We love providing an opportunity for our students and staff to perform! Preparing for a performance gives the students concrete goals, and encourages them to refine their movements and transitions. It adds purpose to their practice. It gives them an opportunity to exercise creativity, and to add a different character or personality to the skills they have learned. And, importantly, it is a culminating point for putting together skills that they have been working on for some time. The sense of achievement and empowerment that can be gained is very valuable! It’s also very inspiring to watch other aerialists perform and to cheer each other on!
So how does one go about crafting a routine for a performance? There is no one right way, but below are some suggestions to get the wheels turning.
The Seed
To my mind, every routine first starts with the seed of an idea. It may grow from a certain move that you really love. It may start with a story you want to tell. It may start with a theme. It may start with a song that you hear, and suddenly you can picture a flow of skills. Whatever it is, this is the beginning of the creation and the narrowing down of choices to be made along the way.
The Music
Whether or not music is the seed, choosing a song needs to be done early in the process since so many other choices depend on that. Here are some things to consider as you make that choice.
What sort of mood do you want to portray? Do you want a slow, flowy sort of feel? Do you want drama and high energy? Or perhaps you want something in between. For beginning students, it can be helpful to have a song that is fairly smooth and consistent throughout and doesn’t really climax—something like Enya or a calm instrumental. A consistently upbeat song can work too. It can be tricky to time movements to specific moments in a song, so it may be a good idea to give yourself some leeway by choosing a song that has the same sort of feel throughout. That being said, more advanced students shouldn’t automatically discount an even-keeled song. I have seen some very well done advanced routines done to songs that were anything but climatic.
On the other hand, you may find that you want to go for something that is more climactic. Songs and routines that have variation can be very interesting and engaging. If you want to include some drops, you probably want to choose a song that has at least one climax, or perhaps a sudden stop (rest) in the music.
Whatever the mood you choose, try to make your movements match. This is part of what takes your performance up a notch or two, and makes it much more enjoyable to watch. Your ability to do the type of movement the song suggests should be a consideration as you are choosing your music. If you’re not quite ready to do high energy movements with fast transitions, then you should probably look for a song that is not so dynamic.
Another consideration that might guide your song choice is if you would enjoy portraying a certain character or flavor. For example, you might want to do something jazzy, or perhaps something with a saucy latin feel. Other possibilities include mystical, dreamy, or whimsical.
This may go without saying, but make sure to choose a song that you enjoy enough to listen to over and over as you practice!
Also, remember that your song choice needs to be approved. We won’t approve songs that have inappropriate lyrics or that we deem too dark.
The Moves
Once the music is chosen, it is time to put together the flow of skills or movements. As I mentioned before, there may be certain spots in the music that suggest a specific movement or type of movement to you. If this is the case, that’s a good place to start. From that point, start to work backwards and forwards. What other skills can lead into the one that first came to mind? What could flow from it? The skill sheets we use in class are grouped categorically, and it can be helpful to look at the list as you are putting things together. Also, utilize the notebooks you’ve been given in class. Hopefully you’ve been taking note of which skills make you feel beautiful, powerful, or strong. You should include some of your favorite moves in your routine! Your notebook is also a great place to write down your routine ideas so you can have that handy as you practice.
It may be helpful to decide what category of skills you want to spend the most time in during your routine. Is your favorite move in a single foot lock or on the knot? Is hip key your thing? If you are not yet comfortable transitioning between categories—like from a single foot lock to double foot locks—plan on staying within one category for your entire routine. If you want to do a routine on the knot, remember that it is possible to do many of the single footlock skills on the knot! This can really expand the library of skills you are choosing from as you craft your routine.
Whether or not you are staying within one category for your routine, you may want to add a bit of floor work to the beginning or end of your routine.
If there is a skill that you have seen on YouTube or elsewhere that you really want to do, make sure that you talk to your instructor about it. Our curriculum is progressive, and the skills that you learn in class build upon each other. Some of the skills you are learning may eventually lead to the one you want to learn. If your instructor thinks you are ready for it, they may help you to learn it a little sooner than you otherwise would, or they may help you to learn skills that lead up to your goal. It might be that the skill you want to learn is a variation of a skill that we have in the curriculum, and so it would be appropriate to learn it and include in your routine. Please do not skip ahead without guidance! There can be important safety considerations that you are unaware of. Also, doing a skill before you are ready to may lead to joint or muscle injury down the road. For these reasons, you will not be allowed to perform your routine if you have included skills that are outside of our curriculum and have not been approved.
The Preparations
Putting together a good routine requires practice. We encourage all of our students to take advantage of open gym time, especially as they prepare for a performance! There are also things that you can do at home to prepare. It’s incredibly helpful to mentally practice your routine as you listen to your song! On the physical side, you can work on your strength and flexibility training. Ask your instructor for some suggestions of things you can do at home to work on specific weaknesses or to improve overall conditioning. Stay in tune with your body, and don’t overdo it physically. Remember that getting adequate rest is important! When you are eager to achieve a certain goal, it can be easy to forget that. Fueling your body well will also help you to perform (and live!) at your best.
Your preparations will also include putting together a costume and deciding how you want to style your hair, but we’ll cover that in a separate post. We hope you have found this helpful!