I`ll Meet You Where You`re At

Intention: I wanted to take a moment to reflect on my creative process and articulate the improvisational movement around my work, I'll Meet You Where You're At, presented at Third Space Dance Festival at Tempe Center For the Arts on June 28-29, 2023.

Third Space Dance Festival: The inaugural Third Space Dance Festival presents professional concert dance performance work from local professional dance artists and choreographers. The live performance pieces represent the quality and diversity of artistry and talent in Arizona, specifically the Phoenix Valley. The program will feature an immersive performance work that will take place in the lobby followed by a main-stage program. The program features a diversity of aesthetic, style, and artistic approach, bringing the community new and innovative performance work by local professionals.

“I’ll Meet You Where You’re At” is a structured improvisational/choreography piece that includes "You Don't Know Me But You Will" (a piece performed by the artist in 2018 which was inspired by the concept of first impressions) and then further explores our expectations versus the reality of who we meet now with an additional factor, digital. This piece explores the question, how do you develop trust with someone and find commonalities when you haven’t met them in person?

Due to the fact that I hadn't performed since February 2020, I didn't have any current work in videos that I could share as my proof of concept. Since I wanted the adjudicators to see what my capabilities are, I decided to take 2 mins from one of my past pieces, "You Don't Know Me But You Will", and add 2 other sections to create a 4 min piece.

A question that I often get is, "How do you perform structured improvisation?". I found myself creating a mind map of what I envisioned for the three sections based off of movement motifs, the music, the lighting/moood, and points in time that evoked emotion. This allowed me to visualize what the piece meant to me and also consider the audience's interpretations. As a choreographic intention, I definitely didn't want the piece to have literal gestures or phrases in the music. Instead, my goal was to allow the audience to connect to it based on their own experiences.

One thing that I found myself struggling with is being comfortable with the choices that I'm making in my improvisation. In the past couple of years, I've taken more Advanced choreography classes that consist of popping, house footwork, and hip hop basics. In those classes, the teachers have pushed for finding a connection to the music and making choices such as adding your own arms to the footwork that feel natural to you. The resolution I found is that it's ok to add these non-concert styles into my own work because ultimately, it's my movement and I have the freedom to choose how I want to move.

Another thing that I found myself struggling with is how do I make sense of all of these external identities such as being an Asian American, a Software Engineer (where there's less women in STEM careers), a Dance Artist, and even the CEO of justplatypost when I see all of these as being "me". There's moments where I definitely find myself showing up as only a Software Engineer or Dance Artist when really my thoughts consist of mix of art and logic.

The first section is Nym by Phlux. This was the same music that I used for my past piece. In a weird way, it felt like I was listening to this song for the first time because my ear for musicality has improved. I also had more footwork in my vocabulary so I was able to pull out different rhythms in the music. My knowledge of my body has also improved which allowed me to make bigger pops. I referenced the same motifs such as the handshake, creating a secret handshake, the "bro" handshake, and the nervousness felt when you're meeting someone new. I think because I have more control over my body now with experience, I was able to refine the movement and not look as tight as I did back in 2018.

In November 2022, I got a voicemail from Mainland China saying that I received a package but no one was there to sign for it. The caller mentioned this in Mandarin, English, and then Mandarin again. There was also a classical music playing in the background which gave a slightly eery and distorted feel. I just knew I had to use it in this piece.

For the third section, I struggled for a good 2 months because I wanted to compose the music myself. A mentor gave me the great advice of seeing what sounds right. My interpretation of being free and expansive will be different than someone else's. A mentee gave me the great advice of turning to what I already have as samples. Using both advice, I ended up using sound samples that I took from my Europe trip where I went to CERN in Geneva, Tekniska Museek in Stockholm, and the Mozart Museum in Vienna. During that time, I was truly inspired by all of the different sounds and the feeling like I could try and do anything.

Connecting all of the sections
A challenge that I came across was how to link all of these three sections together so that the transition was seamless. I had watched the show B_TTERLAND by Bo Park and SHINSA The Collective and was inspired by the use of film projector clicks to change between pieces. I was inspired and incorporated this into my piece as well. I also added samples of the film projector running in the background as a way to create white noise so there wasn't extreme silence.

Back in college, I had a friend who would do the lighting for my pieces and she did an amazing job! This time around, it was up to me to create the lighting and overall, this was a great learning experience for me! Thankfully, we had both a Lighting Designer and Stage Manager who were able to take the lighting ideas that I had and make them come to life! All that I had to do on my side was note the timestamps of when I wanted the cues and the mood(s) that I was going for. Typically, you can also have certain moves be the lighting cues but since this was improvisation, I had the timestamps be the cues. This process turned out to be really painless and I also had one friend who stood on the stage while we were setting the lighting and another friend to film my mark-through.

For the dress rehearsal, I was actually more nervous because I had this run-through filmed by my family so I could share it with friends and coworkers who lived abroad. I did my usual preparation of warming up for 30 mins, improvising to different songs for 10-15 mins, and then listening and running through of the piece. Overall, I was extremely happy with the run-through because it was a mix of what I had intended, feeling the energy of being back on stage, and making new discoveries around different grooves that I could do when listening intently to the sound score.

After my usual warmup on stage, I decided to focus on what would I try differently for this performance. One thing I thought of is making a conscious choice to transition the opposite way out of moves than I would do naturally. For example, if I lift my leg and turn out of it, my natural tendency is to turn inward so then I would turn away from my lifted leg. I wanted to keep things interesting because this was an opportunity to stretch my creativity.
I felt that with this performance, I had better control of my body than I did the previous night. I was able to turn and pause at the end with a leg lifted or hold the ending position before going into the next movement.
After the performance, I received really good feedback. One person was inspired by how I combined contemporary and hip hop footwork as they were looking to do that in their artistry. Another person appreciated my attention to musicality and how I matched my movement with the music. Someone also came up to me and thanked me for the impact that my work made on them. They truly felt my piece which was heartwarming to hear.