"Like Waves" (Sonnet LX) Choreography

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This short (less than one minute!) choreography, "Like Waves," is an excerpt from my 2015 MFA in Dance thesis choreography “The Shrew Unleashed."

The work was danced to poetry old and new, including an improvised collaboration, a slam poem, and some of Shakespeare's Sonnets. "Sonnet LX,” which we nicknamed the more descriptive “Like Waves," incorporates many themes, speaking of time, death, beauty, maturity, praise, and the ocean. This sonnet gives me the feeling of being resigned to an inevitable fate, in awe and powerless.

Working collaboratively, the dancers chose to depict how “the waves make toward the pebbled shore,” rising, falling, turbulent, sustained, strong, bound and at times free, wringing and pressing with the tides. In order to dance the movements of the waves, this was performed as an ensemble, descending and ascending diagonals from upstage right to downstage left.

Structurally it worked well to have five dancers, as we rotated through the lines of poetry, first dancing as we advanced, and then speaking as we retreated, until the last two lines of text, the first of which was spoken two words at a time, the second in unison for a strong final statement. During this school performance it was a bit windy, but the sound effect somehow suits the surf we depicted. Dancers: Misha Matsumoto, Christiana Oshiro, N. Grace Parson, Blythe Stephens, Corbett Stern Sonnet LX by William Shakespeare Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end; Each changing place with that which goes before, In sequent toil all forwards do contend. Nativity, once in the main of light, Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd, Crooked elipses 'gainst his glory fight, And Time that gave doth now his gift confound. Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth And delves the parallels in beauty's brow, Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth, And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow: And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand, Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

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