SOS: Our Response to the Philippines

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone! As we gather with family and friends this holiday to acknowledge our blessings, please remember how little the Philippines is surviving on. Any donation will help! Thank you thank you thank you! Click here to Donate Now!

A message from our own CoEXIST dancer, Lauren Sion:

A category 5 super typhoon (Haiyan/Yolanda) devastated the Philippines on November 8, 2013 displacing 4 million people and affecting 13 million.  Thousands have lost their lives and more than a thousand people are still missing as the Philippines continues to find relief for all of the areas affected by this natural disaster.  A little less than a month earlier, the province of Bohol was hit with a 7.2 magnitude earthquake where thousands lost their homes and more than a million people were affected. 

My family was blessed that everyone was ok.  My mother grew up in the Bohol province where our ancestral house of more than a 100 years is still standing with partial damage but others have been completely decimated.  We have many relatives still living there and their personal accounts of the earthquake aftermath is horrifying.  There are others who need our help.  While my family wasn't affected and we are so far away, it is still my heritage and my heart breaks.

The best and most effective way to help is through monetary donations.  Even if it is just $5 - that can go a long way.  It can buy, 16 pounds of rice, 10 cans of sardines, or 21 liters of water which, at this magnitude of devastation, will save so many lives!

Please. Open your hearts and donate whatever little you can!  You will be making more of a difference than you know for these people who have lost loved ones, homes and literally everything. 

Thank you, thank you, thank you-
Lauren Sion

Dance Kid

One of my longtime, dance studio friends recently brought an article titled "27 Undeniable Signs You Were A Dancer" to my attention. The buzzfeed article instantly brought back so many memories and it was prefect timing to me personally for two reasons. 

First, this past Saturday I substituted at my dance studio, teaching a long sequence of Ballet Technique, Somatics & Stretching, Lyrical, and then hosting a CoEXISTdance Master Class. This ultimately meant that the young dancers and myself spent Saturday at the dance studio from 9:30am to 3pm! Almost a full school day! The most amazing part: I loved every second of it and so did they. I used to LIVE for Saturdays at my dance studio: Ballet Technique, Ballet Repertoire, Dance Composition, Lunch, Modern, Modern Competition. Talk about the glory days. I mean really, what could be better? It's Saturday, you spend 8 hours doing what you love, with the people who become your closest friends. 

Second, the exciting start of the CoEXISTdance Jr. Dance Company has ignited so many reminiscent thoughts for me. It is so refreshing to see such young and genuine dedication, commitment, and pure passion. These are dancers who simply want to dance and want to dance more. All of the Jr. dancers are so hungry for the art form and it is so evident in the studio at our rehearsals and master classes. From their professionalism to their detailed questions, the way they practice on the side of the performance space and watch each other dance, the respect they show to their teachers and their excitement about upcoming shows. 

As a professional, it has been such a rewarding process to touch base with my own roots in my dance training as I work closely with the Jr. Dance Company. The young dancers have inspired me to take a step back and look at my own dancing and choreographing in a much bigger way. Instead of thinking only about my work over the past few months or years, I am so much more inclined to look at my work over the decades, accounting for the past, the present, and the future. Also making me feel ancient, but that is a whole different blog. I feel so much more well-rounded as an artist and I have the Jr. Company to thank for that :) 

Anyway, looking back to the article, I must take a more humorous and personal route by sharing my favorite point. 

1. You and your friends would choreograph dances after school "for fun"
HUGE UNDERSTATEMENT! Me and my friends not only did this after school but at sleepovers, down the shore, at the studio, anytime and anywhere! We had rehearsals and mock performances. From the Lion King's "Hakuna Mata"to Britney Spears, "Tainted Love" to Annie the Musical, choreographing was clearly more than a passion from a really early age. Still is. 

There is no point to this blog other than the simple joy of looking back upon dance memories and laughing. I encourage readers to jump in and share a dance memory or two below in the comment section. There is a beauty to sharing past memories and reminiscing and it feels so good! 

If anyone would like to check out the full article… http://www.buzzfeed.com/jessicamisener/27-undeniable-signs-you-were-a-dance-kid

Hope you enjoyed the read and I look forward to some great comments! 

Katie :) 

Music and Dance are Life

Ever believe in intense dream analysis? Yeah I have those amazing dreams where I can turn a billion times, do a billion flips and partner w/Matthew Powell or Sascha Radetesky (or just be Stella Abrera who is married to Sasha Radetesky and is a Filipina-American principal dancer w/ABT... One of us made it!). However I never really weighed in on them too heavily like the deep meanings of forgetting your shoes, being chased by dinosaurs, or having your teeth fall out... But occasionally I get these dreams where something profound happens - like I fall off my couch and into my glass coffee table because in my dream I was jumping out of a car to escape a bad situation.  That's an extreme example...

Luckily for me I also dream movement and choreography and if I'm able to wake I will get up and start recreating it or at least writing it down.  I always have a pen and paper on my bedside for when these things randomly happen. Words also come out that mean something to me and sometimes I can never forget them. 

About a month or so ago I dreamt the words in the picture above. I know where some of it came from. When I lived in NYC this summer I was sitting at a coffee shop in the east village when I looked out the window and saw a bunch of Asians who seemed to be doing a project w/their class. They were writing things on the sidewalks with chalk. I found it so interesting i followed them all the way to union square park. My favorite one was: 

I stood there and stared at it, music blasting in my ears about rooftops, never feeling alone in New York City, and the ed sheeran song my student sent me saying it made her think of me (aww!) When I went to NYC this summer I was kind of on a mission - to feel - to feel free, happy, and to refuel (amongst other things). I'd literally walk around, ear phones in, dancing around the streets, w/a silly smile on my face. I am first and foremost a dancer in life and the phrase "dance is life" has always been ingrained in my being. I'm single and live in a world where everyone's too busy to stop and just TAKE TIME (myself included). It occurred to me that music is just as important in life - if dance is life... So is music.  (Read my next blog on the importance of the dance-music connection!)

*Lauren