Rambert Dance Workshops
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As a leading Arts Mark Gold School, Dowdales has a reputation for having highly successful partnerships with national arts companies that have included The Royal Opera House and The Royal Shakespeare Company. In September 2011, we were delighted to embark upon a long-term partnership with Rambert, Britain’s most-celebrated contemporary dance company. Working in collaboration with Creative Futures Cumbria, we set up this innovative project to raise aspirations and achievement and allow students to create inspiring work with other young performers in the county. In the first two years, over four hundred students from eight Cumbrian secondary schools have participated in the partnership, gaining access to high-quality contemporary dance and music. In the coming year we aim to showcase our work in a Performance Evening for all participating schools. We also plan to include art workshops and extend the partnership to include local primary schools. Rambert Dance Workshops The second year of our prestigious partnership with Rambert Dance Company got underway in September 2012, with four days of dance workshops in the Muse. Dowdales was delighted to host the workshops enabling almost 150 students to take part in full-day sessions with Rambert animateurs. The students challenged themselves learning technique and professional repertoire, before working collaboratively to create their own original pieces. Further workshops followed in the spring and summer terms, enabling Rambert to “It has been a great opportunity taking part; I work with GCSE Dance students, Dowdales Youth have learned lots of new skills and made new friends. It was fun performing for the other Dance, DYD Springloaded, Year 9 prospective schools and watching them dance.” Alfie, Year 7 GCSE students and Year 7s. Feedback was student overwhelmingly positive. Quote “Working with Rambert was special. It stretched me. What I also learned about myself was that when things were difficult, I didn’t give up. It was a great feeling to keep up with all the challenges that were set for us.” Beth, Year 7 student Visit to The Lowry “You feel In October 2012, almost two hundred really happy because you Cumbrian students travelled to the Lowry think: Wow! Theatre, Salford to watch Rambert’s latest I’ve just done repertoire. The students enjoyed watching the something the professional professional dancers perform Labyrinth of dancers do.” Love and the explosive Sub, which they Gemma, themselves had learned phrases from in the Year 11 dance workshops. Dowdales students were student also invited to watch a rehearsal before the performance and were able to meet the Artistic Director, Mark Baldwin and dancers, Mark Kimmett and Vanessa Kang. “Talking to Mark Baldwin was so inspiring! Thank you for the opportunity of seeing you all dance.” Year 11 student Music Workshops On the 15th and 16th April music students from Dowdales various choirs and instrumentalists took part in music workshops with Russell Hepplethwaite, a professional composer with Rambert Dance Company. The first workshop involved vocalists who composed pieces inspired by sections of Rambert’s current commission “Labyrinth of Love”. On the second day instrumentalists from the school’s swing band, orchestra, samba band “This was a and school of rock worked on a variety of great improvised compositions. experience, Students gained a great deal from the experience considering I and enjoyed the opportunity to extend their skills. want to be a music teacher in later life” Sarah, Year 9 student “I really enjoyed today. I thought it was very a different approach to music and really good to learn.” George, Year 10 student “I learned that in music you need to take risks.” Ellie, Year 8 student Gifted and Talented Masterclass On Tuesday 26th February Dowdales was delighted to welcome Mark Baldwin, Artistic Director of Rambert. Twenty-nine students from Dowdales and the other partner schools were involved in a masterclass with Mark and Rambert animateur, Deborah Galloway. The session started with a contemporary technique class, followed by Mark leading on his version of The Rite of Spring, which students then used as inspiration to devise their own work. Finally there was a sharing of work followed by a question and answer session with Mark and Deborah. Mark later tweeted that he had had a fabulous day at Dowdales. Denise Alexander, Director, Creative Futures Cumbria said: “This really is a once in a lifetime opportunity for these students to engage with such an inspirational and influential artistic director. Mark had an extremely successful career as a dancer at Rambert, where he performed for 10 years and he is now in his tenth year as Artistic Director. Much of his highly acclaimed work has received many prestigious awards.” “It was a brilliant opportunity learning the Rite of Spring from Mark Baldwin himself. He gave us excellent advice for our own choreography and it was interesting to learn a different style of contemporary dance.” Tiffany, Year 10 student “Working with new combinations of people from my school and from other Cumbrian schools, I found myself developing leadership skills when putting forward my ideas for our own dances. It also helped me to understand what it means to be resilient. What they asked us to do was difficult but I achieved it and this made me feel proud of myself.” Ellie, Year 7 student Rambert Sharing at Dowdales th On the 8 July almost a hundred students from the participating schools came together to share and celebrate the work they had created over the second year of the partnership. Dowdales hosted the sharing day, which began with warm-up and technique classes followed by workshops on Swansong and Hush. After lunch the students rehearsed and shared the collaborative work they had created in the morning, as well as performing pieces created in previous workshops. The students showed excellent focus throughout the day and Rambert commended the students on the high quality of their work. It was an exciting end to the second year of the partnership, with all the students looking forward to meeting again next year. “The partnership with Dowdales School is an important part of Rambert’s learning and participation programme. It is so important for us, as a national company, to build long-term relationships with schools across the country and Dowdales School has been a pro-active and creative partner, which has taken a leadership role in coordinating dance activity with schools across Cumbria.” Joce Giles, Head of Learning & Participation, Rambert Dance Company Thank you to our partner schools: Dallam School, Furness Academy, John Ruskin School, Queen Elizabeth School and The Queen Katherine School & Ulverston Victoria High School .