It's a wrap!

Welcome to your final weekly update for

Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project

Proudly part of the REAL New Zealand Festival

For more information about the project, visit the APO website.

It’s a wrap!

Image: Adrian Malloch

It’s hard to believe that the three-year odyssey of Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project has come to an end.

Te Pou Whakairo, the kapa haka group from Ngati Whatua o Orakei, kicked off the night, setting the tone for an exciting evening.

Part 1 of Gareth Farr’s drum-fest From the Depths Sound the Great Sea Gongs was perfect for the occasion, with the APO’s percussion section on fire.

And the orchestra was on top form for the main event, too, Music Director Eckehard Stier bringing out both the savagery and subtlety of The Rite of Spring.

Dancers responded to the energy of the musicians, displaying commitment and focus from the moment the audience laid eyes on the opening scene, a human waka formed from the dancers. This drama continued until the last note of music.

Movement was dynamic and impressive as the dancers seamlessly created new images and formations - no easy feat with 190 on stage. Spotted among the sea of students were several promising young dancers who we would love to see back on stage in the future.

That could happen. Barbara Glaser, the APO’s Chief Executive, says: “Sacre was a testament to the talent of these young Aucklanders, and the bond created between them and the APO will last into the future. We intend to stay in contact with as many of those involved in Sacre as possible. Who knows what may come of it in the future?”  

We’ll leave the last word to William Dart, who reviewed Sacre for nzherald.co.nz: “Royston Maldoom and this project will leave their legacy on all who took part in it. Its impact will extend well beyond those 30 or so minutes in the Aotea Centre, so breathtakingly delivered that one regrets this was its only public performance.”

Be sure to visit the Sacre blog for reviews, documentaries, articles and everything else surrounding Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project over the past week.

A big thank you

Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project has truly been an Auckland project, with professional involvement and volunteer support from a huge number of people.  We would like to acknowledge:

Royston Maldoom

Choreographer and Artistic Director

Eckehard Stier

Music Director

Volker Eisenach

Moss Patterson

Taiaroa Royal

Ann Dewey

Megan Adams

Choreographic Team

Dancers from:

University of Auckland Dance Studies Programme

Associate Professor

Ralph Buck

    Head of Dance Studies

Kristin School

    Teresa Lauago

    Curriculum Manager Dance

    Peter Clague

    Executive Principal

Mt Albert Grammar School

    Jacqui Cesan

    Dance Teacher

    Dale Burden

    Headmaster

Tangaroa College

    David Riley

Teacher in Charge of Performing Arts

   

Ngaire Ashmore

    Principal

Pakuranga Intermediate

    Jessica Taylor

    Organising Teacher

    Stuart Myers

    Principal

Hay Park Primary School

    Connie Igasan

    Organising Teacher

    Margaret Aikman

    Principal

New Lynn Primary School

    Lisa Pickles

    Organising Teacher

    Greg Roebuck

    Principal

Sally Markham

Producer

Marama Lloydd

Costume design and production

Vanda Karolczak

Lighting Design

Natasha Pearce

Project Coordinator

Kendra Oxley

Edda Wiese

APO Interns

Fraser Bruce (drums)

Nick Hill (trumpet)

Workshop Musicians

We would particularly like to acknowledge the support of:

Royal New Zealand Ballet, for provision of dance floor

Richard Jeffery CEO TelstraClear Pacific, for venue and other support

Ralph Buck University of Auckland, for rehearsal space

All participating schools, for support with student participation and transport

Atamira Dance Company for additional costumes

Vicki Slow, for blue cloth

The orchestra and APO staff

We are especially grateful for special funding for this project from:

Real New Zealand Festival
ASB Community Trust

British Council

NZ Lottery Grants Board

Friday night praise

How great was Friday night? The APO office is still buzzing with excitement as reviews, video footage and photographs continue to flow in. Check out the links below for the latest coverage.

Review: Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project
By William Dart
New Zealand Herald
18 October

Review: 'A rich experience all round'
By Raewyn Whyte
Theatreview
15 October

Documentary: Radio New Zealand Concert
Produced by Sophie Wilson
13 October 2011

'Cultural stage mix'
By Daniel Silverton
Howick and Pakuranga Times
13 October

Dress rehearsal at Telstra Clear Pacific

Awesome dress rehearsal at Telstra Clear Pacific yesterday. Dancers looked great and the orchestra sounded fab.  Can't wait to see it all again when Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project debuts at the Aotea Centre tomorrow night (14 October), 7:30pm.

RadioNZ

Coming up on Radio New Zealand Concert any second now, Sacre - the documentary, produced by the most excellent Sophie Wilson. Online at www.radionz.co.nz, or, if you're old school, 92.6FM

Final rehearsals before the riot of production week

 

Students from Kristin School, Tangaroa College and Auckland Uni spent Saturday perfecting the finer details of choreography.

Later on in the day the dancers were paid a visit by the younger cast members of Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project. Students from Hay Park School and New Lynn Primary have been selected to partner with the older dancers for one of the scenes. The young dancers impressed on lookers as they approached the tricky lifts with courage. We can't wait to see them perform on Friday night!

'The language of dance' - Sacre features in the Weekend Herald in a story by Dr William Dart.

Choreographer Royston Maldoom takes students from
Hay Park school through an energetic dance rehearsal. Picture: Adrian Malloch

The language of dance

The New Zealand Herald

By William Dart

Saturday Oct 8, 2011

English choreographer Royston Maldoom brings his energy to a dance-music project involving the Auckland Philharmonia and 180 Auckland school children

Royston Maldoom takes dance very, very seriously. Braving the wind outside a Shortland St cafe, recovering from an exhaustive day of rehearsals, the English choreographer gives out his creative credo over a cappuccino.

"I'm in dance because it's a language," he points out. "It has the potential to communicate just as much as any other art."

Maldoom is in charge of Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra's Sacre Project, in which 180 youngsters from schools around the city dance to The Rite of Spring, while Eckehard Stier and the APO play Stravinsky's score.

Stier himself, on the line from Germany, admits he has "been practising every day, dancing the rhythms and getting them into my body".

Proudly touted as a gala event of the REAL New Zealand Festival, it all comes with a stupendous support team. Maldoom's assistant, Volker Eisenach, is an ever-present right-hand at all the rehearsals I attend.

Local choreographers include Taiaroa Royal, Ann Dewey and Moss Patterson, who have been taking the youngsters through an unsparing warm-up session at Mt Albert Grammar, to the relentless bop of hip-hop.

Then there is the unflappable producer Sally Markham, who arranges the complex scheduling, takes notes at performances and fills me in on the two or more years it has taken to make this project a reality.

It all started in Berlin eight years ago, when Maldoom set 250 young people dancing to the Stravinsky ballet, with the music supplied by the Berlin Philharmonic.

"When I was first asked to do this I said no because I was involved in smaller projects that were important to me," says Maldoom. "But my German friends said I must. Doing it with this orchestra and conductor at that time would give what we were doing such a tremendous profile."

And so history was made in Berlin's old bus depot in January 2003, powerfully caught on film in Rhythm is It!, an award-winning documentary by Thomas Grube and Enrique Sanchez-Lansch.

The movie's byline, "You can change your life in a dance class", sounds like a sickly amalgam of Fame, Billy Elliot and Glee, but Maldoom's aims are deeper and truer.

It's all in the body, he says, comparing his aims to those of a psychologist, but preferring to "bring about change through the choreographic process. If you change the way the body stands and moves you're inevitably changing the way the mind works".

It is fascinating to watch Maldoom slipping into Moss Patterson's Mt Albert warm-up, clapping and stomping as he joins the circle of dancers. Suddenly Stravinsky bursts from the ghetto-blaster and the master has taken over. The youngsters are portraying the four winds. "Run FASTER, jump HIGHER," is the first directive; later, a smirking student occasions a roar: "Don't smile. That's shit if you smile!"

The young people brought into the project range from first-year university dance students to youngsters from Hay Park and New Lynn Primary Schools, Pakuranga Intermediate, Mt Albert Grammar and a blend of Tangaroa College and Kristin School.

Lack of training and experience doesn't worry Maldoom. "Some people may not have the technique but they have something else. I worry far less about technique than about passion, energy and excitement."

I watch him setting up a more formal pas de deux with Tangaroa's John Vahaakolo and university student Sophie Harvey playing the Sky Father and Earth Mother. Later he muses, "Sometimes I wonder whether I really teach dance or performance."

Friday's Aotea Centre presentation promises a veritable evening of spectacle - the programme opens with kapa haka from Te Pou Whakairo and the orchestra in Gareth Farr's From the Depths Sound the Great Sea Gongs - but no young person who has worked with Maldoom will go away untouched.

Megan Garforth from the Mt Albert contingent says "It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience from a good man who listens to what you say".

Jacqui Cesan, who teaches dance at MAGS, pinpoints Maldoom's "self-discipline, great sense of humour and his ability to articulate things in a way that kids can understand. Later on," she continues, "these youngsters will really realise what a significant event this has been, both for themselves and for New Zealand."

Maldoom has left his mark all over the world. Lithuania had him mount a spectacular Carmina Burana in Vilnius' Independence Square to celebrate the country's freedom from Soviet oppression; more recently his work with Ethiopian streetkids led to the foundation of the Adugna Company in that country.

He reminds me of advice that was given to him early on in his career, "Don't think money, think vision. This is something I've tried to pass on to young people ever since - if you're excited, get other people excited and it will happen."

Certainly the buzz at a Hay Park School rehearsal is contagious. Youngsters dash around to the pounding of Stravinsky. They're the hunters and Maldoom is very taken with one boy's tongue-to-the-chin haka grimace.

"It's been a very easy project here," Maldoom smiles. "You have an indigenous culture that's still very strong and the Maori dancers have such a strength and physicality."

A fortnight before opening night, translating the ballet's primeval ritual into the South Pacific was still very much a work-in-progress.

The relationship of the Earth Mother and Sky Father is "always there, guiding the action, hinted at all the way through," says Maldoom, although the climactic sacrifice scene has changed between two of my visits.

It now bears the more general title of The Oppression and yet it will still catch what, for Maldoom, is the core of the piece, evoking "the sacrifice of children that happens in every society. I hope that people will see the relevance of it all, whatever culture they're in."

 

What: Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project

Where and when: Aotea Centre, Friday at 7.30pm

 

By William Dart

Pakuranga Intermediate students rise to the challenge

 

Expectations of the young dancers at Pakuranga Intermediate were lifted this week with Sacre: The Auckland Dance Project set to hit the Aotea Centre next Friday night (14 October). We are pleased to say that they did indeed 'rise to the challenge'!

"The messages that Royston gives them is almost more important than the movement. Being proud. Standing on your own two feet. It's like life coaching"
Jessica Taylor - Pakuranga Intermediate teacher
(pictured second row of photos on the right).