Casual Summer - Gianluca Vincentini [Anna Reviews]

Dear dancers,

Something is changing, can you smell it? Orange, yellow, brown... Little by little the wind is blowing off the green of the trees and redecorating the streets with the classic tones of the easting season. It is time to say goodbye to those naked sandals and pull hats and scarves out of the shadows. Because, inevitably, autumn is making its way in!
However, having said that, there is a room in the area where summer is kept alive all year long. Yes! My dearest heat-aholics, there’s a place where bare feet and sticky sweat are always welcome. Of course I am talking about the weekly professional dance sessions of ProDanceLeeds!

This week, the guest teacher facilitating the sessions is Gianluca Vincentini. Originally from Puglia in south Italy, Gianluca knows how to keep the temperature up. His class starts gentle, taking time to awaken the body through subtle mobilizations. Then we work on the floor, looping a couple of sequences which play with speed, dynamism and directions.
Adding an extra layer, Gianluca brings in his current research on the boundaries between formal and casual movement. Making our way to standing, he encourages us to explore that duality with a few exercises based, as a matter of fact, in formal dance patterns. While being able to relate to the formal tradition of a plié or a tendu exercise, Gianluca’s material juxtaposes spatial and level changes, somehow integrating the nature of casual decision making. With mainly commercial pop tracks feeling the room, also the musical selection seems to be there to challenge formality.
The class finishes with a cool down which leaves us ready to exit summer and enter autumn again. No matter how grey and windy is out there, the heat from Gianluca’s class will keep us warm until tomorrow.

                                By Anna Cabré-Verdiell Bosch

-You can still catch his class Tuesday and Thursday at NSCD, and Wednesday at RJC Dance from 9.30 to 11.00-