Piece Premiere: "With the New Day"

So, my first work as an official college graduate and holder of a Bachelor's in Fine Arts in Dance is complete. I was given the opportunity to contribute back to my alma mater, and choreograph a piece in the University of Memphis' Faculty & Alumni Dance Concert - Momentum. After being a dancer in this concert for the past three years, stepping back and being the brain behind the operation was so exciting, nerve-wracking, and odd to me. 

I started from basically nothing but a costume idea of corsets and petticoats, and from there the work grew. I was willing to cast any gender, race, etc. but ended up with a cast of five beautiful woman. 

My first thought was this: corsets are restricting, yet the petticoats are free - what can this communicate about us as people? 

After stumbling across what would later accompany my movement ("Walk" by Ludovico Enaudi), I became struck with this image of a music box that is slowly breaking down, and how the ballerina inside it wobbles and twitches as the music slows to pieces. 

With this image in my mind, the studio filled with the most hard-working and graceful dancers I could have asked for, and music that lead me off into a more progressive direction than I had expected - we created this work that introduces a little bit of history to the new age. 

Opening and closing this concert in two days was overwhelming and bittersweet, but I couldn't be more proud and humbled by what these ladies helped me create.