The joy of movement and the Alexander Technique: improvisation, momentum, spirals, playing with props, ballet, and more!
Tuesdays and Thursdays, 5:30-7:30pm (December 8, 10, 15 and 17)
Location: RIAT, 115 West 27th Street, Suite 6F, NYC, NY 10001 (between 6th and 7th Avenue)
To register, email emily.a.faulkner@gmail.com.
Most of us know that the Alexander Technique can help us to move and stand in a more efficient, healthful and graceful manner, but the Alexander Technique can also help us access playfulness, curiosity and joy!
With over 20 years experience teaching dance and AT, as well as choreographing and applying the AT to such disparate activities as skiing and basketball, Emily has created a unique approach to movement study. By using the Alexander Technique to help us make satisfying creative choices, we unleash all sorts of explorations!
This class is designed for AT teachers and trainees, as well as advanced students.
Four two-hour classes: We’ll cover the following subjects:
1. From stillness to movement: This class starts with a typical AT-style guided lie down. Images - poetic, anatomical and scientific – encourage a general sense of calm and curiosity as students “direct and inhibit.” Slowly, students are invited to explore more dynamic movement. Music is used to enhance the creative process by tapping into emotions and creating enticing rhythms. When we change our intention and our thinking, we change our impulses and find ourselves exploring movements that are interesting, playful and healthy!
2. Creative chair work: Applying spirals, curves and momentum to chair work. The classic sit to stand is a challenging and beneficial exercise, but sometimes it’s nice to mix it up a little and see what other movement options are available. We will look at spirals and curves from the perspectives of both Dart and dance, and we’ll explore how these curves can motivate movement in and out of a chair. We’ll also explore momentum and see if we can discover any new ways to propel ourselves out of a chair. The emphasis is on experimentation and discovery!
3. Working with props: How can we interact with objects in our lives in a manner that’s healthier and more playful? By emphasizing inhibition, direction and means whereby, we leave the door open to something new. Whether it’s a pen, the dishes, a chair or a ball, in this class we see how our creative impulses, when driven by curiosity and healthy coordination, lead us to fascinating and amusing explorations of how we interact with an inanimate object.
4. Matching and yielding: a science related class that helps us re-define our relationship to gravity. What makes us stable? How do we keep from falling over? How do we meet forces both internal and external to maintain our balance? And how can we meet a partner - a student, a dance partner, a sparring partner – with a refined sense of matching and yielding. We also look at how we match and yield in relation to objects.
5. Emily’s special arm release. We will spend the entire class learning this procedure that Emily learned over 20 years ago from Ann Mathews! This is a heretical maneuver – in that it is very much a doing - but it relies heavily on our Alexander Technique ability to match and yield with great sensitivity and precision as someone releases their arm and shoulder tension. We will also apply the procedure to a leg pull.
6. Ballet Barre: A simple, thoughtful barre appropriate for all levels, from beginner to advanced. Ballet and AT don’t have to be opposed to each other! The ballet form can be healthy, integrating and quite a lot of fun! The basis for this class is very simple: accurate anatomy, directing and inhibiting, and becoming comfortable in the place between letting go and staying up! Ballet requires effort, but it also requires letting go. Ballet slippers are suggested.
