Why You Can’t Stop Worrying When Creating a Self Funded Dance Show

I am all at once nervous and proud. In just a few short weeks, this dance show has come together. In September, when most companies are getting into their regular rehearsal schedule, I was contemplating if I would create anything at all. By December I was in the studio with two of my dancers creating a duet and experimenting with ideas surrounding love styles and Sternberg’s triangular love theory. As the work started coming together, I realized that I really wanted to produce a season and introduce my work as an independent choreographer and artistic director of LaceySassoDance/Sasso & Company.

In about 2 weeks I am producing my first evening length dance show, Love in Motion, featuring only my own choreography. I have been fortunate to be creating work and producing dance shows with friends and in companies for years, but this is the first time that it is all my own. I am extremely excited, but also very apprehensive and somewhat stressed about everything coming together.

Cost of a dance show is one of biggest boundaries that make this show practical. I’ve even setup a Kickstarter to fund the dance show, as going it alone self funded makes it too much of financial burden to produce a show often. We can expect production to be $2000. This amount will go into; theatre rental, set and costumes. Additionally: PR, rehearsal space and compensate our dancers for their 5 months of rehearsal time.

As the dance show nears, I am looking at the choreography from a million angles: as the choreographer, a dancer, the audience, as well as how it flows in a full dance show. I am wondering if the pieces are diverse or if they will all look similar. Is similarity a good thing because it represents the strength of my movement voice or is similarity boring? What is it that keeps an audience on the edge and coming back for more? What about the music and costumes and lights? How will all of these elements effect the environment that I am creating, that you, my audience are experiencing?

It didn’t take long before I was looking at spaces and booking our first full evening dance show. If I am completely honest, I have dreamed of this for years. I have always wanted to have a dance company. I love creating work and being in the process, and I know that I have something to say through movement. I often tell people that I communicate much more clearly in movement than in words, so what better way to channel that than through creating choreography on my own company?

In the last month, I have booked a venue, a lighting designer, a photographer, started promoting, created post cards and fliers, created a show order, found costumes, written piece descriptions, created a program, and enlisted the help of my dancers and husband to create and edit music, create a video trailer, and perhaps most importantly, create the choreography. I am not complaining so much as stating that producing a dance show is a big undertaking, and at the end of the day, you just have to hope that there will be an audience. The added bonus, and most elusive element, is creating an experience that leaves your audience feeling something strong enough to keep them coming back for more.

On Saturday, May 9, 2015 I am premiering three new pieces as a part of my investigation into love styles and a work in progress created to the fun and sassy blues sounds of B.B. King. Alongside these new pieces, the company will be performing some of my favorite pieces of repertoire that have been explored and developed more throughout our work this season. I hope that the dance show is a success. I am not sure who will come or if we will sell out, but I know that I am producing quality work that I believe in. I hope you will join us for Love in Motion at Green Street Studios at 8pm, Saturday, May 9th (185 Green St, Cambridge, MA – Red Line T to Central Square). Tickets are $10 cash only at the door. I am excited to take the leap and put the work out there for an audience to experience. I welcome feedback and hope to see you at the dance show… if you still are on the fence, take a peak at our trailer below for clips of what we will be presenting!!

LaceySassoDance-Love in Motion from Lacey Sasso Dance on Vimeo.