The Edinburgh Festivals are back after a gap of 2 years and the city is buzzing. The competition to gain an audience is fierce with so many productions across all the arts.
Night Dances premiered at Dublin Theatre Festival in October 2021. Choreographed by Emma Martin, it’s a collection of four dance poems inspired by rave music and is currently running at the Edinburgh Fringe. It’s loud, sweaty and intense with live music onstage and the audience seated around the stag, in fact ear-plugs are handed out before the show because of the volume of the music! There is no clear narrative, merely the uninhibited dance of the performers, losing themselves in the at times pulsating music, performed live on stage. Having seen the show I wanted to learn more about how Gilla Band‘s bassist Daniel Fox got involved in this dance production. I caught up with him at the venue Zoo Southside.
How did you get involved with Night Dances?
Emma contacted me through a mutual friend. She reached out in January 2020 just before Covid. I think the idea was to do something that summer. It has been in the works for absolutely ages. She likes the band so we thought we’d feel it out and see if it’d work. I’d never done anything like this before. And talking to her she is a really big music fan. She really knows her stuff and has interesting taste. It’s fun to put yourself into different worlds. A little scary but it all came together.
I have to say I love it! The fact Emma was inspired by rave is a good starting point, and I don’t normally get handed earplugs when I go to a dance performance!
It’s weird for me because I don’t really know this world at all so I don’t know what’s normal. It’s fun to discover that’s weird.
How did you create the music? Was the choreography already set?
I initially came up with a few demos that I’d just done on my own, just to get a rough idea of what instruments we were going to use, to get the general vibe as opposed to the specific music. I took a few drum beats when they were working on the choreography. They were writing it and collaborating together, her with the dancers. We were feeling it out while they were feeling it out themselves. A lot of it was like finding your nose and when something works, its the same with music in general, when you do the right thing it’s just obvious. That’s good, that’s impactful. While they are workshopping they are doing the same thing again and again and it gives us a chance too. Even if its a bit rough the first time you do it, you do it enough times you are then refining aspects of it. Because its dance music what we’re doing so its pretty repetitive. So its finding nice grooves that work with what they want and doing transitions and to bring things up and down.
The keyboard player was really into it, very enthusiastic, but was very mindful of the dancers. I wonder how much you have to pay attention to the dancers during the performance?
When you’re in a band you know exactly how a song goes and all the sections are shorter. And it’s led by the vocal. Here you are doing one thing, being repetitive then there’s a cue and then you’re onto a new thing and let’s repetitive again. It’s like driving on a motorway and you’re taking an exit. You’re doing one thing for ages, you’re quickly taking an exit and then you’re on a new motorway.
That description seems most fitting for the trio part at the end which is the longest section
Their part is about half the show. Brian who plays keyboards has played in dance shows before and he is a trained musician. Whereas we’re sometimes more looking for a move. They are doing a move and so in two bars we have to do this. It’s fun and a little nerve-wrecking at the same time. At times you can zone out because you’re on one groove and its very easy to think “where am I?“. If you play your own band songs you’ve play them a million times, at a certain point its just muscle memory which is a good thing in a way because you can perform outside of the technicalities and you can do it a little more naturally. But even with this at a certain point, especially a couple of shows in with it being the Fringe the rehearsal time is very tight and the guy doing the drum machine is subbing in for the person who did it in Dublin, so there is a lot of learning to be done. And we haven’t played it since we did it in Dublin so there were lots of “how do I do it again?”
Are there plans to take it anywhere else?
I would be shocked if there weren’t plans to take it more shows to be honest but I don’t know the specifics. Obviously a lot of it would be funding dependent. I think they are working on it.
The two musicians onstage with you were people you have worked with before.
Me and Brian have been friends for years. My band and his band used to rehearse in the same building and we all became good mates. I did some engineering on one of his solo records so we’d be very tight, and Emmett plays in two bands and one is a live techno band so he’s a perfect fit.
There have been 3 shows so far. What has the response been?
Good, last night was very smooth. I guess in terms of the audience lots of people don’t know what they are going to, and I think as a dance show its not what some people would been expecting but that can go either way. I have a feeling the more on the weekend we are it’ll be good, its kind of a party. It’s hard to gauge, but some people want to move but because its a contemporary dance show, some people don’t know what the etiquette is. Emmett and Brian were out flyering today and saw a couple of lads with bucket hats and shorts and were “here you go lads“, and they said “are we allowed?“
It’s an interesting combination you have in this show, dance inspired by rave culture.
Its a funny crossover of world but its fun. If some people don’t like it that’s fine. On the first night someone walked out, it really wasn’t for you, which is totally cool! I kinda get a kick out of that to be honest. If you go to a big club, you should always feel a little bit on the dangerous side, not in a big way, but there’s a certain edge. Ever so slightly out of your comfort zone is a generally a good place to be.
Absolutely, and the fact that the first dancer looks quite menacing and begins by prowling around the theatre as you audience comes in….
Yes, and he is the most softly spoken sweetest dude you’d ever meet in your life. The five young girls in the second dance were local. We went down to the practise dance studio just before our instruments arrived and it was the first time they had seen the first dancer, doing his thing. They were giggling but just because they didn’t know what to make of it. They do competitions and it’s a different world so it’s a cool education for them, just to know there’s a whole world out there.
Their part is very striking because there is five of them. It fills the space and for the audience who are seated so close it makes it feel immersive.
Last night was the first night that I could settle into it and start to pay attention to the audience instead of the first two nights were I was concentrating on what I was doing.
Night Dances is a buzz of a show. Very different from the majority of contemporary dance productions with its mesmerising dancers and earth-shattering music. I have often wondered why more contemporary music isn’t used in dance. Here there is no expectation to read any deep narrative into the sections, but just to enjoy the groove. I’ll leave the last word to Emma Martin:
“May the salt of our sweat unite us.”
Night Dances is at the Zoo Southside, Edinburgh until 28 August.
For tickets and information please check here.
