Dances, an afternoon series which has presented numerous dancers and choreographers including: Douglas Dunn, Ellis Wood and Chris Elam. Faulkner has been a certified teacher of the Alexander Technique since 1999. She teaches privately and at Balance Arts with Ann Rodiger, and teaches workshops in dance and the Alexander Technique. She has three children ages 11, 9 and 4.

A Teacher’s Insights on Dancers’ Application of the Alexander Technique
Fernande Girarde
Fernande Girard holds a master’s degree in dance from the Université du Québec à Montréal, and has completed her PhD coursework. She has been teaching dance since she graduated from the teachers’ program of the National Ballet School of Canada in 1981. She has worked professionally as dancer and choreographer, and served as artistic advisor to soloists Roxane D’Orleans Juste (for eight years) and Chantal Lamirande (since 2000). She completed her training at the Institute for the Alexander Technique in New York City in 1989. Fernande taught in Manhattan for close to 10 years, before moving to Montreal, where she currently teaches dance and somatics at the Université du Québec à Montréal and at the Collège Montmorency. She also teaches a somatics course for musicians at UQAM.

Fernande was a presenter at the 8th International Congress of the F.M. Alexander Technique in Lugano, Switzerland in 2009. Her master’s thesis study is entitled: An inquiry into the experience of professional contemporary dancers studying and applying the Alexander Technique to dance: a qualitative study. She has written two articles on the subject of dance and the Alexander Technique:

Suspended Support and the Alexander Technique
Eva Karczag
We breathe air, air breathes and buoys us. In this workshop, we will reflect on the reciprocal nature of breathing and of sensory perception. ‘As breathing involves a continual oscillation between exhaling and inhaling, offering ourselves to the world at one moment and drawing the world into ourselves at the next, so sensory perception entails a like reciprocity, exploring the moss with our fingers while feeling the moss touching us back, at one moment gazing the mountains and at the next feeling ourselves seen, or sensed, from that distance’ . . .from ‘Becoming Animal’ by David Abram

Eva Karczag: Independent dance artist and teacher. For the past three decades she has practiced, taught, and advocated explorative methods of dance making. She performs solo and collaborative work internationally, many of her collaborations involving links across the arts. Her performance work and her teaching are informed by dance improvisation and mindful body practices, including the Alexander Technique (ACAT certified teacher), whose concepts, in particular, shape her methodology. She has been a member of leading groups in the field of experimental dance, including the Trisha Brown Dance Company, and has taught dance at major colleges and studios throughout the USA, Australia, and Europe. She has an MFA degree (Dance Research Fellow) from Bennington College, VT. Current activities include collaborating with Lisa Kraus and Vicky Shick on “Red Thread”, a project inspired by a model of women’s quilting circles, and with visual artist Chris Crickmay and composer Sylvia Hallett on improvised durational performance/installations.

Bringing the Alexander Technique to Argentine Tango
Katherine Mitchell
Whether you have always wanted to learn about tango, or would like to improve your dancing, or are an Alexander Technique teacher who would like to improve your teaching skills, this workshop is for you. We will explore how the principles of the Alexander Technique can improve tango dancing by fostering the connection between partners. We’ll build from simple games to tango patterns. Our goal is to see how easily we can move in tandem, both as a group and with partners. Awareness and understanding of the head-neck-back relationship helps with form. It also improves how we connect with our partner and how we transfer and receive an improvised lead, thereby enhancing the fun and exhilaration of dancing together. How do we prepare to move? What messages are we sending? How fun and easy can it be to communicate well? Experiencing these subtleties of non-verbal connection between dance partners can be applied to any form of dancing. For beginner and experienced dancers alike. We will explore principles of the Alexander Technique through leading and following during simple games and basic Argentine Tango. How do we prepare to move? What messages are we sending unintentionally? Awareness and understanding of the head-neck-back relationship helps with form, and improves how we connect with our partner and how we transfer and receive an improvised lead, thereby enhancing the fun and exhilaration of dancing together. Experiencing these subtleties of non-verbal connection between dance partners can be applied to any form of dancing.

Katherine Mitchell came to the Alexander Technique as an injured professional dancer in the early 1980s. She was a choreographer and dancer in Memphis TN where she danced with the Harry Bryce Dance Theatre and developed environmental pieces for a pasture, a farmhouse and an ancient YMCA racquetball court. She danced with various companies in Chicago and Denver including Radis Dance Strata and ARTCO. She made the transition to social dancing in the late 1980s, calling square dances in rural Illinois and in the city of Chicago. She has maintained a private teaching practice in AT for the past 20 years and has trained AT teachers since 2001. She developed and taught AT classes for the Conservatory for Theatre Arts at Webster University for eleven years and an AT class for dancers at Washington University for five years. She currently teaches Argentine Tango at Washington University. She sees special relevance for the AT in the embrace, connection between partners, and improvisational nature of Tango. She is interested in the AT’s ability to help people avoid injury and thrive at whatever they want to do.

Exploring the Missing Link: Ballet and Modern Dance Technique
Rebecca Nettl-Fiol and Luc Vanier
These two workshops will introduce our work on linking the Alexander Technique to dance through the Dart Procedures and developmental movement.(The Dart Procedures, as developed by Joan and Alex Murray, is a series of movements derived from developmental and evolutionary sequences.) Eachworkshop will begin by exploring the basic concepts of primary and secondary curves as a foundation for looking at the moving body, giving a vocabulary for discussing habitual movement tendencies and preferences, and offering a way of redirecting. Spirals will also be introduced as a key concept for understanding lengthening and support. The second portion of each workshop will be a movement session incorporating these principles into dance technique. One session will be on ballet, the other on contemporary modern dance.

Rebecca Nettl-Fiol is an Associate Professor of Dance at the University of Illinois. A certified Alexander teacher since 1990, she is particularly interested in looking at developmental movement as a lens for enlivening and illustrating the Alexander principles for dancers. Rebecca has presented numerous workshops and papers on Alexander and dance both nationally and internationally. Publications include “Alexander Technique and Dance Technique: Applications in the Studio” (Journal of Dance Education), and a co-edited book, The Body Eclectic: Evolving Practices in Dance Training. She is completing a book with Luc Vanier on dance and the Alexander Technique, to be published by University of Illinois Press. Rebecca is also a choreographer, producing work annually at the Krannert Center as well as in other venues throughout the U.S. Most recently, her work was selected for performance at PS 122 in FranceOff!, 2007, and for the American Dance Guild Performance Festival 2008 at Dance New Amsterdam.

Hawkins Vocabulary and the Alexander Technique
Cynthia Reynolds
In this dance class, which is open to all movers, you will get to connect with yourself and move in the Hawkins vocabulary using a blend of the principles put forward by F.M. Alexander and by Erick Hawkins, an American modern dance pioneer (1909-1994) noted for effortless looking, free-flow movement). Cultivating our attention to how we are using our bodies, our thinking and our kinesthetic sense, we will focus on releasing to move, skillful shift of weight, healthy oppositional head-spine-pelvis relationships, ease, flow, momentum and the pleasure of moving.
Hawkins taught that all movement starts in the pelvis and spine. Alexander says the head leads and the body follows. Both methodologies value undoing, not doing, and releasing to move. Erick taught people to “think/feel,” and that “tight muscles can’t feel.” FM taught to heighten and refine our sensory awareness, and not to take it for granted or rely on it as an accurate measure of what we think we are doing; instead, to be experiencing in the present moment with an expanded field of attention-and in that moment to be able to stop and think- to “direct” – clear, energized spatial thought.

Cynthia Reynolds left the dance faculty of the University of Maryland inspired to train with and dance for Erick Hawkins. She was a soloist in the Erick Hawkins Dance Company for 18 years, performing and teaching with Erick from 1976 to 1993, and was Director of the Hawkins School from 1990-1993. Motivated to open her body and extend her dancing career, Reynolds began studying the Alexander technique, trained at ACAT and certified as an Alexander teacher in 1987. Ms Reynolds teaches the Alexander Technique in private practice one-to-one, and in classes at the The New School for Drama, the NYU Vocal Performance Program, Mannes College extension division, and trains teachers at the American Center for the Alexander Technique. In New York she teaches dance classes informed by the Alexander technique at the 92nd St Y Harkness Dance Center and Panetta Movement Center. Her teaching was the subject of a feature article in Dance Teacher Magazine, and is also featured in Erick Hawkins Modern Dance Technique, a video documenting the technique of Erick Hawkins, created by Renata Celichowska in 2000.

Speaking, Singing and Making Sound: Voice for Dancers
Ann Rodiger
This workshop is tailored specifically for dancers wishing to develop vocal skills for performance range. You will learn how to use your voice well through principles of the Alexander Technique; how your breath and whole body participate in speaking, singing, and making sound; learn how knowledge of good vocal technique can enhance your balance and movement experience. Bring your questions and concerns about speaking and singing. No prior vocal experience necessary.

Ann Rodiger (producer) brings her experience of over 25 years in the Alexander Technique, Laban Movement Analysis and Observation, Dance Notation, movement education, and her own dance performance experience to her work as a teacher. She currently has a private practice in New York City. Ms. Rodiger is the founder and director of the AmSAT approved Balance Arts Center Alexander Technique Teacher Training Course in NYC. Ms. Rodiger has taught graduate and undergraduate level dance courses in several major U.S. Universities, including the University of Illinois-Urbana, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, University of Hawaii-Manoa, City College of New York, and the Juilliard School. Internationally, she teaches regularly in Berlin, and has taught in France and Switzerland. Ms. Rodiger graduated from the Urbana Center for the Alexander Technique in 1981. She also holds a Masters Degree in Dance from the Ohio State University and a B.S. from the University of Oregon. She has also studied ergonomics, Bartenieff Fundamentals, Feldenkrais, yoga and meditation.

Core Emptiness, Spatial Support (Deepening the Practice and the Conversation)
Shelley Senter
Opening the body, the brain and the conversation to new considerations of ideas, language, seeing and organizing the self in time and space.

For nearly twenty-five years, Shelley Senter has been investigating the application of the principles of the Alexander Technique to the performing body and mind. A certified teacher of the Alexander Technique since 1994 (ACAT), her approach to teaching has influenced artists in all disciplines and has been written about in various dance, arts and Alexander Technique publications and scholarly papers. She has been critically recognized and awarded for her distinct approach to movement, both as an independent dance artist and as a collaborator/performer with many distinguished artists, including Trisha Brown and Yvonne Rainer, for whom she is an official repetiteur. She teaches workshops and private lessons in colleges, universities and conservatories, in international festivals and organizations, as well as at Movement Research and the Trisha Brown Company School in New York. After more than a decade on the West Coast, Senter has recently returned to New York City and maintains a private practice in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

Finding Continuity
Jennifer Sielicki
The Alexander Technique is about regaining and maintaining natural poise. The breath and how we think of movement play an integral part in continuity and expression. We will therefore, explore poise and breathing through simple phrasing, allowing time to investigate; how we make each move; how we think about the action and how the breath works through the movement. This will intern allow us to find the connections or flow of movement through the phrasing.

Jennifer Sielicki is the Artistic Director and Founder of Grove Dance Theatre. She began her professional career by studying Performance Art at De Montfort University in the UK. Jennifer is experienced in organizing platform performances from street events at the Leicester International Dance Festival to quarterly showcases for the emerging choreographers in Brighton and Oxford. Her work, both theatrical and dance, has been performed in venues across Europe including The Oxford Playhouse, UK and the Music Conservatory in Enschede, NL. Jennifer moved to New York in 2000. She has been working with the Alexander Technique and dance since 1990 and in 2003 became a certified teacher of the work. She taught Alexander Technique on the graduate acting course at NYU for 6 years and has a private teaching practice in NYC.

Luc Vanier is an Associate Professor in the Dance Department at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee where he teaches ballet, Alexander Technique and digital media. Originally from Montreal, he graduated from L’École Supérieur de Danse du Quebec under Daniel Seillier. In 1998, he retired from Ohio Ballet having danced a variety of roles such as the Workman in Kurt Jooss’ Big City, the Third Song of Tudor’s Dark Elegies, the leads in Balanchine’s Allegro Brillante and Paul Taylor’s Aureole among others. He both received his MFA from the University of Illinois and became a certified Alexander teacher in 2001 from ATCU. His research on linking the Alexander Technique, developmental movement and Ballet is at the forefront of integrating somatic work into dance curriculum and has been presented at various international conferences and workshops most recently at the International Association for Dance Medicine and Science conference in The Hague and the Freedom to Move conference in New York City. Co-wrote Dance and the Alexander Technique: Exploring the Missing Link with Rebecca Nettl-Fiol to be published by the University of Illinois Press in the Spring 2011 (For more information visit www.lucvanier.com)

Movement Strategies for Musical Results

Bring your instruments to learn practical procedures based on the Alexander Technique.

This unique workshop features the all-encompassing Alexander Technique presented by three experienced teachers, therefore, three perspectives. It is a rare advantage to be able to work with three teachers in one place. A person new to the Technique as well as those with experience will benefit from this event.

March 4-6, 2011

PRESENTED BY:
Evangeline Benedetti, Cello, New York Philharmonic
Judith Muir, Clarinet, Co-Director Institute for Music and Health
Ann Rodiger, Director of Balance Arts Center

MC:
David Homan, Executive Director

Supporting Teachers:
Karla Diamond

SCHEDULE:

Friday, March 4: 7-9pm
Introductions and Awareness Activities.

Saturday, March 5: 9am-6:30pm
Three working sessions of lecture/demonstrations will be followed by individual attention in small groups.

Workshop 1: A Firm Foundation from which to Play
The foundation for all playing is sitting or standing. We will explore an optimal way to sit and stand through the familiar squat. The squat is something we all did as children and possibly do today in activities. Within this framework, we will explore Alexander Technique principles of inhibition, direction, and primary control.
Evangeline Benedetti

Workshop 2: Breathing is the Essence of Your Playing
Demystifying common misunderstandings about breathing, blowing, air movement and support. Learn the “Whispered Ah” and how to apply it to improve ease and flow of breath.
Judith Muir

Workshop 3: Playing with Your Whole Body
Learn to integrate your whole body with your playing while you are sitting and/or standing. This workshop will include how you approach, contact, and support your instrument. You will also learn how to be aware of your fellow players, conductor, and audience while you play.
Ann Rodiger

Evening: Informal gathering at a nearby restaurant.

Sunday, March 6th: 10am-2pm
Master Class setting for select participants who wish to perform with critique. Each participant will receive 20 minutes to play and receive individual instruction.

LOCATION:
Ripley Grier Studio
520 8th Ave, 16th Floor
New York, NY

FEE:
$175
(Additional $25 for Master Class performers)

The Alexander Technique helps you:

Balance, breathe and move while playing
Reduce your chance of injury
Increase your rehearsal and performance stamina

To register, click here or call 212.439.5248

Presenter Bios:

Evangeline Benedetti, cellist, active soloist, and chamber musician, has been a member of the New York Philharmonic since 1967, one of the first women cellists to be accepted into the organization. She appears regularly on the Philharmonic Ensembles series at Merkin Concert Hall in New York, including performances with guest artists Yefim Bronfman,Vladimir Feltsman, and Jerome Lowenthal. As a member of the New York Trio Concertant, she toured Japan in 1994 and 1995. In addition to the numerous recordings she has participated in with the New York Philharmonic, she has recorded the Prokofiev andShostakovich Sonatas for cello and piano with Pedja Muzijevic that has been released by Musicians Showcase.

Ms. Benedetti’s second love and career is teaching. She brings a unique approach to this endeavor as a certified teacher of the Alexander Technique, which is a study of physical re-education based on integration of mind and body. Her cellistic approach is steeped in the tradition of Bernard Greenhouse, Zara Nelsova, and Janos Starker, her teachers. She also performed in master classes with Pablo Casals. Her education, after childhood studies at the University of Texas String Project with Phyllis Young, was at the Manhattan School of Music, where she earned her Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees. She served on the faculty there for more than 20 years.

Combining her knowledge of performance and the Alexander Technique makes her teaching approach applicable to all instruments. She has taught musicians in the San Diego, Dallas, and Fort Worth symphonies and has given master classes at Brooklyn College School of Music, Manhattan School of Music, Mannes College of Music, and The Juilliard School. She taught a master class in Pyongyang, North Korea while on tour with the orchestra. As part of the Philharmonic’s Mentors and Protégés series, Ms. Benedetti has made several presentations at Barnes & Noble Booksellers, Lincoln Triangle. In New York. Currently, she teaches privately and in workshops.

Ms. Benedetti serves on the executive boards of the Violoncello Society of New York and the Bloomingdale School of Music.

Judith Muir, M.M. M.AmSAT, is one of the senior teachers of the Alexander Technique in America. She is a founding member of the American Society of Alexander Teachers (AmSAT), and former Vice-Chair of the American Center for the Alexander Technique, New York, with 27 years of private teaching experience. She trained in London with Walter Carrington, one of the most influential teachers of hte Alexander Technique in the world. Her teaching experiences include helping to train students to become certified teachers of the Alexander Technique in Cape Town, South Africa, Manhattan, New York City, and Amherst, Massachusetts. Currently on the faculty at Bard College in the Theatre Department her past and present students include, members of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, New York City Opera, flutist Sir James Galway, and actors Greta Scacchi and Chris Noth.

As Director of Early Childhood Education at the Institute for Music and Healthin the Hudson Valley, Judith also offers an exceptional international background in woodwind and piano pedagogy. She has a Masters degree from Manhattan School of Music and is a distinguished clarinetist. Her performances include classical and jazz concerts on three continents, and her solo and ensemble appearnaces include Carnegie Hall, New York City, St. Martin’s in the Fields, and Wigmore Hll in London U.K. She also runs an award winning music program at the Hawk Meadow Montessori School in Poughkeepsie based on the work of John Diamond M.D. having been personally trained by him for twelve years in his unique approach to music and healing.

David Homan is a composer and collaborative artist. Dedicated to live composition for theatre, dance, chamber music, and musical theatre, Mr. Homan’s current projects emphasize collaboration in live performance and communication between performers and creators in various fields.

He is the founding director of the Live Arts Collaboration, a non-profit dedicated to producing multidisciplinary works in NYC, and the Executive Director of the American-Israel Cultural Foundation.

For samples of his work, or more information, visit www.homanmusic.com

Ann Rodiger brings her experience of over 25 years in the Alexander Technique, Laban Movement Analysis and Observation, Dance Notation, movement education, and her own dance performance experience to her work as a teacher. She currently has a private practice in New York City. Ms. Rodiger is the founder and director of the AmSAT approved Balance Arts Center Alexander Technique Teacher Training Course in NYC. Ms. Rodiger has taught graduate and undergraduate level dance courses in several major U.S. Universities, including the University of Illinois-Urbana, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, University of Hawaii-Manoa, City College of New York, and the Juilliard School. Internationally, she teaches regularly in Berlin, and has taught in France and Switzerland. Ms. Rodiger graduated from the Urbana Center for the Alexander Technique in 1981. She also holds a Masters Degree in Dance from the Ohio State University and a B.S. from the University of Oregon. She has also studied ergonomics, Bartenieff Fundamentals, Feldenkrais, yoga and meditation. She has been working with singers and musicians for over 25 years.

Listen to the podcast of the Panel discussion here: http://balanceartscenter.podbean.com/2010/06/07/alexander-symposium-5-20-2010/

Freedom to Move: Dance and the Alexander Technique
May 21st, 22nd, 23rd, 2010
Location: 440 Studios, located at 440 Lafayette Street between Astor Place and 4th Street in Manhattan

Dancers strive for movement freedom, coordination, and ease. The Alexander Technique provides concepts and tools to achieve these goals. The focus of the Freedom to Move Conference is to bring dance and the Alexander Technique together, to exploring how the principles of the Alexander Technique are being applied to the many aspects of dance.

The weekend will be full of workshops, a panel discussion, and a performance, for AT teachers who work with dancers, AT teachers who would like to work with dancers, dancers who have had experience with the AT, and dancers with no experience of the AT!

All the conference presenters have had extensive experience both in the teaching the Alexander Technique and in dance. The Alexander Technique has greatly influenced their thinking and approach movement, how they teach, and how they create work. The variety of workshops speaks to the fundamental all- encompassing nature of the Alexander Technique and how the concepts are permeating many corners of the dance world.

Come join us and explore!

SCHEDULE OVERVIEW*:

Friday May 21
7–9 pm
Opening Event: Introductions and Inhibition Games
Thomas Baird, Jonathan Bastiani, Daria Fain, Jennifer, Grove, Katherine Mitchell, Ann Rodiger, Shelley Senter

Saturday
9:30-11am Session 1
A – The Sun King Goes Up! – Thomas Baird

B – Releasing with Balls – June Ekman

C – Balance and Ease on the Floor – Rebecca Brooks

11:10am-12:40pm Session 2
A – Working with Dancers – Jane Kosminsky
B – A Way of Thinking: The Alexander Technique as Tool for Dancers – Raquel Cavalcanti
C – Neurological Connections Between Sight and the Tendons – Daria Fain

12:40-1:30pm Break for Lunch

1:30-3:00pm Session 3
A – Finding Continuity – Jenny Grove
B – From Crawling to Leaping, Part I: Primary and Secondary Curves – The Lively Interplay – Rebecca Nettl-Fiol and Luc Vanier

3:10-4:40pm Session 4
A – Dynamics of Flow – Eva Karczag
B – Bringing Alexander Technique to Partner Dancing – Katherine Mitchell

5-6:30pm Panel Discussion: Creativity and the AT
Moderator: Ann Rodiger
Panelists: June Ekman, Eva Karczag, Rebecca Nettl-Fiol, Cynthia Reynolds, Luc Vanier

8pm Concert
Featuring performances by Thomas Baird, Rebecca Brooks and Sarah White-Ayon, Raquel Cavalcanti, Daria Fain, Emily Faulkner, Jennifer Grove, Eva Karzag and Shelley Senter, and more!

Sunday
10-11:30am Session 5
A – Balance and Ease on the Floor – Ann Rodiger
B – Core Emptiness, Spatial Support – Shelley Senter

11:40am-1:10pm Session 6
A – Alexander Technique for Yoga – Ann Rodiger
B – From Crawling to Leaping, Part II: Spirals for Connectivity and Lengthening – Rebecca Nettl-Fiol and Luc Vanier

*The final schedule will reflect registration.

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS and TEACHER BIOS (in alpha by teacher):

The Sun King Goes Up!
Thomas Baird
In the court of Louis XIV, one had to have présence or bearing especially while dancing, but also in giving honors, walking, standing and sitting. Thomas Baird will teach a specific style of movement from a distant era, through the principles of the Alexander Technique. A good introduction to period movement for actors and singers as well as dancers, the workshop will begin with a short Balance Arts Floor Class and will continue with walking, standing, bowing and “fan language.” Finally, the mark of every accomplished courtier was in dancing the Ordinary Menuet. Learn the steps and various floor patterns of this once popular dance. Participants should wear loose fitting clothes and dance shoes with low or no heels.

Thomas Baird is a Baroque Dance specialist, and is the co-director of Apollo’s Banquet, a New York City-based Baroque dance and music ensemble. For ten years he directed the annual East Coast Baroque Dance Workshop at Rutgers University. Mr. Baird is a regular guest lecturer on Baroque Dance at The Juilliard School, Mannes School of Music, and the Manhattan School of Music. He is a faculty member of the Opera Division at the State University of New York at Purchase where he teaches Movement Styles for Singers and choreographs the opera productions. He was the Period Movement Coach for the Broadway productions of O’Neill’s “A Touch of the Poet,” and, at Lincoln Center Theater, Sheridan’s “The Rivals.” In 2005, he made his Metropolitan Opera debut as a choreographer, providing period dances for Alfano’s “Cyrano de Bergerac.” Most recently, he has choreographed and performed period dances for the New York Philharmonic’s Young People’s Concerts at Avery Fisher Hall. Thomas is a certified teacher of the Alexander Technique, having received his training from the Balance Arts Center in NYC (Ann Rodiger, Director). Mr. Baird is a Guest Faculty member in the Dance Division of The Juilliard School where he teaches the Alexander Technique.

Balance and Ease on the Floor
Rebecca Brooks
Find your balance and center through an extended session on the floor. Work slowly and carefully to build your awareness of your limbs in relation to your back. Focus on your breathing, ease, coordination, and direction during your movements. The class is useful for movement professionals and community members alike who want to improve balance, coordination, and strengthen their movements. Ann Rodiger developed the Balance Arts Floor Class to present movement through the lens of the Alexander Technique. Rebecca Brooks teaches her version of the class, building towards full body movements and expanded sensory integration.

Rebecca Brooks is a NYC-based performing artist and AmSAT certified Alexander Technique teacher. She has taught classes in the Alexander Technique at Balance Arts Center, CLASSCLASSCLASS, Movement Research and the American Dance Festival, and she also teaches privately. This spring she has been re-performing Imponderabilia as part of the Marina Abramović retrospective The Artist Is Present at MoMA. Upcoming and recent performance work includes projects with Heather Kravas, Amanda Loulaki, Jillian Peña, Katy Pyle, robbinschilds, and Kathy Westwater. Her own work has been presented throughout NYC. She graduated from Sarah Lawrence College, co-founded AUNTS, currently (wo)manages programs and events at Movement Research, and is Artistic Director of the Rockbridge Artist Exchange in Lexington, Virginia.

A Way of Thinking: The Alexander Technique as a Tool for Dancers
Raquel Cavalcanti
In this workshop we will explore the idea of changing our thinking to change our movement. We will discuss and experiment with Alexander’s principles and see how they can be used as a tool to guide us in our dancing. We will start by observing our habitual ways of moving and using our bodies as we think about the “idea” of dancing or creating a movement. We will then experiment with new ways of thinking to see the impact in our movements. My hope is to make this workshop a revealing and fun experience to everyone interested in using the Alexander principles as a powerful tool to dance making.

Raquel Cavalcanti is a Brazilian-born artist, based in NYC since 1995, who has been creating, teaching, and choreographing dance for more than 15 years. Her own work has been presented in the US, Brazil, and Europe. Raquel became a certified Alexander Technique Teacher at IRDEAT, in New York, in 1999. Since then, she has been teaching private lessons and workshops in New York and throughout Brazil. She worked as Ann Mathews’ assistant at NYU, teaching the AT to graduate students at Tisch School for the Arts. She also assisted Cindy Reynolds at Fordham University teaching the AT to undergraduate dancers. From January to March 2010, Raquel taught the Alexander Technique for Dancers class at Movement Research. She will earn her MA degree in Dance Education from New York University in May 2010. Her master’s thesis research explores the Alexander Technique as a tool for teaching dance.

Releasing with Balls
June Ekman
This workshop will deal with “site specific” areas of the body, using small rubber balls. The purpose is to help deepen one’s proprioceptive awareness of the joints, and take this sensory information into movement in space.

Neurological Connections between Sight and the Tendons
Daria Faïn
Using the Alexander Technique principals along with the Chinese Theory of the 5 Elements and Chi Kung, we will experience how the sense of sight has deep implication in our behaviors.

Finding Continuity
Jennifer Grove
The Alexander Technique is about regaining and maintaining natural poise. The breath and how we think of movement play an integral part in continuity and expression. We will explore poise and breathing through simple dance phrases, allowing time to investigate how we make each move, how we think about the action, and how the breath works through the movement. This will in turn allow us to find the connections or flow of movement through the phrasing.

Jennifer Grove is the Artistic Director and Founder of Grove Dance Theatre. She began her professional career by studying Performance Art at De Montfort University in the UK. Jennifer is experienced in organizing platform performances from street events at the Leicester International Dance Festival to quarterly showcases for the emerging choreographers in Brighton and Oxford. Her work, both theatrical and dance, has been performed in venues across Europe including The Oxford Playhouse, UK and the Music Conservatory in Enschede, NL. Jennifer moved to New York in 2000. She has been working with the Alexander Technique and dance since 1990 and in 2003 became a certified teacher of the work. She taught Alexander Technique on the graduate acting course at NYU for 6 years and has a private teaching practice in NYC.

Dynamics of Flow
Eva Karcag
At the foundation of this workshop lies an appreciation of, and respect for, the innate intelligence of a fluid and alert body. Using movement improvisations, imagery, and the directed touch of the Alexander Technique, participants will be guided to sense, observe, and explore the complexity of anatomical structure as it relates to individual patterns of use. Through embodying our weight and lightness, and our breathing and flow, we can arrive at an experiential understanding of our capacity for equilibrium and efficiency, and taste the integrated openness and buoyant suppleness that generates easeful articulate moving.

Working with Dancers – a Workshop for Alexander Technique Teachers
Jane Kosminksy
In this workshop, Jane shares her approach to working with dancers. What is the psychology of dancers? Where do you begin? What should you look for? Where do you put your hands? How can you help the dancer to achieve safely what seems to be dangerous? Juilliard dancers will be present for “hands on” work and for there their input in integrating dance and the Alexander Technique. Learn how you can help dancers improve alignment, strengthen technique, work without injury, lengthen careers and dance with greater joy and passion.

Jane Kosminsky. Dance Award Winner, School of Performing Arts, 1960. B.A. in Language & Literature, CCNY. Graduate, The American Center for the Alexander Technique. Soloist, Norman Walker Dance Company, 1960-65. Soloist, Paul Taylor Dance Company, 1965-71. Co-artistic director (with Bruce Becker) and principal dancer of 5 by 2 Plus, a modern dance repertory company, 1971-82. Restaged Paul Taylor’s Aureole for productions of Nureyev and Friends and appeared as Mr. Nureyev’s partner, Paris, 1974; London, 1976; Madrid, 1978. Director of Dance, 92nd Street Y, 1986-1988. Faculty, The Neighborhood Playhouse since 1988. Faculty, The American Center for the Alexander Technique Teacher Training Program, 1986-1994. The Juilliard School drama faculty, 1971-1986. Dance faculty since 1986. AmSAT member. Has produced 3 pioneer videos about the Alexander Technique (www.balanceofwellbeing.com). Latest DVD – For Dancers, The Alexander Technique was released in the spring of 2005.

Bringing Alexander Technique to Partner Dancing
Katherine Mitchell
We will explore principles of the Alexander Technique through leading and following during simple games and basic Argentine Tango. How do we prepare to move? What messages are we sending unintentionally? Awareness and understanding of the head-neck-back relationship helps with form, and improves how we connect with our partner and how we transfer and receive an improvised lead, thereby enhancing the fun and exhilaration of dancing together. Experiencing these subtleties of non-verbal connection between dance partners can be applied to any form of dancing.

From Crawling to Leaping I and II
Rebecca Nettl-Fiol and Luc Vanier
In these two sessions we will explore the Alexander Technique principles through the lens of the Dart Procedures and developmental movement. (The Dart Procedures, as developed by Joan and Alex Murray, is a series of movements derived from developmental and evolutionary sequences.) We will demonstrate how a playful investigation of these movement sequences can give you insights about your own movement patterns and inform and enhance your dance technique. The Dart Procedures are especially useful for dancers interested in learning the Alexander Technique because they provide simple movements for exploring Alexander’s principles in a non-dance situation, yet they can easily be linked to dance vocabulary.

In Part I: Primary and Secondary Curves – The Lively Interplay, we look at the two opposing curves present in the body and explore the ongoing interplay between these two movement pathways. This provides a foundation for looking at the moving body, giving a vocabulary for discussing holding patterns, habitual movement tendencies and preferences, and places where we unwittingly interfere with the movement intent. The primary and secondary lens provides us with a flexible and adaptable model, moving us away from “posture” toward a dynamic use of the whole body in action.

In Part II: Spirals for Connectivity and Lengthening, we will show how the primary and secondary curves intertwine to create spirals. The spiral is a key concept in understanding dynamic alignment, allowing us to maintain connectivity without stiffening or bracing. At the same time, the spiral facilitates lengthening and movement through space, propelling you into actions such as turning, falling, or leaping.

Balance and Ease on the Floor
Ann Rodiger
Find your balance and center through an extended session on the floor. Work slowly and carefully to build your awareness of your limbs in relation to your back. Focus on your breathing, ease, coordination, and direction during your movements. The class is useful for movement professionals and community members alike who want to improve balance, coordination, and strengthen their movements. Ann Rodiger developed the Balance Arts Floor Class to present movement through the lens of the Alexander Technique. She has combined her knowledge and experience of the Alexander Technique for over 25 years, Bartenieff Fundamentals, Feldenkrais, Yoga and various dance techniques in creating the class.

Core Emptiness, Spatial Support
Shelley Senter
Opening the body, the brain and the conversation to new considerations of ideas, language, seeing and organizing the self in time and space.

Additional panelist bios:

Cynthia Reynolds left the dance faculty of the University of Maryland inspired to train with and dance for Erick Hawkins. She was a soloist in the Erick Hawkins Dance Company for 18 years, performing and teaching with Erick from 1976 to 1993, and was Director of the Hawkins School from 1990-1993. Motivated to open her body and extend her dancing career, Reynolds began studying the Alexander technique, trained at ACAT and certified as an Alexander teacher in 1987. Ms Reynolds teaches the Alexander Technique in private practice one-to-one, and in classes at the The New School for Drama, the NYU Vocal Performance Program, Mannes College extension division, and trains teachers at the American Center for the Alexander Technique. In New York she teaches dance classes informed by the Alexander technique at the 92nd St Y Harkness Dance Center and Panetta Movement Center. Her teaching was the subject of a feature article in Dance Teacher Magazine, and is also featured in Erick Hawkins Modern Dance Technique, a video documenting the technique of Erick Hawkins, created by Renata Celichowska in 2000.

REGISTRATION

Registration by May 1st: $135 register for full conference here
Registration after May 1st: $150
Pay-by-session: $25 each (does not include concert) register for pay-by-session here
Concert (for pay-by-session students): $10

Registration includes attendance at Opening Event, Panel Discussion, Concert, and one workshop in each session.
Note that Opening Event and Panel Discussion are free to both conference registrants and pay-by-session students.
Register for the full conference on our website SOON. Once you have registered for the conference you will receive an email asking you to chose which workshop (A, B or C) in each session (1-6) you will attend. Priority registration will be on a first come basis.

You can also pay for the conference by check. Email Ann Rodiger to register, and then make check out to Balance Arts Center.

Contact:
info@balanceartscenter.com
vm: 212-439-5248

view photos of conference teachers here!

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