This past week was a complete whirlwind of inspiring dance! As I mentioned in my previous post, this past week was the week that the Eisenhower Dance Ensemble came to JMU to set Laurie Eisenhower's piece, Stop, on the Virginia Repertory Dance Company. Laurie didn't actually arrive until Friday night so two of her dancers, Mary and Alicia, came down to teach us the majority of the piece from Wednesday-Friday.

As you can probably tell by the way I'm wording this, I got in!! We auditioned during our advanced modern class, they chose 6 of us, and we started right away! This piece has 4 sections and is 12 minutes long in total. We never leave the stage and it's very athletic. Lots of jumps, lots of turns, lots of lifts and partner work, and LOTS of quick, precise counts to follow, which is exciting to watch but a tough one to rehearse because the unison has to be so tight. Not to mention exhausting! =P

Mary and Alicia were so wonderful to work with. They taught us well and got us to a point where we had the material for 3 of the 4 sections; the 4th being the 'easiest' to learn. We danced with Laurie on Saturday 10am-9pm (very tiring day) but we finished the piece and had Sunday morning to clean up some spacing and run the whole shabang one more time.

From the videos up on YouTube and from the video we referred to in rehearsals, Eisenhower Dance Ensemble is the real deal. Incredibly talented dancers and so nice!! Laurie has a very calm and quiet composure which makes her pretty intimidating, but her ideas, the way she views movement, and how she was able to communicate what she wanted to us was really amazing. If EDE ever tours in your city, I highly suggest seeing a show. You won't regret it!!

= K =