Image credit: Jennifer Cullen at Live & Direct at Dance Base 2024, Photo by Amy Sinead
Deadline: Tuesday 7 January, 11:00am
Are you a dance artist working in Hip Hop, Street, Breakin’ or Funk styles? Are you interested to learn more about creating hip hop work for the theatre and explore choreographic tools to find more ways to express yourself? Then Live & Direct, Dance Base’s Hip Hop dance development week, is for you!
Running from Monday 10 March – Friday 14 March, Live & Direct aims to support Hip Hop dance artists to explore their approach to making, build new skills and capacity to make performance and gain knowledge to help forge a professional career. This 5 day intensive will be led by hip hop dance artist and current Artistic Director of Dance Base, Tony Mills.
Participants will receive hands on support and mentorship, and we will aim to level up your skills, knowledge and awareness by:
ADDING TO YOUR TOOLBOX
- Undertaking physical and conceptual choreographic tasks to offer you new ways of developing movement, both within and outside of your style.
- Uncovering inspiration and stories that already exist in Hip Hop dance culture and how we can use them.
- You may be a Hip Hop dance artist that also works with other elements such as music/beat making, writing/rapping, art and fashion. This is an aspect we can explore depending on the make up of the group.
- Exploring theatrical techniques that can help to elevate your performance making skills.
- Participants will work as solos and in groups to explore these aspects.
PASSING ON KNOWLEDGE
- Participants will receive a short presentation on the history of UK Hip Hop Dance Theatre and where we are at now.
- There will be a chance to view and discuss the performance work of established Hip Hop dance artists.
- We will provide an advice and Q&A session around career questions and where to look for opportunities and support beyond this residency.
- We will undertake a daily training practice that will help to warm us up, bring us together and share some of our own techniques with those we are working with during the week.
This week is not about creating a performance, but we will have an end-of-week sharing to present some of what we have been investigating followed by an audience feedback session. This week is about nurturing your talent, challenging your methods and giving you tools and knowledge to help you navigate your career as a Hip Hop dance artist.
This opportunity is possible thanks to funding from Creative Scotland‘s Core Targeted Fund.
What the Week will provide:
We will work with a total of 3 artists for the week. The selected artists will each receive:
- A total artist fee of £750
- A week-long residency at Dance Base, Edinburgh from Monday 10 March – Friday 14 March 2025, with shared studio access from 10:00 – 17:00 each day. This week will include daily class with Tony Mills, creation sessions and peer-to-peer feedback/sharing as described above.
- Class would comprise of a touch of yoga, improvisation, games, hip hop techniques, a cypher and designed to bring us together and get us ready for the day. Participants will have an opportunity to teach and share techniques with other participants.
- Selected artists will receive a timetable of the intensive/residency in advance of attending.
- Participation in an informal public sharing at Dance Base to present some of the ideas and experiments that have been explored over the week and participation in a subsequent feedback session.
- Mentoring and support from Tony Mills during the week.
- Documentation of the week (photos/film).
- Travel and accommodation expenses if based outside of Edinburgh.
- An additional budget to cover any access requirements as required to support your engagement in the week, including childcare costs.
Who Live & Direct is for:
We realise that not every dancer in the scene will want to make work for theatre and a professional career in dance is varied. Through this programme, we wish to focus our resources on how we can upskill those individuals with an existing or growing interest in making performance for the theatre, specifically using Hip Hop skills. Therefore, this year, Live & Direct is for individuals who:
- Are based, and working, in Scotland.
- Have trained in, and has a demonstratable background in Hip Hop, Street, Breakin’ or Funk styles. Dancers who specialise in house, whacking or other similar genres are welcome to apply.
- Are clearly interested in making performance for the theatre setting and want to explore this further. For example, you may have already made some work for theatre, are making more intricate shows with your crew/group, perhaps you are making short online dance videos or exploring how to express yourself as a soloist.
- Are prepared to work on their own and in a group during the week.
- Can participate in the full week including morning class.
- See themselves as working at a professional level i.e. you are doing this full time or trying to get there. You could be established figure in the scene or an emerging one.
If you are unsure if Live & Direct is for you, please get in touch with Marlous Lang-Peterse at Marlous.Lang-Peterse@dancebase.co.uk
Timeline:
- EXTENDED Deadline: Tuesday 7 January, 11:00am
- Panel meet: 13-16 January
- Artists Informed: Friday 17 January
- Residency: Monday 10 March – Friday 14 March 2025
If you feel this opportunity is right for you, please download our application pack below and complete the Online Application Form.
If you have any questions, need some help with your application, or have any access requirements that we need to meet, then our team are here to help! Please just contact Marlous Lang-Peterse on marlous.lang-peterse@dancebase.co.uk to arrange a time to speak.