London Contemporary Dance School: Meet the Teachers

In this video you will meet the teachers and get a taste of the classes at London Contemporary Dance School. Technical Training The training at London Contemporary Dance School is designed to produce highly skilled, creative and intellectually curious dance artists, prepared for a career in the diverse and fluid world of contemporary dance. The School is a rich learning environment, where dance artists are nurtured as they develop, and encouraged to take ownership of their training and the direction of their careers. Students are placed in teaching groups appropriate to their skill and experience and take daily classes in contemporary dance and ballet. Classes are accompanied by live music. Through daily technical practice students build their skill and stamina whilst engaging intellectually with the process of exploring physical principles. Our training reflects an awareness of somatics and biomechanics which is important for safe, sustainable practice and emphasises the need to work with appropriate attention to individual physical characteristics. All students have the option to attend individual technique coaching and tutorial sessions to enable the development of their full potential. In addition their technical development is supported by classes in body conditioning, the Alexander Technique and the Feldenkrais Method. Contemporary Technique Teaching The delivery of contemporary technique is structured to balance consistency and diversity. In the first and second year students usually work ten weeks with the same teacher every day so that particular approaches can be explored in-depth. The range of contemporary teaching encountered over the course ensures that our graduates are versatile, with the ability to apply their technical skills to new and varied challenges. Cunningham-based technique provides a continuous thread through all three years of study, as does a range of release-based work. Our range of technique experience is guided by the particular expertise and teaching philosophies of the teachers we want to work with, and how these relate to the needs of a particular group, rather than by prescribing a predetermined number of terms per style. In the third year technical training is linked directly to the performance options chosen by each student, enabling students to work in greater depth. Ballet Teaching At LCDS our ballet teaching is an integral part of the training and is designed specifically to support the development of contemporary dancers and in this respect it tends to be taught from the anatomical perspective. We do not teach the classical ballet repertory, instead ballet classes focus on the development of strong technique, strength, and artistic interpretation. Find out more here: https://bit.ly/2Onv90y