Luminaria (Epiphany day 39)

One of the nice things about being an artist is that you get to be around artists. I'm fortunate to count among my friends people who regularly create, who regularly indulge in the most delightfully recursive aspect of the Imago Dei: that we are created in the image of a creator.

Recently, I've been collaborating with MoDaCoLab (the modern dancers co-laboratory), which will be performing on March 14, at San Antonio's Convention Center, at an event called Luminaria, a giant celebration of the arts, free to the public. (You can go to http://www.luminariasa.org to find out more.)

Possibly in honor of the event's name, the dancers decided to do something with light. They are putting together an innovative, humorous, challenging dance sequence that involves light sources emanating from the dancers themselves. They commissioned me to compose a score for the thing.

Often, when dancers dance to music, the way it works is the opposite of a film score: the composer just writes a piece of music, with or without the input of some dance person for plot or ideas, and then the choreographer creates a dance that works with that finished product. But in this case, I actually saw the dance, which they danced in silence, before I wrote any of the music. Since I'm used to doing film scores, and cuing musical ideas to emotions and movement, I was very comfortable with that, and the result has been good.

Of course, this is just the first draft. The dancers will continue refining their work, and I'll refine mine. So what you'll see on March 14th may be radically different. It'll be fun to see where it all goes.

The images are from a friend and neighbor, Mike Brannon, another one of those artists I was talking about. He's a guitarist/composer/recording artist who also creates fantastic artworks in the form of light fixtures. His works have won numerous awards, and are displayed not only in homes and businesses but in modern art museums around the country. I'm always struck by the combination of "useless" art and "useful" craft that's embodied in these.

Enjoy this sneak peek, and see you at Luminaria.
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To find out more about "Epiphany: 50 Days, 50 Songs," check out my website at http://www.barrybrake.com
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