#20 – Alysa Pires

Choreographer Alysa Pires has created works for Ballet Jorgen, Citie Ballet (Edmonton, AB), Canadian Contemporary Dance Theatre, Cadence Ballet, Ryerson University, Dancestreams Youth Dance Company, Victoria Academy of Ballet, McMaster Dance Company, Helix Dance Theatre, the Parahumans, Kalos Collective, and her own company Alysa Pires Dance Projects.

Her work in theatre includes choreography for ten musicals, a series of world premiere plays by Judith Thompson (CAN), Velina Hasu Houston (USA) and Timberlake Wertenbaker (UK) that toured through Greece (The Women and War Project) and the first workshop of a new commission for the Los Angeles Opera. In July 2014, Alysa represented Canada and performed as part of the Tin Forest Theatre Festival in Glasgow, Scotland in celebration of the Commonwealth Games.

Her work …keeping in mind they may be behind you was reimagined for the 2014 Emerging Artist Intensive in Toronto. Alysa was the sole North American and the only female selected from a pool of international applicants as one of four choreographers to participate in DanceEast’s ChoreoLab in Ipswich, UK in April of 2013, where she developed “i am vertical.” The work recently received its Canadian premiere at the dance:made in Canada Festival in Toronto.

She is the Heliconian Club of Toronto’s 2015-2016 Dancer-in-Residence. Alysa is an Honours BFA graduate of Ryerson Theatre School. Look for a full-length work from Alysa Pires Dance Projects at the 2016 Toronto Fringe Festival. For more information go to www.alysapires.com

Alysa Pires Dance Projects is a Toronto based contemporary dance company. Founded in 2015 as a home for choreographer Alysa Pires, APDP aims to utilize the extreme physical ability of the dancers while maintaining their humanity so that the audience can see their own trials and tribulations expressed through a heightened but relatable physical language. Through highly dynamic physicality and tender intimacy, Alysa Pires makes contemporary dance works that aim to transcend their abstraction and connect to an audience beyond dedicated dance lovers. For more information, visitwww.alysapires.com/APDP or follow us on Instagram @alysapiresdanceprojects.

INSTAGRAM – @alysapiresdanceprojects
TWITTER – @alysapires
FACEBOOK – www.facebook.com/alysapiresdance
FUND WHAT YOU CAN – bit.ly/APDPFringe

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Transcript

Transcript auto generated. 

Phil Rickaby
Welcome to Episode 20 of Stageworthy, I’m your host Phil Rickaby. On Stageworthy, I interview people who make theatre actors, directors, playwrights, and more and talk to them about everything from why they chose the theatre to their work process and anything in between. Alysa Pires is a dancer, choreographer. Her latest work exterminating angel would premiere at this summer’s Toronto Fringe Festival and just launched a crowdfunding campaign on fund what you can. You can find stage really on Facebook and Twitter at stage where the pod and you can find a website and stage with a podcast.com. If you like what you hear, I hope you’ll subscribe on iTunes or Google music or whatever podcast app you use and consider leaving a comment or rating.

You are a dancer? choreographer? Is that right?

Alysa Pires
Yes.

Phil Rickaby
Okay. Is dance something that has always been a part of your life? Was it something you always wanted to do?

Alysa Pires
Yeah, I can’t remember making a decision to pursue it or making a decision to want to join it was something that my parents put me in as a kid I, they put me in a lot of sports and different activities and stuff as a child. But dance was the one thing that I I guess I never complained about going. And they there’s videos of me at Disneyland is a two year old dancing around and waiting because I couldn’t go on the rides that my older brother could go on and just dancing and never been bored or Yeah, and my, my parents said that I would just shut myself in my room and just spend hours in there by myself dancing, they put up a mirror. To this day, in my childhood bedroom, there’s a giant mirror on one of the walls, and a little homemade bar that my dad made. And I would just spend forever in there. And I think that’s where the choreographic side of it came from too, because I was taking classes. I mean, they had me in classes at my local studio. But it was really the time spent by myself dancing that I feel like I kind of fell in love with making my own movement. So yeah, it was just always kind of a given that I was going to continue on and try to pursue a professional career. Like I said, I’d never felt like I made a choice became

Phil Rickaby
Do you know, at what point it became obvious, like when you realised that it was something that you would do as a living as opposed to something that you just did, to pass time or just to do

Alysa Pires
my parents never told me that I couldn’t do it, or that it wasn’t a viable career option or anything like that. So it never felt like, I didn’t know that it could be a career, I was obsessed with Jean Kelly, he was my first crush, and I loved all those old movies. And it was my mom, actually, both my parents were there recently retired, but they were public school teachers. And my mom was a drama teacher and did the musical theatre. And I was in one of her shows, I was 2d and meet me in St. Louis when I was six years old. And so, theatre and the arts were I always understood that it was a career. I know a lot of people who, who didn’t know that they could pursue theatre or dance as a career until they were a little bit older. But it was always very, it was always clear to me that that was something that I could do for the rest of my life and hopefully get paid for it. And I mean, with dance, you kind of have to start training seriously as a kid. And so my my mom says that she had had a moment of realising that I would you know that I have the talent to to pursue it when I was about 10, but to me there was never that moment or never a decision. It was always just a given.

Phil Rickaby
You mentioned Jean Kelly and some of those old those old movies. You remember what the first of those old movies Oh, that you saw the singing and dancing was?

Alysa Pires
The one that comes to mind to see in the rain, just because it’s One of my mom’s favourites and is one of mine as well. I remember watching An American in Paris and some of his other movies as a kid, but Singing in the Rain was kind of I think we had the VHS of it. Yeah, so that was that one was big for me. I also became obsessed with Mimi and St. Louis, because I wasn’t the show. So that movie, although there’s not a huge amount of dance in that movie, but just like old movie musicals, and I like the Olden Newsies original movie with Christian Bale. And yeah, that was kind of my thing as a kid was renting those movies. And we used to be able to rent a bunch of Cirque du Soleil shows they had done recordings of and our local movie store had them. I come from a pretty small town, so I don’t know why they had the Cirque du Solei videos, but I used to watch those all the time, too.

Phil Rickaby
You know, it’s actually because you know, if you have a small a small, like mom and pop video store video rental place, I think the selection was better there than at a blockbuster, for sure. Where blockbuster only had new releases and some of the quote unquote family favourites. Right, right. And so you would almost never find anything except for stuff that was like a big hit. So you need like that Mom and Pop place where they’ve just got shelves and shelves and shelves and stuff that they love or that they know that people love or that people might love? Yeah. Um, did you go to school for dance?

Alysa Pires
I did. Yeah, I went to Ryerson. So I’m originally from BC. And then I moved to Toronto. To attend Ryerson. I was in their dance programme at the theatre school there for four years. I graduated in 2012. And stayed in Toronto after that. So we’re coming up on eight years that I’ve been in Toronto, which is it seems like 15 years in some ways and it seems like 15 seconds and others

Phil Rickaby
what was it like? For you? What was the thought about moving from from BC to to Toronto to for dance? Was it was it something you were frightened by excited by both?

Alysa Pires
Um, I was really ready to go. I actually graduated high school a year early. I was pretty, pretty set on moving on. And I felt like I was ready. In my dance life and in my personal life I was ready for for more in something different. And so I was really excited to go I think I don’t really think I was scared. I I’m actually getting married this summer. But my fiance and I were together then we moved to Toronto together. So having him with me and him making that move from our hometown to Toronto at the exact same time was comforting. It kind of eased all my fears about about being in a new city, but I really loved I really loved discovering the city for myself, it was the first time I ever was in a place where somebody wasn’t showing me around. It was mine to to discover and I remember getting my first Metro pass and just riding the streetcars to learn all the names of the streets because on the subway, you don’t hear all the in between streets are good to see them. So

Phil Rickaby
you’re gonna get to see them which, you know, the Streetcar is a great way to, to figure out, you know, where you are, and totally is,

Alysa Pires
yeah, and just had to have a sense of how all of the neighbourhoods relate to each other to and how how they are in proximity to each other. So yeah, I really, I loved that. And I loved I love the multicultural aspect of Toronto. I love how many different types of people and different types of food and different types of art and music and whatever. It’s there’s just so much compared to coming from a small town that is, I mean, I grew up just outside of Victoria and Victoria is not super small, but the community that I grew up in outside of Victoria is very small, and everybody it’s just small so there’s not as many options or there’s not as many things going on and I think I love where I grew up. And I always enjoy going home and seeing my family, I miss them and I miss the ocean. And I missed the mountains and the forests and all of that. But I, I know that the life that I want to live in the life that I’m supposed to live is in a bigger city. Yeah. So Toronto is perfect for that, at this point.

Phil Rickaby
You’re working on a show for the Toronto Fringe Festival? dance show? Yes. Can you tell me a little bit about about that?

Alysa Pires
Yeah, so the show is called exterminating Angel, and it’s based on Louis Boone wells, surrealist film, The exterminating Angel. It’s basically about most people don’t recognise the title. But when I tell them the plot, they they recognise it’s a pretty well known film. And it’s about a group of wealthy dinner guests who, first, you know, they’re coming together for this very fancy evening. And there’s, it’s pretty evident early on that something’s not quite right, the all of the servants and the staff of the house are basically, you know, look like they’re jumping off a sinking ship, they’re all running, and they’re all leaving, and they’re all trying to get out. And by the end of the night, I mean, it’s a surrealist film, so a bunch of weird stuff happens. But by the end of the night, they find that they can’t leave the room. And they’re not physically trapped. There’s nothing in their way. But they, they just are, are psychologically trapped, they can’t leave. And so what was a very pompous and pretentious gathering starts to disintegrate, as they are struggling to find just basic necessities like food and water, and they start to lose their marbles a little bit. So the, the piece that we’re making for fringe is full length, dance work. It’s a contemporary dance theatre, I would say. It is not necessarily strictly narrative, as far as you know, these are the characters and these are their names, and this is how they all relate to each other. But it’s an adaptation of those themes from that film. And so there’s a cast of, of nine dancers, and which is quite large, most contemporary dance pieces just because of, of the budgets that we work with. Often we are not able to have that many dancers. So nine is quite big. And we have an original score being composed by Adam sechi, Emma, who is in other than my fiance, he’s a Toronto based composer, and he works in online media and musical theatre, and does lots of different composing. And so yeah, he’s making a new score for us. So it’s exciting. It’s definitely a lot of work. But I’m excited for audiences to be able to see it and hopefully for some non dance audiences to be able to take a chance on our show, because fringe is a really great opportunity to do that. When the tickets are, are very affordable. And there’s the you know, the shows are quick and there’s so much going on. We really hope that some people who maybe have never seen any dance before or maybe have an idea of what they think contemporary dance looks like. Or maybe they’ve seen dance before and they had a bad experience. Or maybe they love dance and are a huge fan. We’re hoping that we can reach out to all of those people and create a show that is athletic and physical in its in its movement, but also really intimate and tender in its humanity.

Phil Rickaby
What would you say to somebody who was if not averse to dance, dance ignorant why who what would you say to somebody to convince them to see your show? In particular and or a dance show in general,

Alysa Pires
right? The I think the number one thing, especially with contemporary dance, is that people have this feeling that they just don’t get it. They don’t get it they Don’t they want it to be less abstract, or they want it to be more clear or whatever they, they want, they feel like, sometimes everyone’s understanding it, and they’re not. And that can be really alienating. But what I would say to those people is that that’s really not important. understanding exactly what the choreographer meant in each moment is not important at all really, in the way that when you look at an abstract painting, you’re not you can find your own interpretation of it, or you can see your own imagery in it. My argument all the time to, to people who are maybe a little bit nervous about seeing dance is that we, as people communicate with our bodies, every day, we you know, the what is that saying there’s 90% of communication is nonverbal. We use our bodies constantly our body language, we point we gesture, we all know what it feels like to reach for something, we all know what it feels like to have the wind knocked out of you to get bad news and feel like you can’t breathe or to be so excited that you have this physical reaction, or being so upset or so angry, we communicate and experience movement in our bodies every single day. And what I would say to those people is to use your knowledge of how your own body interacts with the world, and view dance through that lens. So you don’t need to perfectly interpret every moment the way the choreographer intended it to. What most choreographers intend is for you to just have some sort of reaction, some sort of feeling, whether it’s of you know, being impressed by the the athleticism and the physicality of the movement, whether it is relating to a specific gesture or relating to a specific feeling or just being moved by by the emotion of the work, whatever it is, being able to just use your life experience and use that lens of of you view everything through the lens of your own experience, which is what we do when we see any type of theatre. But I think with dance, for some reason, people just want it to be clear. And I would say to those people that you have all of the tools that you need to be able to have your own reaction and whether that is clear or not. Or whether that is what the choreographer intended or not. Doesn’t matter.

Phil Rickaby
I happen to be one of those those people. Yeah, who is what when I go to when I go to a dance show at Fringe, which is usually where I end up seeing, seeing dance, for the most part, I find myself struggling to see what the narrative is even isn’t clearly a narrative. I’m, as somebody who myself is a storyteller, I’m always looking for the narrative with your lens, that’s my lens. And I sometimes with with a dance show, I find it difficult to find it. That’s not I mean, that I know, I know, that’s my failing. As far as an audience member, what I need to do, what I should, I think do is learn to just sort of accept it for what I’m seeing, and try to take it in and interpret it later. But I also find it very difficult to turn that part of my brain, right.

Alysa Pires
But I would also say there are many different types of dance and each choreographer is different. And so if you are somebody that likes to be able to find the story, maybe there is a different choreographer, or a different type of, of contemporary dance that would be more suited to you. I think, for some reason, dance gets all lumped together in the way that if you went to go see a play that was, you know, very dark, and maybe a little bit abstract, and then you went to go see a comedy. That was very realistic and true to life. You would never say that. Those were the same thing and, and people would come out of it and go, they wouldn’t say Oh, I hate plays. They would say Oh, I hate comedies or I hate Yeah, whatever. We’re with dance. A lot of people come out and they just go I hate dance. So that’s it. I’m never going to another dance show without you and I know it’s because the volume is so much less. The dance shows that fringe are very small portion So you know that a lot of people just aren’t exposed to dance in the same way that they are to theatre. But yeah, I would challenge audiences. Even if you say, you see a dance show at Fringe, hopefully you come see our show, I hope you don’t hate it. But if you do, if you leave a dance show and you didn’t like it, or you didn’t get it, I would challenge those audience members to try one more. And try to find one that seems through the descriptions or through maybe any teasers that you’re seeing online seems totally opposite. And then and then see how you do with that. Just because they’re everybody is so different, I think I would describe our show as as being highly physical and being very athletic. And maybe on a more technical contemporary ballet. In a technical contemporary ballet way, in some moments where there might be other I don’t know, I know, some of the artists who are making other dancers for fringe, but I haven’t seen their pieces yet. So I don’t, I don’t want to speak for them. But some of them might be more pedestrian, or some of them might be a totally different style. Some of them might use texts, some of them might have live music, you know, it’s all so different. And I think my personal mission with fringe, obviously, I want people to see our show, I want people to come and I want people to, to enjoy it. But my over arching mission is just to get people to see more dance. And hopefully, whether it’s our show or another fringe dance show, just hopefully build a bigger audience for the other 50 weeks of the year. Because there’s your Is this your first Toronto fringe? This is my first Toronto fringe Yes.

Phil Rickaby
Have you? Because I know in my experience, it looks sometimes like Okay, first off in the Toronto in most Fringe Festivals, it is hard to get your voice heard.

Alysa Pires
Yeah, there’s so much so

Phil Rickaby
much. And it’s hard in some ways to get your, your voice heard as a dance show. Do you do you feel like? I mean, you’ve spoken about dance generally getting lumped together? Do you have a plan for getting your voice? And your show getting attention for your show a little more? Or are you going to? Are you more interested in like getting the dance in general, the raising the profile of dance in general at

Alysa Pires
Fringe? I both? Absolutely. I want people to just go see dance. But of course I want people to see our show. And if you see one show dance show at Fringe obviously I would love it to be ours. But I’m sorry, there’s a fly buzzing around my face. I want yeah, both I do want people to see more dance. Of course, I want people to come see our show. And I would be lying if I said Oh, I’m fine. If they go see another dance show instead of ours, you know. And so we are I’ve spoken to a couple of the other dance artists in fringe this year. And we are trying to work together to help promote each other shows and to be really supportive of each other. In that way, I am also trying to connect with a lot of a lot of other artists who are not doing dance shows and seeing how we can, you know, do ad swaps in our programmes or how we can help support each other and I think being strategic about what shows I’m reaching out to by way of it being shows that I think are similar, although they’re not dance shows maybe their audience would be interested in. If they were going to go see a dance show they’d be interested in the type of dance work that we are doing. So I mean, it’s a huge it’s I think it’s the struggle of every French show. That is very true. And dances, maybe even more so. But yeah, so I mean, I’m working very diligently to make sure that I’m taking every opportunity for our show to be featured. And for our just because we’re a dance work not To be left out or not to be under the radar at all. So I mean, that’s a pretty big undertaking as the choreographer of the show and the producer of the show, to be trained to do all of that as well. But it’s something that I, that I feel really passionate ly about. So yeah, I help people. But we’re, we’re, we’re working our, our brains out for to make the show as good as it possibly can be. And then also, to raise the profile and to be involved with as many other fringe activities, I think sometimes dance can be a little bit segregated, just because as dancers, we’re not as connected through the fringe community as maybe theatre artists would be a lot of, I think in my cast, maybe only a handful, maybe even just one or two of the dancers have been in fringe shows before. This is my first time being involved in, in a Toronto fringe show. The composer for our show has composed before, for fringe in the past, and even just, even just as a composer, he’s been way more involved, and knows that many more people just because it’s part of I feel like it’s more part of the theatre community than it is the dance community. Yeah.

Phil Rickaby
It’s so important when you’re when you’re doing fringe to, to be involved in like to make sure that you are, you know, at the fringe tent and meeting people and seeing stuff and, and seeing so much of it. I think that a lot of theatre, people don’t do enough going to dance to be honest with you. And I know that I find the same. It’s hard. It’s, I think what I was saying before the technical issues began, which might not make any sense to anybody who missed the part that I’m about to edit out. I think I was saying, Actually, do you remember what I was saying? Because I may have forgotten.

Alysa Pires
You were saying that it was it’s important to see others

Phil Rickaby
it is important to see other shows. And I think that I know for me, one of the there’s the pressure, the fringe pressure of seeing the shows that all your friends are in and while also trying to see stuff and expand your your theatrical palette as it were just to get out and see a little bit more than than usual. Right. It’s definitely hard to get outside of that. Yeah. I don’t even know if I have a question.

Alysa Pires
No, I think it’s a good point. I think it’s a good point. And I think it’s, again, I think it’s tougher for people in the theatre community because the volume is just that much greater and it’s and it’s more integrated into into the community in that way where the dance shows are a lot less so for our community. There there’s only a handful of shows to see anyway. And if you know anybody there, they’re pretty much going to be in just those shows. But so I am certainly go going to be working to see everything I can outside of as well as the the dance shows and and hopefully challenging other people to do so as well, on both sides of that.

Phil Rickaby
You’re not currently in Toronto, are you?

Alysa Pires
I am not. I am sitting on the living room floor at my grandmother’s house in Kelowna.

Phil Rickaby
And are you preparing for your show out there?

Alysa Pires
Um, we just had some rehearsals. I’m actually a way for all of may. I am adjudicating a couple of different dance competitions and planning my wedding which is this August and I’m attending a family wedding. So it was a trip that was planned prior to us getting into fringe. So we had we auditioned for the show, which was super exciting because there aren’t a lot of open call auditions for for contemporary dance work in Toronto. So we had we had to split the audition into two between the to live auditions and some video submissions. We had over 150 people audition for eight contracts. We have nine dancers but one of them was already cast. So yeah, it was, it was crazy. And it was awesome to see that kind of interest in that kind of energy in the room. And it’s tough, I mean, to have to see that many talented people and have to say no, because it’s just the reality of it. But it was a really amazing experience, I was very humbled by it, to see that many people come out. But that was in February. So we did that in February. And we, I actually, my company produced a nother show in March. So we did that first. And then right when that was done, we started rehearsing for fringe, and we had rehearsals throughout the last month, and then I am gone. And it is my administrative month. So I am taking care of all of the all of the marketing and publicity stuff that I can do, connecting with people and trying to set up set up things just like this. And we also are going to be launching our crowdfunding campaign in just a couple of days. And so that will be happening while I’m away. So it’s going to be a very busy time, my, the composer is currently writing the music for the show as well. So we are very much talking through all of that, once I’m back at the beginning of June, we will be going into an intensive rehearsal period where we’re together four days a week. And, and finishing up the show. And by finishing up I mean, making the show at that point when I’m back in June. So it’s it’s kind of a different thing for fringe, because, you know, they’re, they want to help us promote the show. So we were like, they’re asking questions, very specific questions about it in there. And a lot of it is still up in the air, because that’s how, that’s how dance works for me there. Unless you’re doing your remount you’re making it in the room, I can’t write a script. At two o’clock in the morning, when I feel inspired, I have to wait until I’m with. I’m in a room with bodies. And so that’s a, I guess a unique aspect to to creating a dance work is that you can’t I can’t just send somebody a script and say, Hey, can you read through this? Or? Or can you learn this, and we’ll start rehearsals next week or whatever. So it’s, it’s a challenge. But it’s also the exciting part about what we do is that it lives in the dancers bodies day to day, I mean, I film everything on my phone. And that’s helpful for the composer. And that’s helpful for us for our memories, but it really is within the bodies of the dancers. And as the movement becomes more settled, and it becomes more consistent. We are the challenge then becomes to bring back the immediacy and bring back the that feeling of it being for the first time, which is something that I think all performers struggle, absolutely. But because of the the physical nature, we want the movement to be really settled in their bodies. But at the same time, to have that energy of it of it being the first time so and as things changed, what details are we retaining? And what details are we kind of letting go of it’s always funny to watch the old rehearsal videos once the show is, is set, because there’s inevitably things that have fallen by the wayside and, and small details that didn’t seem important at first that are now the highlight of that moment. So yeah, we will be this is admin month, and then we’re going back into our intensive creative period in June. I’m, I’m

Phil Rickaby
curious about the process or your process of composing or sorry, choreographing? Because right. I mean, in, in my mind, and I’m sure in a lot of people’s minds, dance comes from the music, or is I think that, you know, it’s hard to choreograph without it but it sounds like you’re a signer of like getting a sense of it without the music or what is the process of creating a show like this? Like?

Alysa Pires
I think every for me, personally, every piece is different. Sometimes the music comes first. And I’m very inspired by that and wanting to make something that that really is linked to the music in that way. And sometimes it’s, it’s something else entirely. So for this show. It’s images and moments. particularly moments that I, I’ve been inspired by the movie or thoughts or concepts of how those themes from the film could physically translate. And sometimes sometimes I get images. So for this show, I had an instant image of what the first moment of the piece would be, which is always a good sign to me, if I know what the opening is, and I feel strongly about it. So I’m not gonna give it away. I had a very clear image of what the opening of the piece would be. And so normally, the way it happens is we come into the studio and I say to the dancers, okay, this is kind of my thought for this moment. And a lot of NA, a lot of the time, they all say, so maybe I think it starts like this, or something like this. And we use their improvisations in their input as well. So a lot of the time, especially when we’re making partnering work, I’ll say, you know, where does it feel like you can go next? Or what’s your impulse? Does it feel like you want to go this way? Or that way? Or what’s the impulse? And then, based on that, sometimes I’ll go, yes, that’s exactly it. Okay, what’s next? And sometimes I’ll go, No, maybe not. And so it really, it depends on what the moment needs a lot of the time, because I’m not physically going to be performing the piece. And the movement has to live in the bodies of the dancers. So especially with partnering or with big physical lifts, and stuff like that, it’s less about me going, Okay, now, your left arm is going to go exactly here, and your right arm is going to do this. And it’s more about me saying, I think her body goes up this way. And then her leg kind of does that you catch her this way. And maybe it makes this image and then the dancers very much are figuring it out. With me. And, and so there’s a huge amount of trial and error. Mostly error. But But that’s, that’s the fun. And then occasionally, when we’re making more phrase work, so something that would be in unison or something that is more specific, a lot of the time, we are still making it collaboratively in that way that I’m going what’s next, maybe it’s something like this, but I’m dictating more the specifics. And that moment, there’s at the beginning of our show, not the very beginning, not the opening image but near the beginning of our show, there’s a Unison sequence of gesture, this that’s supposed to represent the the formality, the dinner party, the the pomp and all of that. And so the gestures are very specific. And so we we are working on them together. But in that case, I have to say no, I need your left hand exactly here. And then in the, in the bigger stuff is really, it’s really the dancers input as much as mine. Sometimes I see very specific images, like the dancer is connected to the other dancer in this way or there. There’s, I think it’s a turn. And then this happens. And sometimes it’s just a feeling or it’s just I think, I think this character, quote, character has this relationship or something happens to them in this way. And so the music, we often play music in rehearsal just for the vibe or the kind of the ambiance of what that moment is going to be. And then that for the composer becomes kind of a temp track for, for him to think, Okay, this is, well, this is the tempo that she wants, or this is for the gesture sequence. It’s a it’s a waltz, it’s a three, four, and we’ve choreographed it to that. And so the music that he is writing is not the same as what we’ve been using in rehearsal, but it’s the same tempo and it’s a waltz. And so yeah, that I feel very fortunate to be able to work with him and, and to say, you know, I liked it better when it was the oboe instead of the flute or this tempo, actually, you know, for the dancers, it needs to be a little bit faster, it needs to be a little bit slower or whatever. So that’s, I that’s a luxury that a lot of people don’t have. And so I’m very fortunate for that. It also helps that we don’t have to pay any royalties or anything like that on

Phil Rickaby
the music. Do you Is this your first time working with your fiance in this way? Or is this Yeah, no,

Alysa Pires
no, he’s made. He’s composed for me many times before. This is the the largest scale project we’ve done together. He’s written music for shorter works for me, and he’s done a lot of He’s done a lot of more sound design for me as well, where I have a piece of music And then but I kind of want this effect and then I want this to happen and and so he will he does a lot of that type of stuff for me as much as he does original composition so it’ll be kind of a blend of both I mean it’s all everything will be his but the not all of it is super melodic

Phil Rickaby
so you’re you’re currently off in NBC during your admin month, how much time in terms of in terms of hours goes into putting the show together once you’re into her your your intense rehearsal period, how many hours a day? How many days a week are you are you working here until the fringe in at the beginning of July

Alysa Pires
are fizzle physical rehearsals when we will be actually in the studio with the dancers we’re doing currently what we have scheduled is four days a week for four hours each day, and that’s not always with all of the dancers, sometimes working with just a soloist or just on a specific section. That’s just the creative side. And then I’ll go home and I’ll do all the admin and also be fine tuning the score with the composer and, and all of that. So for me, certainly, I imagine that I will be working for eight to 10 hours a day on the show, but physically in the rehearsal with the dancers. It’s it’s just it’s just those I guess 16 hours

Phil Rickaby
you did you were saying that you videotape everything when you get back from your rehearsal, are you reviewing the videotape the video and making notes and changes or is it in the room more than the video

Alysa Pires
a lot of the time I’ll I’ll watch the video kind of obsessively until the next rehearsal. And it’ll just give me an idea of maybe where to go next or, or maybe some edits that I want to make. But and it’s also good for the dancers, too, to see where we rehearse primarily doesn’t have a mirror, which is kind of unusual for, for dance. But that’s just the space I have a residency at. So I kind of love it, because not when we’re doing the super detail gesture that’s helpful to have a mirror, but I love it because the dancers really are right away, using their eyes inside of the movement, because there isn’t that temptation to look away, or just to check in. So they’re, they’re instantly already invested in, in the focus of the piece, which most professional dancers do right away anyway, but there, there’s just not that temptation. So I drop box, all of the videos to the dancers, so that they also have the opportunity to watch it because a lot of the time, especially if there’s, you know, nine bodies in the room, I can’t be watching everybody the whole time. And so sometimes they’ll watch the video and go, Oh my gosh, I was using the wrong arm there, I was doing something totally different, or the angle of that, or I think their lift is better because they do this, we should try to do that. So it’s it’s a helpful tool and especially because obviously I will I would love to have way more rehearsal time with the dancers. I you know, I would have loved to been working on this show for the past year, full time. So it’s a helpful tool in the short amount of time that we have together to just for them to be able to do some of that research on their own. And just being able to to come back in the next day with a with a deepened perspective of what we’re working on.

Phil Rickaby
That’s really cool. Now do you have a web presence for your your company and your show?

Alysa Pires
Yeah, so Well, I in my admin month I’m going to be revamping my website but my the my website which is also the company website is just Elisa pyres.com. We are on Facebook at facebook.com/elisa pyres dance, and we’re on Instagram at Elise fires on Twitter at Elisa Byers and we are going to be I don’t have the link right now for our phone what you can campaign but that will be coming up very shortly in the next couple of days. But that can be found on our Facebook page as well. We did a really awesome promo photo shoot. My fiance actually also is a very talented photographer, which for me? Yes. So he took these amazing pictures at the clay and paper theatre space, which unfortunately I believe is no longer and so yeah, they we are I haven’t released all of those photos yet. So if, if you like our Facebook page, you’ll be able to see all of those amazing photos as they come out and and all of our little updates and teasers that we will be releasing between now and the show.

Phil Rickaby
That’s great. Well, thank you so much for talking to me today. Lisa,

Alysa Pires
thank you so much for talking to me. I’m glad we were able to chat and hopefully as someone who’s a little bit scared of dance hopefully we’ve eased that fear just slightly. Cool. That’s my my main goal. Great