My Body, The Buddhist

16 my body hears many voices, not one voice

16 my body hears many voices, not one voice The key to multi-level existence is deep listening. Deep listening includes all sound as well as language and its syntax, the nature of its sound, atmosphere, and environmental context. This is essential to the process of unlocking layer after layer of imagination, meaning, and memory, down to the cellular level of human experience. Listening is the key to performance. Responses—whatever the discipline—that originate from deep listening are connected in resonance with being and inform the artist, art, and audience in an effortless harmony. —Pauline Oliveros, composer or, the tower of babel revisited for seven performers April 1993, Austin, Texas choreography Deborah Hay ’ : Some of the movement descriptions may seem incomplete. It is because at times my capacity to differentiate between one movement, mine for example, as being more appropriate in the moment than one of the dancer’s seems unreasonable . Rather, if I am in the position of not knowing how a dancer will manifest a set of movement directions, my interest as well as the dancer’s is consistently heightened, especially when one is observing or applying oneself to several months of practice. This choreographic incompleteness could be considered an immersion into a larger sense of choreography. Here the performer exercises a practiced trust in the cellular body’s momentary configuration. Adjectives like unexplainable, unidentifiable, tricky, formless, ancient rites, Deborah Hay: My Body, The Buddhist page 82 82 Deborah Hay: My Body, The Buddhist page 83 my body hears many voices, not one voice : 83 unpatterned, suggest the dark side of performance life—the unnamed , unknown, unforeseen half. To indicate where this material occurs in the score, the symbol will appear in the margin. The spoken text was re-created as I was typing the dance score. In fact, for four months the individual performers practiced spontaneously invented speech, deliberately excluding any accent that might suggest an already existing language.    (character descriptions were assigned in the weeks following the dance performance, after seeing the video, and while I was writing the movement score): Michael Arnold: s sk ki ir rt t- -m ma an n—a calf-length, a-line skirt accentuated skirt-man’s shoulders. His outstanding feature is an electric-like charge that radiates through his physical bearing. Beverly Bajema: b ba ar re e- -h he ea ad de ed d o on ne e—a devoted practitioner who periodically shaves her head. She reflects clarity and experience. Jewell Handy: a am me er ri ic ca an n a af fr ri ic ca an n a am me er ri ic ca an n—part of Jewell’s identification of herself the first day of the workshop. This does not limit her other identities. Meg McHutchison: w wo om ma an n- -i in n- -a a- -s sl li ip p—a tall, mid-western body in a sexy undergarment. Characteristically intellectual, statuesque, and earnest. Grace Mi-He Lee: a as si ia an n w wo om ma an n—a young, Korean-American dancer. She sneezes, laughs, and tells jokes, dancing. She is sharp and committed. Jason Phelps: y yo ou un ng g a ac ct to or r—obvious to the viewer. He is gangly, focused , and theatrical. Ginger Rhodes Cain: w wi it tc ch h—a mother and artist, with long brown hair and recurring quizzical expressions. She possesses farm girl elegance. They are costumed in varying shades of ordinary black clothing. preset: The lobby walls exhibit written and graphic responses to a public request for personal interpretations of , the symbol used to identify this dance event. Deborah Hay: My Body, The Buddhist page 84 84 : my body, the buddhist Calling cards with the symbol and request had been issued to the community weeks earlier. Tower sculptures stand in the studio lobby. They are made by Beverly Bajema, Austin artist Ken Burns, and students from Linda Montano’s performance art class at the University of Texas. For two mornings prior to the event the choreographer and performers scrub scuff marks from the floor in the studio/theater. Eight risers hold five folding chairs apiece. They are separated from one another like islands. Newspaper is spread, covering the floor of each platform. Beverly Bajema finds foreign press to arrange along the front border of each riser. Pressed white bed sheets...