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It has been so sweet to be back in the studio with Eventual Dance Company! We are working hard and enjoying each other’s company as we prepare to share an excerpt of our work A Dance For Me For You on Friday, 8/16 at 6pm as part of the community celebration weekend at Jacob’s Pillow, less than a week away! The whole company will be performing, including our live 3-piece rock band. The Pillow has a wonderful lineup of activities for families happening all day long - I encourage you to check out their schedule. The whole day is free with no tickets required. We hope you can join us!
And, it would mean so much to us if you could donate to our project fundraiser, and share it with your networks.
You might be wondering, Why are you fundraising? Surely you are getting paid to perform? Well, I’m glad you asked! Here is a little bit of financial information for you, so that you may dip your toes into a particular case study that might illuminate what the concert dance “economy” can sometimes look like. While I’m at it, I’d also like to plug two artists in my network, Victoria Awkward of VLA Dance and Jenna Pollack, who both have embarked on rigorous financial transparency projects as part of their practice. And, there is an amazing podcast by Miguel Gutierrez that explores “the ethical entanglements between money and art-making,” including a deep-dive into current reality and the history of the concert dance economy in America. At this point it is a few years old, but I cannot recommend it more - especially amid the urgency of today’s rabid cuts in arts-funding. Check out their work!
So, here goes:
The Community Day performance at The Pillow pays a grand total of $500 to each artist. To be clear, that means $500 for each company, not each individual. We have an ensemble of 7 dancers and 3 musicians, and then myself as choreographer / director. If we had no other expenses and split this evenly, that means that each of us would walk away from this performance with about $45.
But of course, we do have other expenses. Rehearsal space at our usual studio costs $36 for a 3-hour rehearsal, and we held five rehearsals. Performing with a live band has some technical particularities - I was unable to hire a sound engineer for this one (which would cost ~$1000), opting instead to scramble to try to learn some new skills and purchase the hardware and software to make our performance possible, which means $165 in cables and about $25 in a pro-level software subscription. We had to update costumes for this round, both because clothes wear out and because people’s bodies change, which means about $200 in purchased garments and some unseen amount of labor on my part doing simple mending and alterations. Speaking of unpaid labor, ideally I like to pay the dancers and musicians (and myself!) $20 / hour for rehearsal hours, and $100 for a performance fee in a split-bill show. For 11 artists with a total of 15 rehearsal hours and one show day, that comes to $4,400 in labor costs.
To add that all up, the actual cost of this performance is $4,970.
I do not know for certain as I have not spoken with any other festival artists about their finances, but I imagine that performing at The Pillow as a festival-curated artist comes along with a very different financial package. (If you are one of those artists and are open to talking about it, hit a girl up!)
Now of course, I knew from the get-go that we would only be provided $500, and that that stipend wouldn’t cut it. When this opportunity was offered to us, I called each EDC dancer and musician individually to talk through the rehearsal schedule and finances, and asked everybody to think through whether or not this is something that we want to do as a group. Unanimously, each person gave a resounding YES, and even moved work, travel, and other commitments around in order to make it possible.
Our enthusiastic YES comes from many places. Perhaps the top of that list is our excitement to perform on the Henry J. Leir stage, an iconic platform for concert dance that has been graced by many of our heroes. Our yes also comes from our excitement to have a chance to work together as a company again. Our weekly rehearsals have been on hiatus since I’ve been away at school, and a good reason to re-enter our practice together has been so very sweet. For me, performing in a community-centered performance alongside my fellow Massachusetts artists and dance schools is also in line with my values, not to mention the opportunity to build a connection with an institution that helped to spark my love of dance in the first place. Getting to see the free performances on the Inside-Out stage at Jacob’s Pillow as a little girl is one of the reasons that I am still dancing today.
I am proud to be a Community Day artist. I hope that someday it also means being valued materially the same way that we do the nationally-touring acts, but that is fodder for a future letter. Until then, THANK YOU FOR DONATING! Now go out there and support your local arts scenes!
Love,
Caitlin
THE NEWS
Upcoming for EDC:
Join us on August 16th at Jacob’s Pillow in Becket, MA
Eventual Dance Company is excited to present an excerpt from A Dance For Me For You with live musical accompaniment as part of Community Day on the beautiful Henry J. Leir outdoor stage. The show starts at 6pm and is free of charge - no tickets needed. I recommend coming early to get a good seat and enjoy the grounds.
In order to support our mission to pay the dancers for their work, we are having a Project Fundraiser. It would mean so much to us if you could donate!
Mutineer performs August 17th at Sena Farm Brewery in Worthington, MA
After performing with us at the Pillow, our musicians will be playing alongside some other awesome bands from 7-10pm in nearby Worthington. Come through, grab a beer with us, and enjoy some badass music in a lovely environment.
Other dance news to keep your eye on:
Union Busting at Dallas Black Dance Theatre
After the dancers voted unanimously to unionize with AGMA in May, Dallas Black Dance Theatre (DBDT) has terminated all of their dancers. This sort of union-busting is illegal, and also indicative of a larger systemic problem in our sector, where dancers are seldom paid a living wage (see above letter RE: unpaid labor costs). EDC stands in solidarity with the dancers of DBDT. You can read the dancer’s open letter HERE.