Those of you who follow our Facebook and Twitter profiles will know that we were rolling out 2 amazing projects last week.
Company dancers Mike and Megan were leading our New Ground volunteers in a week of holiday dance classes with children fromthe Six Bells Community Centre in Abertillery, South Wales.  During the week, Megan created a lovely piece of work for them called First Run, with music by Primal Scream.  The whole week was a resounding success ending in a brilliant performance by the children at the FFIN DANCE Easter Dance Faktry Festival on the Friday evening.  It’s always such a privilege to work with children who are performing for the very first time, hopefully leaving them with a lasting positive memory.  Volunteers Dai, Jess, Laura, Cariad and Olivia were an amazing help during the week. Meanwhile, I was creating a new piece of work with the course delegates of the FFIN DANCE Easter Intensives.  I challenged dancers Lizzie Crouch, Ruth Allen, Catrin Lewis, Julian Lewis and Russell Preston Fine to find the nuances of texture, pattern and tone in fabulous music by The Kronos Quartet, Matt Haimovitz and Zenzile.  All cello music with differing qualities.

Snips of Homage to Cello – Medium.m4v
This piece, Homage to Cello, was also performed as the headlining act at the Faktry Festival.  The Faktry Festival is held twice yearly with an emphasis on platforming new work to an audience: it also showcases the diversity of the work that our education and outreach strand undertakes – working with young professionally trained dancers all the way through to tiny 3 years olds just embarking on their dance journey.  Other performances were given by our other community groups Scarf Dance and Abertillery Youth Dance, and guest appearances by Blaenau Gwent Junior Youth Dance Company, Combination Dance and Leapers Dance, all of whom have a very close link to the dance faktry.

A crazy, busy and challenging week for us all – but so rewarding to see such quality and passion for dance and all in Abertillery, South Wales!

sue lewis