MOVE-MEANT: Artistic collaboration and “trusting the process”
Over the last few weeks, I've experienced quite an amazing revelation about the comparison of dance when paired to music. This is the first time in my “LifeTime” where I had the privilege of working with any dance company in any capacity. Watching experienced choreographers at CooperMorgan Dance Company conjure up magic with MOVE-MEANT to music I strategically produced is a humbling and very sobering experience for me. While sitting in on rehearsals, I have seen first-hand, the dancer’s process of creativity. This type of creativity derived from a totally different vantage point. It was almost foreign to me. I, now, have utter respect and admiration for the process of being involved in the world of dance.
I have a newfound sense of awareness and know there is a sense of maturity and personal evolution that transpired recently. By turning over the reigns of creativity and stepping aside to let allow someone else to take what I sketched on my canvas and trust the process. There has to be an allowance or space to create. When the MOVE-MEANT is interrupted, so is the flow. The allowing and creativity are squelched. If you’re trying to control someone else’s creative process — you could stop the flow altogether. It can become lost, may never return, or take a while to return.
True collaboration requires a great deal of trust and communication on both sides in order for the work to take a life of its own.
As a music producer, I feel there’s a complete technical and yet, an organic correlation that occurs between producing tracks to seeing the process of choreography to MOVE-MEANT to music. Those special aha moments when the proverbial light bulb goes off is almost identical to what I've experienced when I started creating these works of art.
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Created as sounds of sonic solace, these compositions were given to me during or after the transition of life to life. The compositions from a place of loss or the absence of something hoped for. I've often compared myself to a painter standing at a canvas, preparing my own portions of gesso and adding limited color or abstraction. Some are short and void; while others are lengthy and layered intentionally until they felt right to me and were as comforting as I needed them to be. When the production was complete, I felt it. I knew it in my soul. I would walk away from the digital canvas with satisfaction. I would smile. There were periods where I would work until sunrise and periods where I wouldn't be inspired to create. It was okay either way. I allowed it to be and didn't force the process. I created it and I am proud of its evolution.
I envision so much this project. From charting the music out to a complete orchestral performance with lights and stage effects. I envision the dancers touring and traveling all over the planet sharing the MOVE-MEANT and the audiences experiencing the sonic frequencies in an audible and cinematic environment. This is why I feel in my heart that the new adventures of professor:clock is my magnum opus. Yet the project is no longer mine. It’s ours.
