DANCE SPOTLIGHT INC
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Mission Statement
Dance Spotlight was formed to preserve our national dance legacy. We accomplish this by producing historical records of influential dance techniques for various media as well as classes of influential teachers of these techniques, all of which are made available to dancers, instructors, and scholars worldwide. Our work enables the techniques to be studied, taught, danced and appreciated by dancers and audiences around the world. Our work also contributes to being able to pass along the essentials necessary to perform choreographic works of master choreographers and create new works. We have documented the Lester Horton Dance Technique with 3 technique Videos and 4 class videos. We have begun the preservation and documentation of the Martha Graham Dance Technique, completing the Beginning Level Video and one class video. We are currently fundraising and in production for the Intermediate and Advanced Graham Technique videos.
About This Cause
BACKGROUND of Dance Spotlight, Inc. Dance Spotlight was originally a partnership between Babs Coffey-Fisch and Jeanne Suggs to create a TV magazine show called Dance Spotlight to increase audience familiarity with dancers and their personal stories and thus help to increase attendance at dance performances and an overall interest in dance. Then after Alvin Ailey expressed to Babs that she should document the Lester Horton technique, the foundational technique of the Alvin Ailey Company, we formed Dance Spotlight to produce and distribute these videos. Babs and Jeanne are Co-Executive Directors of Dance Spotlight, Inc. and Jeanne is the director and editor of the videos. In collaboration with Ana Marie Forsythe, then the head of the Ailey School Horton Department, we documented the Horton Technique in 3 technique videos and 4 class videos. Then in 2011 the Martha Graham Company asked us to document the Graham technique. We have dedicated the last 6 years to the Graham Legacy endeavor while developing additional class videos taught by noted teachers in the Graham and Horton techniques. Now Dance Spotlight is exploring other documentation formats for teachers to pass on what they consider essentials in the teaching of their signature technique. The Beginner Level of the Graham technique has been completed and is in distribution. We are fundraising and shooting the Intermediate Level now and planning to produce the Advanced level video in 2022. THE MARTHA GRAHAM LEGACY PROJECT – current major project SUMMARY The goal of the Martha Graham Legacy Project is the documentation and preservation of the Martha Graham Dance Technique as Martha Graham created and taught it. The current objective is to create a beautiful, comprehensive digital and video record of the complete Graham technique. This will be accomplished by producing in partnership with the Martha Graham Dance Company, three professionally produced digital videos of the exercises and movements that make up the Graham technique: Beginning, Intermediate and Advanced. These will be augmented with interviews with former Graham dancers that worked with Ms. Graham adding their insights about the origins, performance and teaching of the technique. WHY THIS PROJECT IS NECESSARY MARTHA GRAHAM (1894-1991) changed the direction of dance in America. Before Martha's impactful shift, in the US there was ballet and the beginning of modern based on foreign influences. But Martha was a revolutionary. Graham worked tirelessly to invent a new language of dance, one that could reveal the passion, the rage and the ecstasy that is part of the human experience. This new language of dance was different from everything that preceded it, and left everything that came after it indelibly changed. We are in danger of losing this great legacy and the artistry of Martha Graham. Each dancer and teacher adds their interpretation and adapts the technique to their body or that of their students thereby changing it. We need to record the technique now while dancers that worked directly with Ms. Graham are still with us in order to preserve this technique as it was designed so that dancers can still be trained in its unique approach and still perform the Graham choreography. This documentation will capture and preserve the technique as Martha Graham created and taught it. This reference will enable the continuity of the technique on which dancers and choreographers can build. This technique is invaluable for training expressive dancers. Currently there exists only partial records of the technique with little explanation and not of high production quality. The videos we are producing are of a professional and high quality video format that can be adapted to developing technology for generations. PROJECT FORMAT: The current project will culminate with two additional interactive digital videos—intermediate and advanced - documenting and analyzing the exercises which make up the Graham movement vocabulary. The documentation will record sequences in a way that captures the proper emphasis, placement, alignment, and emotional significance of the technique. The goal is to recapture the anatomical direction that was essential to Ms. Graham. Each exercise will be performed by Graham dancers and shot in a studio theatre with multiple-cameras for best coverage. The voice-over script has counts, instructions, visual imagery and when helpful, describes the energy flow through the body. The dancers will be chosen based on their excellence in performing and executing the Graham exercises with clean lines and without affectation. Miki Orihara, the Dance Director, and Susan Kikuchi, the Associate Dance Director, are there to direct the dancers and to make sure the technique is being performed accurately. Janet Eilber, the Artistic Director of the Martha Graham Dance Company, is also reviewing the work as we progress. Several accompanying videos are being produced and edited from interviews with former Martha Graham Company members who worked directly with Ms. Graham. These members provide invaluable first-hand insights into the technique, keys to its performance, and how it evolved over time, adding an important element of oral history, as well as a fascinating personal and historical context to the technique. Two segments already produced for the Beginning Level are: Essential Elements of the Graham Technique and Teaching Graham. PRODUCTION SCHEDULE: Spring 2020 Scripting: Intermediate Fall 2020 Taping: Intermediate Winter/Spring 2021 Post-production; release of Intermediate Level Fall 2021 Production: Advanced Winter 2021 Post-production: Adv WHO WILL BENEFIT: The Graham technique is taught in major dance schools, universities, colleges, and dance companies around the world. The documentation will be available for use as a reference by these teachers and students. By making it available through online streaming, dancers around the world will be able to access it. Our experience with the Horton videos is evidence of the need for these documentations. Our beginning level technique video filmed in 1990 is still in demand. Teachers find the videos to be essential references. Many teachers do not have the means to travel frequently to study with Master teachers. These videos give them additional tools to accurately teach the technique. The Graham technique is even more widespread than Horton so the demand and need are even greater. This project will provide greater knowledge of and access to this extraordinary Graham legacy. It will be a lasting cultural gift and will have an enormous impact on future generations of dancers by preserving this amazing movement language. THE TEAM BABETTE COFFEY-FISCH - Producer Babette C. Fisch (Producer) has been involved in dance for over 40 years. Babette studied ballet and modern dance from the age of 9 at the Garden State Ballet. In 1963 Babette was accepted at the Royal Ballet School in London, England. Babette’s first professional performances took place at Covent Garden in 1963. Upon returning to the USA in late 1964, Babette turned to writing and published several articles in Dance Magazine. Babette moved to North Carolina, where she began teaching dance classes: ballet, Graham and Lester Horton techniques. Babette then created the Greater Charlotte Dance Guild, sponsoring over 18 dance companies, managing local residencies and performances. Upon moving back to the New Jersey area in 1972, Babette taught ballet and modern dance at the Newark Community Center for the Arts. She then co-founded Dance Spotlight to produce videos to help preserve foundational dance techniques. JEANNE SUGGS – Producer/Video Director, Editor Jeanne Suggs, an award-winning Producer/Director, has had her own video production company in NYC since 1983. She has produced or directed works for the theatrical, commercial, home video and broadcast markets. Over the past 30 years under Dance Spotlight, Jeanne has co-produced and directed the seven Horton technique and class videos. She co-produced, directed and edited the Beginning Level of the Graham Technique. Since 2009 Jeanne has been producing and directing an educational/exercise live action/animation series “Activity Works” for kids in the classroom. Jeanne co-produced her first dramatic feature, Calling It Quits, in 2007 and in 2012 produced a film short, Ice, followed in 2015, by the feature, Lost Cat Corona. Jeanne studied dance from the age of 4 and continued to study professionally with Stone-Camryn School of Ballet in Chicago, Merce Cunningham, Luigi, and at the Graham School in NYC. MIKI ORIHARA – Dance Director Miki Orihara is best known for her work as a dancer for over 26 years in the Martha Graham Dance Company, which she joined in 1987. In addition to performing the Graham repertory, she has worked closely with the renowned Japanese-American dancer, choreographer and director, Yuriko, preserving her unique approach to Graham Technique. Her teaching credentials include numerous workshops in Japan, Art International in Moscow, at Peridance, The Ailey School, and New York University. She is on the faculty at the Graham School, The Hartt School and Barnard College. As a Regisseur of Martha Graham’s work, she has been setting works worldwide. SUSAN KIKUCHI – Associate Dance Director Susan Kikuchi was a member of the Martha Graham Dance Company (MGDC) and served as Director of the Graham Ensemble and School, and Artistic Program Manager of MGDC. She has re-staged many Graham works for the MGDC, Joffrey Ballet, Boston Conservatory, Ballet San Jose Silicon Valley, and colleges and universities in the United States. Ms. Kikuchi has worked in productions of The King and I since age seven: Broadway credits: The King and I, Pacific Overtures, Flower Drum Song, South Pacific, Jerome Robbins’ Broadway. Ms. Kikuchi has served on the faculties of The Ailey School and the Martha Graham School and is Artistic Director of the New Dance Drama Educational Projects in Florence, Italy.