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Published On: Apr 19, 2005 10:17 PM
Total entries in this category:
Published On: Apr 19, 2005 10:17 PM
The LA Wars....
LA turf wars a difficult predicament
all 'round...(with hotlinks to be added later)
Been unable to update the blog with news during
this last part of the trip, (typing this over the Pacific just south west of
Hawaii) due to iBlog's inability to log-on to my server while surfing in Hawaii
and LAX - the non-Kelly Slater type. (We actually visited the surf
championships at Sunset Beach where he was competing but it was a
non-comp day due to bad weather. You only get to see the relative size of those
north shore waves when you see a surfer on
them..whoof!)
I learnt that David Dassa was changing his regular night to a Thursday when he announced it at his Thanksgiving marathon, and I knew then it would create waves (Ahem!).
Little did I know just how big those waves would be! But Rikudlistas soon found out!
It all seems a little familiar..
Not wanting to pour oil on troubled waters, the situation does bear a little resemblance to the Melbourne IFD scene, about which Lili and I were questioned often during this trip. Many who came up to us on our recent travels still marvel that IFD exists in Australia, much less has the following of some 400 people on a regular basis - that's our estimate anyway.
Melbourne innovates...
And that it is the home of many tech-based adjuncts to enjoying the past-time, such as the dance database, hebrew-songs.com, and the video webpage, all of which started life independent of each other - and without the assistance, co-operation or even approval of the three main dance group leaderships - a situation I can say has significantly changed in recent times. Which is another story entirely...
One of the things Lili and I took some pride in was the looks of astonishment on some faces when we said that not only could one dance in Melbourne 6 days a week, but many of those days had multiple classes, both in the AM and PM!
There is a long history to the Melbourne IFD story, and one day I will make my personal attempt to bring it together in the blog. For now, Melbourne dancers do enjoy a cornucopia of dancing opportunities, with a reasonable degree of harmony between groups, albeit with the odd occasional upset or public spat. Each group has its own "reputation" or persona, usually emblematic of the leaders' personalities, for better or worse. Some go to some groups because of these persona, some avoid for the same reason, and others have learnt to live with it - perhaps transcend it - because the end justifies the means. Many large cities will have similar dynamics.
The Good and the Bad of it...
At its worst, any rivalry between the groups has its outcome as a rush to teach too many "new" dances for the sake of being first, but from my perspective any new dance has a greater chance of lasting the distance if at least two of the groups include it in its repertoire. Occasionally the rivalry ends up being plain silly, with intending visiting choreographers not helping by asking all groups to withhold teaching their dances for months in advance, then arriving and not teaching the dance at all!
In the middle is a crossover group who attempt to support all three main groups without any public display of favouritism, attending workshops and camps sponsored by any of the groups.
Here, I must declare a bias which may not meet the approval of many: I have stopped attending workshops of choreographers I have never met if one particular group sponsors their visit. Why, you ask?
Having attended other workshops with choreographers I have met in other contexts, usually UK or US camps, I have generally been disappointed with their performances here... somehow, it seems all about more dances, rather than getting to know them as creative people. It's a personal bias probably stemming from spending days at camps with choreographers talking of things other than their current dance. Somehow, their best isn't enabled here...
At a workshop, it seems to be just about their dances, and I really don't get to know them any better. So I would rather wait until I can meet a "new" choreographer in other contexts, such as a camp. That doesn't apply if I have met them before, but for a first introduction it needs to be about more than just the dances. Call it idiosyncratic, but it's how I feel.
Returning to the subject at hand...
So having introduced in a long-winded way the matter of context, those of us who do not inhabit Lala-land might have cause to pause before being critical of what has happened recently,
Clearly, there is a long history that must be considered here, and somehow this latest breakout of hostilities in a public forum has surprised some, disappointed others, and been "more of the same" for another group.
I would ask both parties to the dispute, and their respective supporters what might happen if a NYC-based markid of repute, or one from DC for that matter, decided they had enough of living with cold weather and decided to put down roots in the LA area. And in order to make a splash opened up classes on two nights, Thursday and Sunday or Monday. In full knowledge of course that both David and Israel held classes on these nights. Would we see the same vitriol or defensiveness displayed?
Is a city the size of LA with some 250,000 Israelis inhabiting the general area too small for three competing groups? Neither David nor Israel are the only markidim in town, but in effect they appear to act as a duopoly.
Australians are very aware of the effects of duopolies within the community (mainly to do with airlines) and it is not pretty, such that it is not unknown for both to join forces to force out a nimble third startup. When they succeed they return to a comfortable duopoly with little innovation occurring.
This airline analogy is stretching the point, but duopolies often act as if they have a right to do as they please, since the competition's activities are well-known and it's merely a game of safety tit-for-tat.
The irony should not be lost on most US-based readers, since marketing and competition analysis has been raised to an art-form by American business.
I want to bring in here the subject of Gadi Meir's "Video-in-Motion" (VIM) newsletters which used to accompany each new video Gadi produced. Now living with his young family in Israel, Gadi brought a professionalism to Camp videos I don't think I have seen duplicated, and he did it with analogue recording equipment.
The texts of these newsletters are probably floating about somewhere on the internet, and at one stage were kept on Ernie Cohen's now-defunct website. In effect, these were the first IFD weblogs, expressing without fear or favour Gadi's acerbic take on the world of IFD.
I recall copying these and placing them on a billboard at one of our dance venues for local dancers to read. In one, Gadi gave a potted history of the weekly allegiances and tiffs between choreographers, and who was in who's camp this current month, be it Mishael Barzilai, Yoav Ashriel or Israel Shiker who were the main Histalmut organisers at the time.
Gadi humorously wrote of kiss-and make-up stories between yotzrim, as well as how one slight would see an act of dance revenge soon follow. It got so silly some accused others of "stealing my steps".
(Funny aside: While staying a night with Eileen Weinstock, we sat with Moshe Eskayo discussing IFD when I pulled out the iBook, logged onto the Keff wireless network, and showed Moshe how the US Library of Congress maintains a website showing late 19th Century American dances. In one short scene is a couple in their full ballroom outfits, showing steps and moves the same as Marco ben-Shimon's Leil Stav, as well as Gadi Biton's Chaki Od Rega - yes, I'll put it up soon.)
In the end, the dance consumers will decide what they want, regardless of the intrigue behind the dances. Some who learn of a dance's checkered history will refuse to dance it on principle, while others close their eyes to some acts of creative bastardry.
Consumers in LA will act in much the same way I think. The worst outcome might be that some will throw up hands in disgust and drop out completely, although I would assert they were on their way out anyway, and the latest turf wars just added another nail to the coffin.
My advice to consumers (I am in no position to offer advice to the Yakovee or Dassa families or nearest and dearest) is the following:
• Be wary of accusations you are being disloyal if you dance where you like to dance.
• Exposure to different dance programs, styles of teaching, markid preferences can only add to your IFD knowledge base and enjoyment. No markid is universally popular and all are hypersensitive to criticism - and that's not a bad thing!
• There is no unitary reason to go dancing - if your friends go exclusively to one location, and you value that part of your IFD experience over other aspects, that's fine. If you like diversity, that's fine too, and stare down any accusations of disloyalty. They're your feet and your dollars to spend as you please.
And these are only my thoughts as an occasional visitor to the LA scene. Local denizens will have an entirely LA-centric take, for which I suggest they choose to dance at a camp or workshop on the other side of the country or outside the US just to meet another group of dancers and gain another perspective.
For me, I need the break from the local scene a few times a year to come back and appreciate what we have....
I learnt that David Dassa was changing his regular night to a Thursday when he announced it at his Thanksgiving marathon, and I knew then it would create waves (Ahem!).
Little did I know just how big those waves would be! But Rikudlistas soon found out!
It all seems a little familiar..
Not wanting to pour oil on troubled waters, the situation does bear a little resemblance to the Melbourne IFD scene, about which Lili and I were questioned often during this trip. Many who came up to us on our recent travels still marvel that IFD exists in Australia, much less has the following of some 400 people on a regular basis - that's our estimate anyway.
Melbourne innovates...
And that it is the home of many tech-based adjuncts to enjoying the past-time, such as the dance database, hebrew-songs.com, and the video webpage, all of which started life independent of each other - and without the assistance, co-operation or even approval of the three main dance group leaderships - a situation I can say has significantly changed in recent times. Which is another story entirely...
One of the things Lili and I took some pride in was the looks of astonishment on some faces when we said that not only could one dance in Melbourne 6 days a week, but many of those days had multiple classes, both in the AM and PM!
There is a long history to the Melbourne IFD story, and one day I will make my personal attempt to bring it together in the blog. For now, Melbourne dancers do enjoy a cornucopia of dancing opportunities, with a reasonable degree of harmony between groups, albeit with the odd occasional upset or public spat. Each group has its own "reputation" or persona, usually emblematic of the leaders' personalities, for better or worse. Some go to some groups because of these persona, some avoid for the same reason, and others have learnt to live with it - perhaps transcend it - because the end justifies the means. Many large cities will have similar dynamics.
The Good and the Bad of it...
At its worst, any rivalry between the groups has its outcome as a rush to teach too many "new" dances for the sake of being first, but from my perspective any new dance has a greater chance of lasting the distance if at least two of the groups include it in its repertoire. Occasionally the rivalry ends up being plain silly, with intending visiting choreographers not helping by asking all groups to withhold teaching their dances for months in advance, then arriving and not teaching the dance at all!
In the middle is a crossover group who attempt to support all three main groups without any public display of favouritism, attending workshops and camps sponsored by any of the groups.
Here, I must declare a bias which may not meet the approval of many: I have stopped attending workshops of choreographers I have never met if one particular group sponsors their visit. Why, you ask?
Having attended other workshops with choreographers I have met in other contexts, usually UK or US camps, I have generally been disappointed with their performances here... somehow, it seems all about more dances, rather than getting to know them as creative people. It's a personal bias probably stemming from spending days at camps with choreographers talking of things other than their current dance. Somehow, their best isn't enabled here...
At a workshop, it seems to be just about their dances, and I really don't get to know them any better. So I would rather wait until I can meet a "new" choreographer in other contexts, such as a camp. That doesn't apply if I have met them before, but for a first introduction it needs to be about more than just the dances. Call it idiosyncratic, but it's how I feel.
Returning to the subject at hand...
So having introduced in a long-winded way the matter of context, those of us who do not inhabit Lala-land might have cause to pause before being critical of what has happened recently,
Clearly, there is a long history that must be considered here, and somehow this latest breakout of hostilities in a public forum has surprised some, disappointed others, and been "more of the same" for another group.
I would ask both parties to the dispute, and their respective supporters what might happen if a NYC-based markid of repute, or one from DC for that matter, decided they had enough of living with cold weather and decided to put down roots in the LA area. And in order to make a splash opened up classes on two nights, Thursday and Sunday or Monday. In full knowledge of course that both David and Israel held classes on these nights. Would we see the same vitriol or defensiveness displayed?
Is a city the size of LA with some 250,000 Israelis inhabiting the general area too small for three competing groups? Neither David nor Israel are the only markidim in town, but in effect they appear to act as a duopoly.
Australians are very aware of the effects of duopolies within the community (mainly to do with airlines) and it is not pretty, such that it is not unknown for both to join forces to force out a nimble third startup. When they succeed they return to a comfortable duopoly with little innovation occurring.
This airline analogy is stretching the point, but duopolies often act as if they have a right to do as they please, since the competition's activities are well-known and it's merely a game of safety tit-for-tat.
The irony should not be lost on most US-based readers, since marketing and competition analysis has been raised to an art-form by American business.
I want to bring in here the subject of Gadi Meir's "Video-in-Motion" (VIM) newsletters which used to accompany each new video Gadi produced. Now living with his young family in Israel, Gadi brought a professionalism to Camp videos I don't think I have seen duplicated, and he did it with analogue recording equipment.
The texts of these newsletters are probably floating about somewhere on the internet, and at one stage were kept on Ernie Cohen's now-defunct website. In effect, these were the first IFD weblogs, expressing without fear or favour Gadi's acerbic take on the world of IFD.
I recall copying these and placing them on a billboard at one of our dance venues for local dancers to read. In one, Gadi gave a potted history of the weekly allegiances and tiffs between choreographers, and who was in who's camp this current month, be it Mishael Barzilai, Yoav Ashriel or Israel Shiker who were the main Histalmut organisers at the time.
Gadi humorously wrote of kiss-and make-up stories between yotzrim, as well as how one slight would see an act of dance revenge soon follow. It got so silly some accused others of "stealing my steps".
(Funny aside: While staying a night with Eileen Weinstock, we sat with Moshe Eskayo discussing IFD when I pulled out the iBook, logged onto the Keff wireless network, and showed Moshe how the US Library of Congress maintains a website showing late 19th Century American dances. In one short scene is a couple in their full ballroom outfits, showing steps and moves the same as Marco ben-Shimon's Leil Stav, as well as Gadi Biton's Chaki Od Rega - yes, I'll put it up soon.)
In the end, the dance consumers will decide what they want, regardless of the intrigue behind the dances. Some who learn of a dance's checkered history will refuse to dance it on principle, while others close their eyes to some acts of creative bastardry.
Consumers in LA will act in much the same way I think. The worst outcome might be that some will throw up hands in disgust and drop out completely, although I would assert they were on their way out anyway, and the latest turf wars just added another nail to the coffin.
My advice to consumers (I am in no position to offer advice to the Yakovee or Dassa families or nearest and dearest) is the following:
• Be wary of accusations you are being disloyal if you dance where you like to dance.
• Exposure to different dance programs, styles of teaching, markid preferences can only add to your IFD knowledge base and enjoyment. No markid is universally popular and all are hypersensitive to criticism - and that's not a bad thing!
• There is no unitary reason to go dancing - if your friends go exclusively to one location, and you value that part of your IFD experience over other aspects, that's fine. If you like diversity, that's fine too, and stare down any accusations of disloyalty. They're your feet and your dollars to spend as you please.
And these are only my thoughts as an occasional visitor to the LA scene. Local denizens will have an entirely LA-centric take, for which I suggest they choose to dance at a camp or workshop on the other side of the country or outside the US just to meet another group of dancers and gain another perspective.
For me, I need the break from the local scene a few times a year to come back and appreciate what we have....
Posted: Wed - December 3, 2003 at 09:39 PM |