wednesday silks
i'm performing tomorrow evening at spontaneous celebrations! no, really. i'll be on silks, pam will be on static trapeze. we go on while the grass gypsys are preparing for their set.
also, a bunch of folks i practice with will be performing in a sort of tribute to old-time freak shows at the oberon april 15th.
the latter show will involve jeremy as the bearded lady flying on spanish web, which became sort of the theme of last night's practice...
jeremy's been borrowing a corde lisse rope from harm_city_heart to practice with (he jury-rigged up a hand loop for it), and that was hung towards the end of the evening last night... which somehow led to harm_city_heart egging everyone on to try it. :) now, spanish web is basically the thing that got me interested in aerials: the triton troopers had a big spanish web act every year and flying looked like a lot of fun! but it was strictly gender-segregated: girls flew, boys spun. (in fact, in the entire circus we had three male aerialists: two based in our version of flying trapeze, and the third was a guy who sorta did everything, but who must have learned it somewhere else.) i understood from talking with folks who did it that there was certainly skill involved in spinning the rope. but if i was going to be basing i was way more interested in something a little more direct, like partner acro (which i did do). but i wanted to fly, darn it. so, that spurred me being interested in silks when the opportunity came, years later.
but i had never actually flown spanish web; the closest i'd come to doing anything with it was spinning klingonlandlady in a spanish-web-like bit on silks for a performance in cypher's class.
so it didn't take much persuading to get me up there. and it was fun! though i think i needed to learn to hold my body stiffer, to take the spin better. still, nifty. :) and many, many folks took turns. some of the guys looked pretty good, demonstrating that in fact guys can look good on spanish web (without having to present as female). :)
other bit from the evening: there were some folks there who train with jill. one of them showed me a drop they'd been making up over at aircraft, which she said was tentatively named "london frog." :) it was sort of a combination spool drop and a thigh wrap slack drop with the slack loop looped around the knee, straightening the knee to drop. very cute. :)
i ran through my routine a couple of times. the first time i was panting by the end and very annoyed with myself-- am i out of shape again? again? already? maybe i'm just not sleeping enough? i have been pretty sleepy lately. but a few minutes later i ran through it again and was fine. maybe i needed the warm-up? dunno.
i tried, on the second run-through, to match style with the music that was playing at the time. it was a sort of dancey, driving-beat kind of piece which is tough to match on silks-- fast movements get you jammed up, and encourage you not to hold nice poses long enough besides. but it's probably good practice to do things that are difficult sometimes. i was able to bring some things from the weekend's laban movement classes to it, at least, using the music by sometimes specifically moving in opposite style to it. still, it would also be nice to play some more flowy music, too. and also, i should practice the stuff from this past weekend way more...
also, a bunch of folks i practice with will be performing in a sort of tribute to old-time freak shows at the oberon april 15th.
the latter show will involve jeremy as the bearded lady flying on spanish web, which became sort of the theme of last night's practice...
jeremy's been borrowing a corde lisse rope from harm_city_heart to practice with (he jury-rigged up a hand loop for it), and that was hung towards the end of the evening last night... which somehow led to harm_city_heart egging everyone on to try it. :) now, spanish web is basically the thing that got me interested in aerials: the triton troopers had a big spanish web act every year and flying looked like a lot of fun! but it was strictly gender-segregated: girls flew, boys spun. (in fact, in the entire circus we had three male aerialists: two based in our version of flying trapeze, and the third was a guy who sorta did everything, but who must have learned it somewhere else.) i understood from talking with folks who did it that there was certainly skill involved in spinning the rope. but if i was going to be basing i was way more interested in something a little more direct, like partner acro (which i did do). but i wanted to fly, darn it. so, that spurred me being interested in silks when the opportunity came, years later.
but i had never actually flown spanish web; the closest i'd come to doing anything with it was spinning klingonlandlady in a spanish-web-like bit on silks for a performance in cypher's class.
so it didn't take much persuading to get me up there. and it was fun! though i think i needed to learn to hold my body stiffer, to take the spin better. still, nifty. :) and many, many folks took turns. some of the guys looked pretty good, demonstrating that in fact guys can look good on spanish web (without having to present as female). :)
other bit from the evening: there were some folks there who train with jill. one of them showed me a drop they'd been making up over at aircraft, which she said was tentatively named "london frog." :) it was sort of a combination spool drop and a thigh wrap slack drop with the slack loop looped around the knee, straightening the knee to drop. very cute. :)
i ran through my routine a couple of times. the first time i was panting by the end and very annoyed with myself-- am i out of shape again? again? already? maybe i'm just not sleeping enough? i have been pretty sleepy lately. but a few minutes later i ran through it again and was fine. maybe i needed the warm-up? dunno.
i tried, on the second run-through, to match style with the music that was playing at the time. it was a sort of dancey, driving-beat kind of piece which is tough to match on silks-- fast movements get you jammed up, and encourage you not to hold nice poses long enough besides. but it's probably good practice to do things that are difficult sometimes. i was able to bring some things from the weekend's laban movement classes to it, at least, using the music by sometimes specifically moving in opposite style to it. still, it would also be nice to play some more flowy music, too. and also, i should practice the stuff from this past weekend way more...