VIDEO: Last Rehearsal Before the Cirque Éloize Auditions (Patreon)

Hello my strange and wonderful friends!

Reporting to you today from Montréal, QC!

The audition for Cirque Éloize on Wednesday went well and I'm partway through my write-up for you folks about that. In the meantime, I wanted to share how my last act run-through went the night before the auditions, on Tuesday November 8th! 

(I didn't record my solo run at the auditions on Wednesday -- I wasn't sure if that was appropriate or not, so I erred on the side of caution and didn't try to -- but Éloize recorded it all for their own records. I'm going to send them an email next week to see if I can get my grubby little paws on any of that footage. If I'm successful, you can be certain I'll be sharing it with you all *immediately* lol). 

I shared the previous rehearsal video (the one you all saw in my last post here on Patreon) with my friend Xander Taylor, who is currently with Cirque du Soleil's BAZAR in Brazil. 

Xander kindly took the time to give me a little feedback on what he thought I could reasonably try to tweak or improve in the few days remaining before the audition. He thought the structure of this short 3-minute number would be stronger if I moved the drop towards the end, so I re-structured my sequences and sections and gave that a go (and that's the way it stayed for audition-day). 

I also tried a couple grounding exercises that have been helpful for me when I'm on TV/Film sets when I need to ~~~get into character~~~ before doing a run of the straps act, and I felt a lot more present and connected to the work. Like I was able to live in the movement a bit more, rather than just frantically trying to survive it 😅

This practice run happened in the Studio Création of the École Nationale de Cirque. 

Those of you who have been following along with this aerial straps adventure since at least this summer may remember this giant, beautiful, riggers-dream training space from the Residency hours that I was granted through TOHU, the main circus presenting organization here in Montréal.

I was in this space (Studio Création @ ENC) last in July. 

Up until that point in the summer, all my lessons and training with my coach, William, had been happening at Kalabanté Studios (which has a much lower ceiling height). When William and I started our residency sessions in July at this ENC studio, I was violently humbled: the height of the rigging-points, and the amount of 'empty' line above my head, presented enough of a technical challenge for me that I couldn't execute any of the movements that I'd been training so hard on.

BUT––

I'm pleased to say that the months of training & practice that elapsed between then and now were enough for my technique to develop to a degree that I can execute my moves even on the terrible scary intimidating high point. There's still things in this that I'm not happy with in this rehearsal video, that I know I can (and will) tighten up. But for now? I can find some satisfaction in knowing that it's pretty much the best I have to offer right now.

It was truly gratifying to be back in this space, clip into that giant centre point, and still be able to do my flare-to-flag, chuck my switches, hang onto the one-arm-chin-up-spin (not as long or as well as I'd like, but hey).

The rigging point that we got to do our solos on at Cirque Éloize the next day is the same height as the one in this video, but for reasons I'm unable to explain (honestly, I have no idea why or how) it's an easier 'ride' than the ENC rigging point. It was the perfect psychological prep for the last day before the auditions. 

For anyone curious about the funny-looking object made of black metal being constructed in the background of the video, that's a SWAYPOLE. I'm 98% sure that it's these cool cats (Shannon & Philippe) (we chatted over the training session but never actually introduced ourselves to each other -- *facepalm*) – if you've never seen a swaypole act in action, don't deny yourself the pleasure of tapping that hyperlink to see the short youtube demo it connects to.

In closing for today, I'll add the note that the ceiling height of this space is what I need to be able to do my work in successfully: it most closely resembles the rigging point height in the venue I hope to present my Numéro Barbette work in one day. 

It's this exact studio that I'm going to be back in all of next week –– Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday -- with either William, or my conseil-artistique (Marie-Josée Gauthier) to keep pushing forward on Le Numéro Barbette. I've managed to sweet-talk some more Residency times out of the artistic coordinator at TOHU. ***cue creative panic***

Your next post will be a breakdown of what my audition-day was like at Éloize that happened on Wednesday! And then we'll be back to Barbette.

I hope you're all having a great week ––

Stay strange & wonderful.
XOXO Ess