(Appendices will be labelled with a * and number, whereas bibliographical references will be labelled with just a number)
Introduction
The project I am proposing is a 10 minute long video of a contemporary dance piece, structured and designed in tandem with the music it is danced to. The core idea for this project is that we work together to create a piece of music familiar to Josh’s ‘Movement Language’, that tells an identifiable, albeit conceptual, story, of Josh’s design- that can be emphasised by his dance. In this sense, rather than making a piece of music to his dance, or him dancing to a piece of music, it is a mixture of both- with the through line being the story. In terms of its use outside of this assignment, it will be used as a piece of promotional material for Josh on his social media, as well as an application submission to a dance school in Austria that he wants to get in to. This project’s personnel are as of now, Josh and I, however there is an opportunity to involve a lighting director to create a light show to add production value to the video if we feel it would be useful.
Josh
Josh is a 3rd year student at The Northern School of Contemporary Dance here in Leeds, and describes himself as an artist of many forms, primarily dance, however he writes and produces music, as well as dabbling in filmmaking- specifically cinematography for his videos. As previously mentioned, he aspires to go abroad to pursue a career in dance, as he is deeply passionate about expressing his relation to music through movement. For this reason, he is highly motivated to complete this project, and to work hard on it, so I believe he is a perfect choice of collaborator.
Methodology and Rationale
I initially reached out to Josh in mid-October, after a friend of mine told me about the kind of work he did, and I felt that it could work well as a collaborative opportunity (see appendix 1*1). We arranged to meet in person to discuss possible project ideas and themes, and I took notes on the session*2. Josh was very clear that he felt the piece should have a story, and that the movement of the track should be cyclical- in his own words “It should feel like I end up back where I started, only weirder and more f–ed up”. We decided that the best way to tackle this project would be for me to mock up a couple demos of what my sense of his concepts were, and then pick the best one and go from there. Once this was done, we would follow a timetable as shown here*3, with the main idea being that I build the track off of Josh’s input and inspirations*4. I made sure that we had a schedule where we were never out of contact for an extended period based on my research of long term collaborations, where I found that consistent communication is key in ensuring both parties are invested in the project, and will get the most out of them creatively1. The other added benefit of this is that it keeps us constantly working on the project, ensuring it is done in time.
It was/is important to us that the music reflects who Josh is as a dancer, so once we had settled on a rough ‘genre’ for the track- being electronic/experimental with elements of EDM and Psychedelia (based on conversation and the playlist shown in appendix 4)- I decided to do some research into Josh’s influences as a dancer2,3. From this I understood that the most effective music would be music that could evoke passionate movement, something that builds and releases, and that sits in one place a while, allowing him to feel it. As well as this I found that a dance choreographer that Josh takes inspiration from tends to use cathartic, rapid movements and contusions, so I took a note to include parts in the track that could supplement this. This ties well into my strengths as a producer, as I am very experienced with synthesis and psychedelic music, and spent most of my early years of producing making extremely similar music
Around the time the music is beginning to be finished, we will start work on choreography, as we only need the key structure of the track to base this off of. While choreography is certainly not my background, and I will very much let Josh take the lead on it, I think it’s important that, in the same sense we collaborate and work together strongly on the music, we do the same for the dance. To help me be able to give the best feedback in this area, I have started researching dance in general, trying to find ideas and concepts that I like that I think would be effective in telling the story we are going for.
The final stage will be filming- we are torn between using a number of different locations spliced throughout the video to help make a more engaging piece of media, or using a dance studio at Josh’s uni to make the most of its lighting setup and professional background. Currently the plan is to try it in the studio first, and then if we decide we want to use multiple locations we will afterwards, which we will most likely have time for as we are far ahead of schedule. To my mind, I think that using multiple locations would be much more effective at conveying a story, and would get more out of Josh’s other strengths, namely cinematography.
Market Analysis
For this project, identifying a market is somewhat difficult, as its core premise is that it is an audition tape for a dance studio. Despite this, we also are intending the video to be used for promotional content for Josh’s social media, across all platforms, and so from this perspective we can use market analysis.
Aside for the possibility of a video going extremely viral, the way that this type of project would make money is through garnering an audience to hopefully monetise in future (from my side this would be exposure for music I have made, from Josh’s it would be potential work for dance companies etc). To this extent, the important things to think about are what kind of audiences engage with similar content, and what form that content takes. To find this out I went onto social media*5-9, where I found that though a large part of the audience we would be aiming for is other dancers supporting each other, there is a type of media called Screendance. Screendance is a short-form media that incorporates contemporary dance with striking visuals and narrative to marry film and dance4– perfect for our project. To most effectively hit this market the use of multiple different filming locations could be extremely useful, as well as incorporating sound effects into the track to help with immersion.
Costs and Budgeting
All necessary equipment and resources are accounted for already, so budgeting is hypothetical, however I made this provisional budget to illustrate what kind of costs this type of project could take:
Hypothetical Funding
Help Musicians ‘Do It Differently Fund’ – provides grants of up to £3000
Leeds Inspired- Small grants of up to £1200
Leeds Cultural Programme- Provides grants of up to £2000 for one off projects
Risk Assessment
- Primary risk is injury to Josh prior to filming that prevents him from being able to dance- mitigated by the fact I have a backup dancer who could learn the routine choreographed and be filmed instead- Josh and the backup have a working relationship already so would not be an issue
- Falling behind schedule/ being too busy- very possible but unlikely as we have planned well and are far ahead of schedule. We are both very motivated for this project so this is not a huge worry
- File corruption/ device breaking- Files are backed up both on a hard-drive and a cloud, should my laptop break I can borrow one until the problem is resolved.
Evaluation Viability
In the presentation feedback, aside from a few notes on information layout, the feedback was mostly positive. My peers, like I, seem to think that the project is viable. I believe this is because I have a clear schedule, which both Josh and myself are following, as well as a clear, achievable plan that we can execute. We have collaborated so far very well, managing to get the majority of the music ready, and have shared ideas and implemented them very well. Our strong working relationship will (I hope) continue, which should allow us to complete the project to a very high standard and leave us with something we can be proud of.
Appendices
1
2
3
4
5
9. Links For Budget
https://thedancestudioleeds.com/studio-hire/
https://www.ultimateeventdancers.co.uk/hiring-dancers/how-much-does-it-cost-to-hire-dancers/
https://www.poptop.uk.com/leeds-city/suppliers/photographer/videographer
https://hygglo.com/uk/category/9452-cameras/leeds
10. SWOT
11. Demo of track (unfinished)
References
1-Barrett, M.S., Creech, A. and Zhukov, K. (2021). Creative Collaboration and Collaborative Creativity: A Systematic Literature Review. Frontiers in Psychology, 12(713445). doi:https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.713445.
2- The Kennedy Center (2019). Merce Cunningham + BIPED. [online] www.kennedy-center.org. Available at: https://www.kennedy-center.org/education/resources-for-educators/classroom-resources/media-and-interactives/media/dance/merce-cunningham–biped/.
3- sophiereyyoga (2024). What is Somatic Dance? [online] Sophie Rey Yoga. Available at: https://www.sophiereyyoga.co.uk/post/what-is-somatic-dance.
4- Wiederholt, E. (2017). Screendance: The Newest Genre. [online] Stance on Dance. Available at: https://stanceondance.com/2017/12/28/screendance-the-newest-genre/.
