removing the dance critics?

Just heard that LA Times dance critic Lewis Segal was laid of from his staff position. Though it's not surprising after all my research on dance journalism/criticism last semester showing the fall of the field, it IS quite disheartening to someone who hopes (or hoped) to turn dance writing into a career...

"Writes Segal, who has been in the post since 1996 and written about dance for the LAT for 12 years before that: '...my position is being eliminated in the latest round of of staff layoffs and cutbacks...I have followed my supervisors' advice and applied for the Times buyout, which means I'll be off the staff as of the end of this month. However, there is some talk about my freelancing for the paper in the future.'"

Read more on the National Arts Journalism Program blog.

Why does this keep happning? Zimmer, Tobias, now Segal...

critical conversation

There's an interesting conversation going on over on greatdance about the role of the critic and what qualifies a person to be an effective dance critic.

It's interesting to note that the dialogue is going on at all, and it's something I'm so intrigued by given my research on dance criticism last semester. There are so many opinions about something so subjective that I don't know how conclusions can be reached...but we're trying.

Check out the conversation and let me know what you think. Why do you trust the dance critics you agree with? How important is criticism to the dancer/choreographer? What do you think gives a writer/person the authority to judge such an art form?

Just brainstorming...

off to Nutcracker weekend #2!

In the freezing snow I'm off to the train to Connecticut for my second (and last) weekend of Nutcracker. I'm excited to be in the BIG theater this weekend, and will update regularly from the hotel :)

Also of note is that I just spoke with the NY Times dance writer about my thesis and she gave me some GREAT insight and interesting perspectives. I'll share details next week when I have time to finish off my thesis. So glad this insane semester is almost over!

Happy snow day :)

career day?

Today I gave a dance/dance criticism "lecture" at this high school I was asked to visit. In case you missed the back story, my huge senior thesis project is on dance journalism and one of my professors at MMC also teaches at this high school and asked me to visit them and "inspire" them with all I'm doing. Yeah.

It was actually kind of fun! I felt like it was career day back when I was in middle school, but this time I was the "adult" in the room. Strange, haha. Not many of them were interested in the journalism part, even though I brought a stack of dance magazines and press kits and my writing and stuff. But they were interested in my stories about ballet and Nutcracker and such, and they asked lots of questions.

They even applauded my answer to the question, "Is there anything you would change about your dancing experiences in the past? Or anything you regret?" Someday soon I'll write a detailed answer to that important question on here, since it has come up a lot lately. No time right now though.

I had (ballet) class and lunch (yes, we do lunch) with my teacher this morning, which was good. However my foot is still hurting from rehearsal yesterday. Not fun. Crazy me, though, I took night class too, and all on pointe, but it actually doesn't hurt as much now as it did yesterday. Good sign I guess. I had to take class again though because I pretty much won't have a real class now for a week, because they don't give warm-up classes before performances at Albano so I just have to warm myself up. Great.

Ugh, I have SO much to do before I leave Thursday morning. Last minute school stuff and whatnot...off to do some work!

snow, onstage and off!

It snowed today!

I had this big long creative blog post typed up and then my comptuer died (as it often does) so here's the boring version of my day...

When I woke up to snow I half-hoped I wouldn't have to go all the way to Hartford for our last Sunday of Nutcracker rehearsals...but I'm really glad I went! As a surprise we got to rehearse in the theater today instead of the studio. I guess they got in early to lay down the marley, so we spaced and ran through everything today so that Thursday won't be so stressful (tech and dress day).

It was fun! I really love being onstage and being in a theater and everything. And this theater is super spacious because it's not in a city, haha. So nice. Rehearsal itself went well, although my Achilles is acting up again. My body often decides to go crazy on me when I change dancing environments, such as going on to a hard stage or going into 20 degree weather. Lovely.

Besides being unable to walk after the bus ride home, the day was good. I got home to a nice email from (my favorite) New York Times dance journalist, and Dance Editor of Time Out New York, Gia Kourlas!!! She's another contributor to The Winger and Kristin put me in contact with her to get some input for my (ever-developing-excitment) thesis. Wow! This paper is turning out to be a lot bigger of a deal than I ever expected but I'm really happy about it and that people care about it. It's no longer about my grade. It's about getting the issue out there and getting the opinions flying.

Anyway, I have yet another busy week ahead. Tomorrow after morning class I'm lecturing at that high school I mentioned last week. That should be amusing, to say the least. Tuesday and Wednesday will be mostly spent at my internship since Thursday, when I would normally be there, I'll be at the theater all day long in Connecticut. I'm spending from Thursday-Sunday staying over there and really can't wait to perform! The only part I'm not looking forward to is putting on pink tights. I've been kind of rebelling against them and wearing black tights since I "graduated" from BAE in June and have been in no rush to get them back on. But I guess Waltz of the Flowers would be slightly unattractive with little black legs sticking out of a pink costume, haha.

I'll keep posting through the busy week but come Thursday I probably won't have internet access...so wish me luck for Nutcracker year 13!

more opportunity

Tonight I had my last class of my 'intro to dance' course at school. It may have seemed like a joke to take it, but it has paid off...

First of all, I had to present my final paper tonight, which was an excerpt from my thesis. I brought a whole bunch of magazines and my laptop to show websites (like The Winger and Explore Dance). After class my teacher (who teaches at a performing arts high school in the city) asked if I would come lecture her students on dance criticism and my experiences in dancing and such. How fun! Too bad I'm like the same age as some of them, haha. But it should be interesting...

She also asked if I was interested in choreographing on them for their spring show. I think I'm going to do it, but it will be my first big-scale choreography project! I've done little solos for myself here and there, and helped some friends choreograph (for Rock graduation, a BAE show, etc) but this is all me. I'm kind of excited about it even though it adds still more work to the crazy life of Taylor.

Well anyways, that's the news for the evening. Tomorrow I'm being interviewed for this new ballet website BalletConnections.com . For once, I'm not doing the interviewing, haha. The guy thought I'd be interesting to talk to because I'm in both dance and journalism...little does everyone know that I have about 5 lives going on at once (school, grad school, freelance writing, ballet, internships). So much to do and say and so little time! But also he mentioned something about a potential writing project because he runs a book publishing company. THAT would be amazing.

We'll see how everything works out.

getting work done

I'm finally starting to make a dent in the pile of work I have to get done for the rest of the semester.

Last night I finished my (exceedingly long) draft of my thesis on dance writing and the shift from print to the internet. What was supposed to be a 10-15 page draft with roughly 20 sources turned out to be 23 pages with 62 sources! Did I go a bit overboard or what? Well, that's how I do things I guess.

I also just finished my review of Pennsylvania Ballet, which should be up over at ExploreDance.com soon.

I still have a ton to do, but luckily my internship let me out early today because of the holiday, so I have some extra time I wasn't counting on. I'm trying to get as much done now so I can pretend to have a REAL break over Thanksgiving. I probably won't update as much while I'm home from Wednesday night - Sunday. Happy (almost) Thanksgiving :)

conversations about dance blogs

Recently I posted my thesis proposal on The Winger to get more input from dance bloggers and readers, since my topic concerns dance writing and the shift to the internet. It seemed fitting to publicize my ideas there just to get them out there, but the response was something so amazing!

People genuinely care about this topic, and I'm so excited about that. Dance journalism is not something to be forgotten as it would seem from diminishing coverage in print. Today even the former dance editor of The Village Voice left a comment on the post! It sparked great conversation and I can only hope more discussion will come. This week I have to sit down and make time (which I verrry little of) to write a draft of the thesis paper. It's a ton of work, but I'm so ready to get it all on paper!

On top of that I have writing assignments now for ExploreDance.com. I'm reviewing a couple of performances next week and doing some other articles. Exciting!

Also this week I'm starting my many interviews for my movmnt magazine article, so that should be interesting. I love getting the opportunity to speak to these incredible people! That's why I want to be a writer -- to hear these stories and ideas and get them out there for others to hear. As movmnt's editor reminded me, "As journalists, we are storytellers."

Senior Thesis Topic: Dance Journalism in New Media

So this week I'm submitting my "prospectus" for my senior thesis due later this semester. Basically I just had to outline what I'll be writing about and list some questions to be explored in my research.

I thought I'd share it here to see if anyone has some other ideas to add or comments about what I'm thinking about. See what you think and TELL ME.
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Dance Journalism and Criticism in New Media

For my paper I would like to explore the changes that the internet and new media are bringing to arts journalism, specifically dance criticism. With the invention of online communities, blogs, and social networks, the journalism and publishing industries have seen significant changes in recent years. I want to investigate these changes and see how they are leading us to the future of arts journalism.

Being passionate about both dance and writing, this topic has intrigued me for some time now. The culture of the dance world is extremely unique and they way this community fits in and interacts with the larger world has proven to be a special relationship. Concert dance is far removed from mainstream culture and the art form has always struggled to find a place in popular media. I personally want to find a way to integrate this sector of society and raise awareness of what’s going on in the dance world by communicating with the mainstream. In a culture that thrives on celebrity pitfalls like Britney Spears and Paris Hilton it seems as though true art is far underappreciated.

With that being said, the most powerful method of communication about dance, besides movement, has been in print media. Newspapers traditionally provide entertainment listings where dance performances are given brief blurbs of details and ticket information. Only the country’s largest papers allot space to dance criticism, and as a result only few dance companies are represented in the press.

The more important issue is that in recent years there has been a severe cutback in print space given to dance coverage. Magazines, such as New York Magazine, have completely eliminated the position of Chief Dance Critic and run stories on dance very rarely. Newspapers have also seen a shortage of staff on this beat due to funding. The New York Times, which is the largest print outlet serving the dance community, has drastically cut space for dance in the popular Arts section over the past 20 years.

Another major issue with dance journalism is the shift in dance magazines. In the past, the major monthly publication for the art form was Dance Magazine, owned by Macfadden Performing Arts Media. The other regular magazines dedicated to dance include Pointe Magazine (specifically for ballet), Dance Teacher (for educators), and Dance Spirit (for a younger, competition based sector). All of these were owned by Lifestyle Media, Inc, which ran a slew of other smaller magazines. In August of 2006, Dance Magazine bought out this company, thus merging all of the dance titles under Macfadden’s reign.

The issue that I see with this is that of media convergence. The larger society of American, and the world for that matter, has seen a surge in the power of the media giants. Ownership has become a great issue, with 5 or 6 major companies running the majority of society’s media outlets. Time Warner, News Corporation, Viacom, and others have been the key players in acquisitions and mergers across all types of media, from television to print.

If this is problem enough for the “real world” it is even more of an issue in the “dance world” because the community alone is so small. With all of the dance news coming from essentially a single source now, Macfadden Performing Arts media seems to have a monopoly of power. Only certain voices are being heard and few opinions are being expressed in print. The situation is a mirror image of what’s going on in the larger scheme of media.

What seems to have risen as a solution to these two major issues of coverage cutbacks and media convergence is dance criticism online. A number of message boards have been in existence for years, allowing dance enthusiasts and balletomanes to express their opinions on the goings-on of the performing world. But only recently have blogs begun to pop up which provide more in depth coverage of performances, news, and general issues relating to dance. These sites allow a bigger variety of perspectives to be exposed and are not limited to the restrictions of time and space as print outlets are.

The internet has allowed for a beneficial increase in dance writing and has allowed for a close connection to be developed among the community. There is now an outlet for public discourse around the art form that would be nearly impossible to have without new media. Especially with the New York Times rumors of eventually going out of print and being solely online, this could be the future of arts journalism and potentially publishing as a whole.

Questions to Explore:
-What other internet conventions could be used in the context of dance journalism? For example, would the Wiki platform be used to document records of past performances or choreographic notations?

-How have the websites of the various dance magazines taken advantage of new media, and how do they compare to independent websites?

-What sparked the decline of dance journalism in print, and how can that be prevented in the online context?

-What conventions of the “dance world” impact how the topic is covered in media? For example, funding is an extremely big problem and dance companies perhaps need to be represented in the best possible light to stay alive. Is this preventing some of the more controversial issues facing the dance world from being publicly exposed?

-How can the dance world gain exposure in other mediums besides the internet and print?

-In what ways is the industry of publishing changing which may affect the future of arts journalism?

(c) 2007 Taylor Gordon