Ben Dancing

I was recently persuaded of the benefits of signing up to Twitter. A few weeks in I’m not at all sure I’ve got it – but then maybe I haven’t tried hard enough. It reminds me unfortunately, of a very noisy infant school
playground with lots of bigger people pushing. I’m not sure where all that noise will get us.

That said it did bring me back into contact with an old friend, dancer and choreographer Ben Wright, a long ago student of mine. I taught him contemporary dance at Derby Academy of Dance run by the marvellous Eve Leveaux, who is still going strong after decades of teaching - launching the careers of many young dancers, Ben included.

Ben sent me this image of a programme of dance – must be at least twenty years ago – and now I remember but little of those hours in the studio working with him on his solo Blue Bird I’m With You. We’d have had fun and laughed a lot as well as worked hard – he was always great to work with, so quick and insightful even as an inexperienced dancer, full of wit and a spirit of bounce. He’d have had plenty of quirky ideas – a choreographer in the making even then. What remains in my memory is a sense of the fluidity and line of his dancing – the way he moved with such apparent ease, even when he had a back injury – a kind of easy grace. He was so good to watch.
I haven’t seen him dance for years. I'm not sure he still performs himself. But I’d like to see his company bdance. You can read about them here.
http://www.bgroup.org.uk/