Realities of performance art

This spectacular photograph taken by Bill Pusztai captures so much of the time between dances, and from my perspective many aspects of Bowen Island Blacksheep Morris. I'll take you through the photo, left to right, and describe what I see from my perspective as a dancer, performer and friend to many in the picture. My thoughts may not be correct for others, but these are my perceptions.

• Banjo Jim (far left, holding the banjo) - his smile comes from a deep satisfaction. Davie Days is becoming one of our favorite venues to perform, it is one of the places where the audience is as colorful as our dance kits. Jim loves to perform live and the positive energy from the audience is reflected in Jim's smile. This is one of the main reasons we perform, the joy of entertainment, the deep satisfaction which comes from performance art, sharing oneself with your smaller and larger community and the amazing friendships and camaraderie.
• Gerald - I suspect Gerald is checking his hand for blisters. He always gives 200% during these performances and is most often to perform while injured. Which happens often when performing with sticks bashed by fellows at least 6 foot tall and over 200 lbs. Yes folks, Morris dancing takes some work. We practice (almost) weekly, we work on new dances most of the time and come up with (or learn) a new dance twice a year.
• Squire Bob - Melodian player extraordinaire. Bob is always playing to the crowd, so no surprise his back is to the photographer as he is turned toward the audience. He provides the musical heart and fills the role of our Squire like no other. Without Bob there would be no Blacksheep Morris. Bob also incarnates the tradition of Morris... he has been performing Morris for more than 35 years and there is no corner of this tradition he is not familiar.
• Peter - dancer, musician and fool... and master of none! (well, maybe the fool). Morris is as much about the music as it is the dance. And in either capacity I believe we all feel we could improve. The unique part of Morris dance is the relationship between the dance and the music and which takes the lead. For without one, you could not have the other... which one sets the tempo? which captures the most attention? From afar it is the music, it draws you in. Once engaged the visuals, and rhythm, of the dance take over. In the end, the music has to lead. This can be difficult when the dancers also use percussion instruments.
• Graham - dancer, founder and drill sergeant. Without Graham we would likely have no discipline. The Blacksheep are about as disorganized as you can get when it comes to pulling off any kind of performance. Graham keeps us focused during our practices and works really hard at this in the hopes to bring some rigor to our performances... but, then of course it is very very hard to herd sheep. And Graham is no sheep dog.
• Brian (far right, holding the drum)- mainland sheep, occasional sheep, wise sheep. I am always very excited when Brian joins us in either practice or performance. In fact, if any of the off island sheep show up I am excited. The sheep welcome all who choose to join and participate (regardless of gender, we are a mixed side). And many of those from off island bring a knowledge of music, morris and dance that makes us stronger.
• All other sheep (not shown and too many to list here. You know who you are!) - if Squire Bob is the Heart of the Blacksheep then the whole herd is the Soul. It's amazingly eclectic mix of individuals, and those words were carefully chosen. We like that we have no theme within our outfits, many border morris sides have a chosen colour scheme, we have none. Individual freedom to create is desired. Eclectic mix, just get to know us. You may be surprised that such a diversity of backgrounds can so deeply enjoy each others company. 

So there you have it. What is it that happens between performances. Even though Morris dancing takes some work we do it for the deep satisfaction, camaraderie, love, friendship and connection to community. The music fills our hearts and grounds us into the tradition of Morris dancing. This perfomance art is as much about the music as it is the dance; amazingly, this eclectic mix of individuals finds the balance between discipline and disorganization to actually perform. We pride ourselves on being a mixed side where the Soul of our performances lies within every member of the side.


Thank-you Sheep... for the love and friendship, you all deepen and enrich my life!

Personal Learning Ecology

I was prompted by a very interesting tweet the other day. Nancy White asked the question "What was the difference between a Personal Leaning Network (PLN) and a Personal Learning Ecology (PLE)". This question got me thinking and I have reflected upon it often in the last few days. One thing that jumped out from this reflection is to add the Personal Learning Environment to this question.
This is how I define these three related ideas;

• Personal Learning Network is global and includes wherever your network reach extends, all resources are available (these resources can be; filtered or unfiltered, human, digital, printed, or otherwise). It is important to consider everything in your network that can contain or process knowledge and provide skills acquisition or understanding as a part of this network. Your PLN is very broad.
• Personal Learning Ecology is more geographically related... the learning objects are what is available in the "local area" or within easy reach (digitally or otherwise). Items in the learning ecology are what come available as the learner goes through their day and are the items in which the learner has built their knowledge. These objects have the ability to be viewed through multiple intelligences and consumed using multiple tools. They are the things that are on the current learning path and not too far out in the persons network. What is in the ecology is a subset of your PLN and these items are very easily accessible through multiple modalities at the right time. Often it is the objects that are right in front of you during your learning that are most important, its the "when the student is ready the teacher will come" idea. And with PLEcologies the teacher can come in many forms. Depth and breadth is also important, therefore when the learning opportunity presents itself it needs to be explored in its entirety.
• Personal Learning Environment is the full extent of the tools used to gather knowledge and deepen understanding. This PLE is more technology based and includes all your devices, approaches and collaborative technologies.

An example:

I have taken it upon myself to develop an expert understanding of the Morris dancing and related folk music tradition with focus on learning to play the pipe and tabor. I've committed myself to this journey and for me its about getting to mastery, not the rate in which I get to mastery. I purposefully put myself in positions to learn more. I have been documenting my process in learning the pipe and tabor and regularly seek out opportunities to deepen my understanding of Morris dancing and playing these traditional musical instruments. I have felt this is slowing due to not getting the correct mentorship and feedback as I try to learn, and not knowing what is my next step toward deliberate practice is difficult. I continue to read books on the subject and attend festivals and face-to-face workshops to learn more. Recently two things have occurred that I consider show the difference between a learning ecology and a learning network.

1. A while back I was searching for books in these subject areas. My emerging learning network on this subject pointed me toward a couple of books which I have begun to read. One of the books describes when learning the pipe and tabor it is good to do this by ear, and it is a good idea to practice while sitting at a piano so you can listen correctly to the notes as playing on the piano then play them on the pipe. This back and forth between piano and pipe will greatly assist in learning the tones that occur when over-blowing the pipe. Training the ear is important to learning the pipe. Even though the book(s) came via my network, it is the presence of these books close at hand that put them into my ecology.
2. I have also been focused on learning a jig called "I'll go and enlist for a sailor". Some of the steps were eluding me. Over this last weekend I attended the Marlboro Morris Ale and was fortunate enough to meet John Dexter, who could teach me the jig. I was shown the steps in detail by a master of the dance, much of the mystery of the steps were demonstrated, they are no longer a mystery. All my reading of the dance, watching videos had prepared me well for this master / apprentice type session. I was ready to learn and the correct situation presented itself as I was on my learning journey. The Morris Ale became a part of my learning ecology.

These are both examples of how what was right in front of me from within my PLEcology is what I needed best. How this is different from the PLN is that I focused my learning on what was directly in front of me as resources instead of searching my broader network. Most often it is important to hold the faith that the right learning is available at the right time.

Lyrics for I'll go and enlist for a sailor

Oh list, oh list to me sorrowful lay,
And attention give to me song, I pray,
When you've heard it all you'll say
That I'm an unfortunate tailor.

For once I was happy as a bird in a tree,
My Sarah was all in the world to me,
Now I'm cut out by a son of the sea,
And she's left me here to bewail her.

Why did Sarah serve me so?
No more will I stitch and no more will I sew;
Me thimble and me needle to the winds I'll throw
And I'll go and 'list for a sailor.

Now me days were honey and me nights were the same,
Till a man called Cobb from the ocean came
With his long black beard and his muscular frame,
A captain on board of a whaler.

Well he spent his money both frank and free,
With his tales of the land and his songs of the sea,
And he stole me Sarah's heart from me,
And blighted the hopes of a tailor.

Well, once I was with her, when in came Cobb
“Avast!” he cried, “you blubbery swab.
If you don't knock off I'll scuttle your knob!”
And Sarah smiled at the sailor.

So now I'll cross the raging sea,
For Sarah's proved untrue to me.
Me heart's locked up and she's the key;
What a very unfeeling gaoler.

And so now, kind friends, I'll bid you adieu,
No more me woes shall trouble you;
I'll travel the country through and through,
And go and 'list for a sailor.

Transcribed by Reinhard Zierke and Garry Gillard
http://www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/~zierke/guvnor/songs/illgoandlistforasailor.html

I'll go and enlist for a sailor

One of the items that stood out for me while participating at the Marlboro Morris Ale was having John Dexter teach Joe and I the "I'll go and enlist for a sailor" jig. I have been wanting to learn this jig for six months now and have been watching video and preparing myself to play the tune on a pipe and tabor. I struggled with some of the basic steps of the jig and felt I needed some direct instruction; fortunately, John is an excellent teacher.

I also found a number of good references to play this tune and found the sheet music.

For instructional purposes I also found this video. Stay tuned as I take the dance apart, and video myself learning each piece... one day soon you may see me dance the whole jig.

Marlboro Morris Ale

 

I spent the weekend dancing and playing music. I am a Border Morris dancer and will musically participate as a percussionist whenever the opportunity arises. The dancing was in six and eight person dances with the occasional mass dance (that's everyone dancing), the music participation was with playing an ugly stick. All this took place at the Marlboro Morris Ale. It was an amazing weekend.

What stood out for me most was;

1. The fantastic dancing from the youth at the ale
2. That we danced at a number of care facilities
3. The amazing meals, coordination and logistics
4. The quality of singing during the open pub nights and during the day
5. Singing "Pinball Wizard" as a shanty
6. Having some "I'll enlist for a sailor" jig lessons
7. Hanging out with some great friends and making new ones

Sir Isaac Newton and Lorenz's Butterfly

Oh the wonders of Morris Dancing. I came to a deeper understanding of one of our dances over the last week. The dance is known as Lorenz's Butterfly. I actually find it one of our most beautiful dances, this is due to its dynamic flow and simplicity.  It is also the only dance I know how to call. Here is a version danced by Bogart's Breakfast;



What gave me a deeper understanding was initiated by my watching this outstanding BBC production titled; Complexity - Secret Life of Chaos, and the reading of some amazing scientific minds;

• Edward Lorenz and his work with Chaos Theory and the butterfly effect.
• Alan Turing and his interest in Mathematical Biology.
• And a couple of other amazing minds mentioned in the BBC episode.

So what really got me thinking about how all this fits together is how the dance has four dancers ganging up on one dancer, dressed as the devil. I see the four dancers being Alan Turing, Edward Lorenz, Boris Belousov and Robert May all beating up on Sir Issac Newton signifying the death of the Newtonian scientific view. And therefore giving birth to a new science that includes Chaos Theory... The dance has the following moves which signify the following themes;

1. Opening - ganging up on Newton.
2. Chorus - exchange of ideas.
3. Round the gardener - scientific inquiry within a focused area of study.
4. Chorus - further exchange of ideas.
5. Flutter - the birth of a new theory.
6. Chorus - further exchange of ideas.
7. Lines - the communication of a new theory.
8. Chorus - further exchange of ideas.
9. Exit - the setting free of the new theory.

So there you have it. A Morris dance interpreted as scientific discovery or is that scientific discovery interpreted as a Morris dance, or is that a small jig that sets off the wonders of a whole chaotic Ale... Oh the magic of it all.