Footnote to Incomplete Essay: My transformation from music fan to dance fan

The transition of my enthusiasm from music to theatre came, perhaps, in part, as a consequence of two remarkable gigs that I saw in the 1990s: Swans, touring on the back of their Love of Life album and The Young Gods around the time of TV Sky. Both bands conjured a mixture of furious violence and triumphant ecstasy, invoking a shamanistic mysticism (Swans' Michael Gira manipulates a theological vocabulary while The Young Gods embrace a lyrical paganism) that transformed the rock gig from a tired ritual into a celebration of life and community.

Against this, the business-as-usual of most rock'n'roll appeared tired and predictable: bands playing their hits to a group of fans who would sing along, or younger groups searching for an audience in half-empty basements, lacked the raw energy and the musical confidence Gira and Frans Treichler embodied. Memories of Michael Clark's collaboration with The Fall, and the appearance of a company I believe to have been DV8 dancing to Swans on London's South Bank, hinted that there were more interesting ways to experience the thrill of art transmitting beauty and meaning. I still attended gigs - although it was not until I discovered the Glasgow bands on the fringes of the city's visual art scenes that I recaptured the excitement - but even major events like Radiohead's big tent tour felt like shams.

I can date the exact moment when "contemporary dance" replaced rock music as my favourite art: Les Ballets C de la B, Tramway, performing VSPRS. Admittedly, the live band - an amalgam of gypsy and jazz musicians belting out a psychedelic adaptation of Verdi's Vespers - lent the choreography a recognisable rock'n'roll energy, but the terrifying movements of the dancers, the intensity of Alain Platel's intentions and the cast, drawn from the worlds of classical ballet, acrobatics and more difficult to define areas (my subsequent art crush Iona Kewney, who would later develop her own work that followed a similar rough beauty, was a visual artist who had found herself dancing in an attempt to capture her wild muse) did more than illustrate this heretical re-imagination of the seminal religious composition.

I followed the dancers into a trance. In under two hours, Platel fused music and movement - and a stunning, ragged, set - into a contemplation of both the dangers and pleasures of religious ecstasy. Reviewing the critical commentary of the time, it's clear that Les Ballets C de la B were controversial. There is a contempt for their style - they have been mocked as circus performers. But for me, the performance was a revelation: both of dance's ability to represent altered states (and provoke them), and the potential for theatre to be more dramatic, more vital and more vigorous than the supposedly primal energies unleashed by rock'n'roll.

Michael Clark (Number One...)

Michael Clark's reputation as the bad boy of dance rests mainly on the works that he made in the 1980s: choreographies like No Fire Escape in Hell and Curious Orange married dance with a post-punk ferocity and queer decadence in a time when these ideas were still threatening. Clark's early work was challenging and disorientating, using his ballet training to distort traditional dance movements into something alien and strange.

If he has never quite lost both the playfulness and vitality of his 1980s' work, Clark's recent choreography is far more obviously influenced by ballet. Thanks to the programming of New Territories, Edinburgh International Festival and Tramway, he has become a familiar presence in Scotland - it has been possible to trace the development of his process through the repeated booking of the show that eventually became come, been and gone. Having a company predominantly trained in ballet has lent his choreography a more recognisably classical shape.

This isn't so much about the young radical maturing into a conservative - part of the pleasure of No Fire Escape was the importance of ballet as a foundation, and far less skillful choreographers have followed his lead in seeing that contemporary dance, once in opposition to ballet, can be informed by ballet technique and grace. The alluring, yet alien, dances of his Barrowlands' Project - which is likely to have been a beginning for the show arriving at Tramway this weekend - are the result of Clark's interesting in testing how the fundamental ballet postures, such as the outward rotation of the leg - can reach some distinctly unfamiliar places.

Aside from the ballet, Clark's use of music is another distinctive quality. It's not so much that he choses rock music over classical (or electronic, which is increasingly fashionable), but that he has a genuine affection for his choices. The various collaborations with The Fall - eventually, he had them on stage for Curious Orange - the repeated visits to Wire's back catalogue, the various Bowie numbers suggest that Clark choreographs to music he loves - no afterthought in the process for him. He even used an iconic image of Bowie, Iggy Pop and Lou Reed as publicity, affirming that "rock had been his rock."

So the arrival of Scritti Politti in Tramway should be no surprise. They come out of the same post-punk time that energised Clark and, like him, have a respect for traditional forms given a subversive twist. Green Gartside may have realised very quickly that a polished production could allow him to infiltrate popular culture - in the early 1980s, they stood up alongside mainstream pop bands despite  their lyrical interest in serious left-wing aesthetics and politics. And Clark, who now gets commissions for community projects from Glasgow City Council, has noticed how the veneer can enhance and hide the more radical yearnings that were on the surface in his youthful productions.

Tramway, 4 - 6 October 

Probably not an exclusive now but I tried: Michael Clark announces special guest...

I've been sitting on an article about Michael Clark's Barrowland Project for a while - I'll put it up some time in the next week when I finally work out whether it can be considered as a community piece (there was five minutes of performance by 'local people') or a dry run for the new work he is presenting at Tramway in the first weekend of October.

The professional parts of the Barrowlands Project were stunning, slinky and stylish, and the musical choices, as to be expected, were slyly hip. That Scritti Politti have been announced as special guests for the New Work next week does suggest that Clark was testing a few ideas at the Barras that are going to be developed in the New Work.

However, this very short blog simply says that Clark is getting a live band up on the stage with him at Tramway. Just like in the piece that inspired me to write about dance, Curious Orange. Only that time, it was The Fall, a cantankerous post-punk ensemble led by a lyricist determined to follow his own path.  This time, it's Scritti Politti, a  post-punk ensemble led by a lyricist determined to follow his own path. 

It's Tramway, it's Clark - who has made peace with the ghosts of his ballet training, it's a live band. I am a little excited...

Thu 4 - Sat 6 October 7:30pm

Tickets £20 / £15

Cab it Up!

There are many things that disappoint me - my own ability to cope with hot weather being the one most pressing at this moment. However, the opportunity to work with Michael Clark has always been high on my "to do" list. And now, there is that opportunity.

Only I can't do it, because I am going to be fringing it during August, and won't be able to commit to the rehearsals.

However, if any men are interested and, like me, they lack dance training, I'd rush to this site.

www.dancehouse.org/thebarrowlandsproject




Wiping away my tears, I have cut and pasted the information...

The iconic Scottish dancer and choreographer Michael Clark returns to Glasgow following the company’s remarkable four-week long residency at the Whitney Museum, New York. He will once again engage both professional and community dancers to generate choreography, expanding what our experience of movement can be. This will culminate in performances at the celebrated Glasgow Barrowlands on 8 & 9 September 2012, the final weekend of the London 2012 Festival and marking the shift in focus to Scotland and Glasgow 2014.

Michael Clark Company and Dance House invite local people to become performers alongside the Company dancers, accentuating the communal dance experience in this landmark event. The Barrowlands Project is supported by Creative Scotland and produced in partnership with Michael Clark Company, Glasgow Life and Dance House, Glasgow.

VOLUNTEER REQUIREMENTS
• Age 18 or over
• No previous formal dance training - (by formal dance training we mean vocational full time training, this does not exclude those who have attended regular dance classes, either recently or in the past).
• Able to participate in movement/dance for 2-3 hours a day.
• Available for ALL performance and rehearsal times, with flexibility to attend rehearsals on other days/times as needed.
• While applications from all over Scotland are welcomed, we anticipate this being of most interest to people in the Greater Glasgow area as participants need to commit to the intensive period of rehearsals in Glasgow.

HOW TO APPLY & REHEARSAL DATES
For rehearsal schedule please go to: www.dancehouse.org/thebarrowlandsproject
• Send us no more than 250 words about yourself and why you would like to do this, your date of birth and occupation, along with your contact details (full name, email address, home address and telephone number) toinfo@dancehouse.org. Please add The Barrowlands Project in the subject line of your email.
• Deadline: 12 noon Friday 8 June 2012.
• Successful applicants will be notified within 10 days of the deadline. Please note that due to the anticipated volume of applications, we are unable to contact those who have not been selected.