TICKETS: $15

How incredible! I’m 28. I started my dance company just four years ago, and I only began working professionally in 2006. Earlier in 2011, as I prepared an exhaustive (and exhausting) application for CHIME, I knew the chances that I would be selected were slim – the program is competitive, and only accepts three people every year. Alas, I am one of the fortunate ones! Wow.

Here’s how it works: Elizabeth Streb is the program ‘Chair’ – so she brings into the studio concepts she’s interested in, and leads us through investigations. She asks questions, challenges preconceived ideas, and pushes us to work more rigorously and more intelligently along the way. The three mentees are each required to bring in one colleague (typically a dancer from their respective companies). For CHIME, I’m working with Catherine Newman…a tremendous talent, brilliant mind, and FACT/SF Founding Member. In addition to the 3 mentees and their 3 colleagues, Ms. Jenkins provides her own company of eight rockstar dancers to be additional bodies and minds in the room, helping the three mentees with their physical investigations.

I was quite nervous on day one. Streb can have an intimidating persona – she’s highly esteemed and dauntingly accomplished, and enters the room dressed all in black, with black biker boots and black spiked hair. She’s 61 years old, but I’d certainly avoid a bar-brawl with her at any cost. She’s fierce, and for us dance folks, she’s also one of the few living icons and pioneers. She has been called the ‘Evel Knievel’ of dance, her company is performing in the London 2012 Festival in conjunction with the 2012 Summer Olympics, and she received a MacArthur Genius Award in 1997. In video interviews and her book, How to Become an Extreme Action Hero, Streb can come across as direct, confrontational, and ascerbic.  Before ever having met her, I feared that our working relationship would not only be challenging, but also possibly explosive…alongside those fears, though, I also had no doubt that I would learn a lot, and experience even more.

We finally did meet, and Streb is in fact direct.  She has clear interests and is well-practiced in explaining and defending her opinions. She is also, however, incredibly kind and generous. She pushes limits, but also welcomes questions, and is quick to defuse a tense moment with a knowing and compassionate smile. In our first week together, February 12-16, I did not feel like she was ‘teaching’ me something…I felt like I was in dialogue with her, and the many others in the studio, working together towards a lofty but important goal…ultimately aimed at understanding WHAT dance is and HOW we dance. That’s a lot!

So, as I gear up for week two of CHIME Across Borders, I’m infinitely more excited than apprehensive, and so grateful to have this opportunity for continued growth and development. The whole experience feels like flying off of one of Streb’s Action Machines, soaring to new heights and taking it all in.

If you have a moment March 13-17, swing by the MJDL and watch us find new things.