Self confidence

„You can all do it. You must just want!“

Maldoom is convinced of it, although he has just entered the rehearsal room and sees the children for the first time; he knows it, because that´s how it has been in each of the round 300 projects he has realized around the globe in the past 30 years.

For many of the youngsters, his introductory remark is like a blow in the face; one more, but this time, a blow of a new kind: Could it be that somebody believes in me?

And sure enough, when expression and communication meet, self confidence is only a matter of time, who knows, may be just the time of the project?

Didn´t Maldoom assert in one of his projects that  

          „you can change your life in a dance class?"

Indeed, chances are that sustained effort  followed by several successful performances will have a lasting impact on a number of kids.

Mind you, we should  not expect a spectacular change right after curtain-fall. It won´t be  as palpable, as solid and concrete as the house newly erected  by your nextdoor neighbour; but an experience of such intensity is bound to leave its mark on each child.

After all, the house next door wasn´t built in one day either; what such a project gives to the youngsters is a pile of solid bricks for the  most fascinating construction: 

the shaping of an individual with character, open to new experiences and strong enough to resist to the current or better still, to swim against it.

 SIBIU 2007

The theatre group "Sfintul Ignatiu" composed of 15 children, aged 4-18 is invited for the second year in a row to present a performance rehearsed under the benevolent lead of producer Liana Ceterchi

Community Dance = Expression + Communication

In the last decades, family and social relations have changed dramatically. Back then, village life was punctuated by public festivities where the inhabitants met to sing or dance. More recently,

Royston Maldoom and Josef Eder have set out to give community dance its past glance back.

Music is a universal language and so is dance. Gather  a hundred youngsters in a hall, dress them alike to conceal their background and elaborate a choreography  to a given piece of music with them. If you have the right approach and know-how they will soon  feel more free to express themselves.

Differences in background and skills will gradually fade away and give way to more acceptance, tolerance and communication between them. And once they get the feeling that they are ONE group  with the same goal and that the only way to get there is to work together, you have reached a win-win situation.

Ex-pression

               "Youth without aging and life without death" 

                  International Theater Festival Sibiu 2007

Communication implies, or even requires the participation of one or more persons  to com-municate with; expression is the sine qua non condition and the first step towards communication; but inversely expression, being primarily a personal search, can make do with just oneself.

Whether you draw, dance, doodle, sing, swing or write sonets, you respond to a deeply felt need: that of expressing your body or soul´s feelings of the moment, be it joy, anger, pain, sadness or love. Whatever you do, it is art, at least for yourself and this is what counts.

                 „Children are artists“

For Maldoom all children  have hidden talents. His job is to help them „ex-press“ their abilities, their feelings.

No wonder then, that he chose to act in war and crisis regions, in prisons, to work with street youngsters and children with special needs; indeed, the stronger the pressure, the deeper the need to "get it out".

Communication

Bucharest-Christmas 2005

Mariuca, an amazing 80 year young Romanian lady "acting" in a Christmas play as the grandmother these children never had

Man´s best asset is communication; after food and drink his most vital need is to share with others his thoughts, his feelings, his activities.

But isn´t it sad and paradoxical, that precisely the century of communication should generate isolation? Maldoom and his team are fighting against it: Community dance is their answer.

Mobile phones, internet, television and advertizing are all means of communication. They use communication; but they abuse it, and above all their users, by depriving them of their most precious ability: genuine communication and exchange. 

A familiar scene: a bunch of youngsters is sitting at a coffee shop, each of them involved in a lively telephone conversation with an absent buddy, when he could have a „real“ exchange with a friend he has at hand; or a mother pushes a pram -mind you, with a child in it- a mobile phone plugged in her ear, when she could be discovering the world anew with her child´s eyes.

You feel like telling them all: hey, you are here, not there! 

Royston Maldoom and Josef Eder will bring them with both feet back on the floor: Focus!

"Firebird" heading for Bucharest

I am now back from a hard work´s fortnight in Bucharest, but happy to say that the results achieved have exceeded our expectations.

Thanks to our very devoted team composed of Margareta Vlad, Oana Davidescu and Cristina Serafim (all three working at the German Embassy), Elena and Aurel Vlad (both sculptors) and last but not least Alexandra Arnautu, the newly hired and enthusiastic local coordinator of our project, we can now say that the project WILL take place.

And here are the latest news:

Josef Eder, one of the project´s two leading choreographers, travelled to Bucharest to spot locations and get to know some children, educators and the project team. He was very enthusiastic but I shall ask him to post his first impressions on this blog himself very soon.

Together we selected two Romanian dance teachers to assist him and Royston Maldoom during the rehearsals.

The participation of Romanian professionals in this project is essential for its sustainability. Indeed, one of our aims is to trigger further similar projects for underprivileged youths in Romania in the next years.

By the way, this aspect is also one of the main conditions for Maldoom and Eder´s participation in any new project, since they wish to act as catalysts for the spreading of community dance.

In order to be well prepared  for the oncoming project,  Catalina Gubandru and Irina Roncea, our new assistants, will be sent  by Caritas Vienna and our association "Jungen Rumänen eine Chance!"  to a one-week community dance workshop to be held  by several choreographers in Vienna next week. One of them will be Royston Maldoom. We are looking forward to reading their report on this blog as soon as they return.

First Romanian company steps in

DC Communication, a young and dynamic Bucharest Architecture Studio and Communications company is eager to promote community spirit and to have an impact on Romanian society. The company´s director, Mr Frolu, spontaneously agreed to support us for the promotion of our project. This gave us a big boost and we are looking forward to collaborating with him and his team.

100 kids to dance on National Theatre stage

We now have a firm date and location for the Firebird première: Mr Ion Caramitru, director of the Teatrul National Caragiale, is giving us the opportunity to perform in  his theatre on September 5th 2009. If the budget allows it, this first performance will be followed by a tour in the province the following week.

For her part, Mrs Gabriela Bancila, Headmistress of the Liceul I.L.Caragiale,   has offered her high school´s sport premises and cantine for the one-month rehearsals in August 2009.

German companies enthusiastic about the project

The precious advice of the  German-Romanian Chamber of industry and Commerce´s President and Executive Director, Mr. Merica and Mr. Walde, of Mr. Stein from Stein & Partners and of Mr. Simon from ABB Romania enabled us to contact a number of companies operating in Romania.

Several German companies have already promised  their financial support. As soon as their sponsoring has been confirmed, they will appear on our sponsors´ list on this blog.

Other companies and hotels would like to make contributions in kind such as food, catering, costumes, accomodation or transportation.