3:30.

I remember the choreographer Peter Quanz saying something very strange to me around this time last year. He was working on creating the piece “Kaleidoscope” for ABT and mentioned that he had been keeping himself up all night working on it. Apparently he was fighting with pennies late at night in his apartment working on formations for the corps. When he first told me that, it sounded completely ridiculous but now I absolutely understand his frustration.

My lesson of the summer has been that creation is an all-consuming entity. The only explorations I had done with creation before were Star Wars ballets in my basement as a child, and the occasional work on some writing; miniscule to say the least. As an adult I began to realize that there is no rule or form to letting creation out of you. Awaking at 3:30 in the morning and grabbing my camcorder to film the movement that had popped into my head, I began to realize the power that Peter had no control over. I would work in the studio all day long and get a few sections out only to get frustrated that it wasn’t pouring out of me. Then I would all of a sudden feel it surge through me and realize that I can’t force it. Some of my favorite stuff that I did for “Snow” was stuff that I didn’t start in the studio.

Another important lesson that I learned was the idea of giving myself parameters. I struggled with the idea of doing Snow scene because I thought that there was nothing “original” I could bring to it. The word “original” is a creators’ worst enemy, the devil looming over your shoulder as you purge out the work. Getting over that fear of originality was only aided by the fact that I was choreographing “Snow”. I had a rough sketch provided by the borders that “Nutcracker” establishes, therefore structuring my work in some way. Any other time I have played around with choreography in the studio I have always said that I didn’t want to make it a story, I just wanted to play around with movement. However, there must be structure within abstraction. When you look at an abstract painting, it isn’t any less planned than a detailed Seurat; it’s just a different type of structure.

Since I have started choreographing this summer I find that I just want to do more and more. It’s a hunger that has to be fed but finding the right nutrients is so difficult. I listen to music all the time and am stimulated by so much of it, but only a handful of things really make me want to get into the studio. How do I find that great piece of music that will pull something out of me? At this point I don’t even really care how good it is, I just want to be doing it.

On my hellish plane ride home I had the chance to listen to the new Thom Yorke (front man of Radiohead)’s album. It is another clear example of something that sounds very random in it’s composition but is every bit as structured Tchaikovsky. One song in particular stood out to me as a possible duet for my friend Blaine and I. You can listen to it, “The Clock”, down below. I guess I’ll just have to see if it starts waking me up at night, then maybe I’ll know it’s the right choice.