Just earlier than the world got here to a halt as a result of pandemic, Shirley Halili-Cruz gathered 10,000 dancers to carry out “Unity Dance” in a bid for the Guinness World Record’s Largest Dance Contingent class.
The choreography mirrored her imaginative and prescient as chair of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts-National Committee on Dance (NCCA-NCD) to embrace and promote dance teams from varied areas and their various types.
The contributors studied a video of her choreography, set to the pop music “Sayaw (Dance)” carried out by Davaoeña Maan Chua.
“Unity Dance” was to be carried out earlier than Guinness World Records officers in April final yr in an open area in Pototan, Iloilo, however the world lockdown upended the judges’ journey plans.
Unwilling to waste all the trouble poured into the venture to date, the NCCA-NCD produced a video model of the efficiency, with a legion of dancers—a whole lot at a time—swaying arms, clapping palms, pivoting and shuffling in faculty corridors and in entrance of campuses. While these schoolyard photographs and Cruz’s cameos in completely different areas have been performed earlier than the pandemic, the finished “Unity Dance” video is interspersed with postquarantine footage of small pupil teams allowed by their native authorities items to take part. Physical distancing and different well being protocols have been adopted.
She has not given up on the prospect of Philippine dancers touchdown in Guinness World Records, Cruz says. “But the officials have to be physically present to make a head count of the contingent, so we shall wait until the situation improves and restrictions ease up.”
Virtual performances
In fact, not even a pandemic can pull this dance proponent away from her signature large-scale initiatives. The largest NCCA-NCD endeavor to this point in the course of the quarantine is “Dance Xchange on Air,” a sequence of digital concert events that includes teams nationwide.
From the comforts of their houses, by way of the Dance Xchange Facebook web page or its YouTube channel, viewers could also be transported to any variety of places: a forest in Pampanga to witness Mabalacat National High School boys reveling in the joys of an Aeta searching dance; a riverside in Negros the place members of Busilak Dance Theater Company carry out whereas carrying bunches of bananas in “Handuraw,” a competition favourite; a gravel-laden backyard with {couples} from Binhilan Performing Arts Guild sporting barong and traje de mestiza executing the stately “Alcamfor” from Leyte; the seashores of Laiya, Batangas, with women in blue robes from Halili-Cruz School of Ballet twirling on the dock; or a transport terminal with South Avenue dancers grooving to hip-hop.
For the primary season of “Dance Xchange on Air” (Oct. 24, 2020, to Feb. 1), the NCCA-NCD produced 27 exhibits, plus a world version that reached 32 international locations. It concerned 262 teams and colleges, and has been seen by over 1.72 million as of this writing.
“We are proud that many of our videos are making waves in social media,” says Cruz. One such video is of Ligliwa Dance Group from Pangasinan, whose members, clad in easy T-shirts and saggy shorts, carry out an intense modern piece in an open basketball court docket. The video has recorded half one million views.
Sustaining creativity
Much earlier, in 2009, Cruz initiated the Philippine International Dance Xchange Festival, which consisted of particular occasions participated in by fans from right here and overseas.
The first competition was held in Dumaguete City, Negros Oriental, and has since been hosted by completely different provinces in order to make the occasion accessible to a wider viewers. An common of 30 teams joined, half of them from Europe, Africa and elsewhere throughout Asia. Workshops have been likewise organized for its generated viewers of 25,000.
The competition ran for a decade till pandemic restrictions drove the competition emigrate online as “Dance Xchange on Air.” The idea was nonetheless to showcase Filipino ethnic and folks dances in addition to Western ballet, modern, lyrical and hip-hop—carried out in open areas.
“This is our contribution to the dynamism in the dance community and our way of sustaining creativity,” says Cruz. “The atmosphere has generally become more collaborative and dance creations have become more meaningful and attuned to current realities. The dance sector has been restless, as have all the other arts, and eager to move forward.”
To be signed up, every group submitted a four-minute video of high-definition broadcast high quality. Since the concert events have been to be proven by way of Facebook and YouTube, the dance music needed to be royalty- and copyright issue-free.
Postproduction course of was tedious, to say the least. Cruz previewed all of the movies and despatched suggestions to the teams. “I really meant to include everyone regardless of expertise levels, experience and artistic standards,” she says. “I believe in giving opportunities to as many as possible. So, one huge challenge was how to help groups whose dance videos did not meet our standards. Some had to make 10 revisions. In that sense, it became a mentoring session, too. We requested choreographers to fix some parts of the dances, or we asked the groups to improve video quality. Everyone was very cooperative.”
Each episode runs for over an hour and options 13 to fifteen teams with Issa Litton, clad in Twinkle Ferraren’s Filipiniana tops, as host. The sequence has been cross-posted in different Facebook pages for wider attain.
Arts month and past
Commemorating the Arts Month of February, “Dance Xchange on Air” featured “The “International Conference/Webinar on Dance Research,” hosted by the NCCA Dance Division from Feb. 16 to 19. It consisted of 20 researches on world points, finest practices and postpandemic progress.
The division held “A Virtual Exhibit of Dance Costumes,” with historic and cultural annotations on Feb. 25.
“Sayaw Pinoy Goes Virtual” can be streamed each Saturday at 6 p.m. till Mar. 27, Cruz says, “Sayaw Pinoy Goes Virtual” showcases all genres, from ethnic to ballet to hip-hop, in locations which might be vital to Philippine tradition—vacationer websites corresponding to Cathedral Falls in Kapatangan, Lanao del Norte, Negros Occidental’s Tangel Cave burial website, Camugao Bridge, Hacienda San Lucas and an outdated sugarcane central.
“Buyogan Festival Dance Tribute to the Frontliners” is about in Buyogan Stage fronting the Leyte Gulf. She cites the story of Spaniards touchdown in Leyte and asking the natives what the place was referred to as. Thinking that the foreigners have been asking a few swarm of bees, the locals replied, “Ah, buyog.”
Considering this prodigious output, Cruz shouldn’t be bragging when she says that the dance sector has been essentially the most dynamic and most efficient in the humanities neighborhood in these uncommon occasions. She provides, “These programs also serve as a breeding ground for upcoming groups, especially those from other regions.”
Producing the digital sequence shouldn’t be with out challenges. She notes fluctuating web connections, audiences’ brief consideration spans, online coordination and logistics. On a private degree, she says, her drastically diminished mobility following an enormous stroke in 2014 after an lively life as a dancer and trainer has been fairly the check, however one which she has in reality triumphed over.
In her personal phrases, “I cannot walk unassisted. I cannot write with my right hand but I have learned to work with my left. And precisely because I am wheelchair-bound, I am compelled to be more imaginative and more innovative.”
—CONTRIBUTED
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