cats and coffeehouse chronicles

more green market fare . .

that was of great interest to the kittens . . 

("where are our goodies?")

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i had a ticket today to la mama's coffeehouse chronicles celebrating fifty-five years of the rod rodgers dance company. ellen, the girls' dance/choreography teacher, spoke on the panel along with other several other early members of the company and several current members. interspersed with the discussion was a video interview with rod rodgers along with excerpts from three dances. 

in the 1960's ellen regularly attended a dance class taught by mary anthony at mary's studio on broadway at waverly, which is where she met rod. she was a part of his company for the beginning years, traveling with them overseas one year for a tour and also accompanying them to several prisons where a specific dance piece titled box 71 was performed. (here's a link to a photo of her with rod rodgers and company member barbara roan.) rod rodgers grew up in detroit in a family of professional dancers and performers and came to new york city in 1963. you can read about his life and career on encyclopedia dot com here. he was dedicated to bringing dance to children in underrepresented neighborhoods, a commitment the company still maintains with their strong youth program at its fourth street location. the panelists spoke about how rod always took care of his dancers, paying them well for home performances and while touring. he also recognized the importance of having a space that the company could call home, and acquired the building on fourth street around the late 60's, early 70's. i would often rent studio space there so the girls could practice the dances they were working on for ellen's class. it was wonderful to be present for this event.

in the studio with ellen, marina (ellen's student during the time she held her classes in the company's building) and rod's son jason. (here we are in the same studio for a rehearsal in 2011, and here in 2017.)

afterwards, i walked three blocks to see korrina at her new work place . . 

i'll have to go back to try the food one day.

errands, hot chocolate, and fabric dyeing

today was such a beautiful day with blue skies . . the end of december and january are often very grey so i'm always appreciative of the sunshine.

 earl grey tea this morning . . (we received a few walnut boat candles for christmas from a friend) . . 

 and fresh homemade sour dough bread.

 morgana and i walked downtown to aljo, the dye store ellen always recommends.

 it's time to dye the costumes for the group dance she's doing for ellen's alumni concert in three weeks. she chose turquoise, military green, 

 golden yellow, magenta and scarlet. hmmm . . . i think she's doing lemon yellow also. she has six dancers who will be wearing unitards and a chiffon scarf.

 inside aljo . . 

 and then a hot chocolate with homemade marshmallows from baked, a coffee shop in tribeca.

 it was very good and very filling so morgana was lucky that i couldn't finish all of it.

i'm glad it was such a nice day on which to run errands.

in the evening at astor place where the cube is finally out again.

 i met morgana at the rod rodgers dance studio after her babysitting job to see the solo piece she was thinking of doing for ellen's show.

 it's very last minute though . . only three weeks until the concert, so it's not definite that it'll go in.

she's been so busy that it's been difficult to find the time to rehearse.

 dyeing two of the unitards . . 

 it was a long tiring process . . can you see madeline's head peeking out on the top left?

they're always hopeful that i'll feed them whenever i'm in the kitchen.

studio rehearsal and rock concert

on the last minute m and c asked me to schedule a studio rehearsal for them at the rod rodgers dance studio on east 4th street between 3rd and 2nd avenues. i was hoping korrina would also work on her dance for a little bit, but she visited a few friends before going to a concert this evening (she took my camera with her, so i haven't been able to upload my photos to iphoto yet) (finally uploaded on monday, may 9th). at the studio, sasha the cat (a lovely grey calico) hung out with us for awhile before growing bored with the dancing and searching for more interesting activities. after rehearsing, morgana went to her dance class and chanda and i came home and read about mushrooms and mold. she has three mushrooms sitting upside down on paper in the kitchen right now, waiting to see the designs the spores will make when they fall. we made sweet potato fries (from the around the world cookbook) and beets and chicken for dinner. korrina came home around midnight and said the concert was amazing.