It was a cold winter in Melbourne but our classes in Hawthorn kept things warm with some extra special guests. First off, we dove into the national dance of Laos: The Lam Vong. Class volunteer and former Australian diplomat and academic Roger Peacock shared his experiences living in Laos with his Laotian wife. His knowledge of the Lam Vong had us listening to the khaen musical instrument and promenading around in a circle to the beats of the Lam Vong Pra Suk while getting a better understand of Laotian culture. Thank you, Roger, for sharing your cultural knowledge!
Next, we had the opportunity to have Meg Morley accompany our Wednesday class. Meg is an accomplished Australian pianist and artist living London. While on holiday in Melbourne she supported our class with live accompaniment and shared some of her experiences while working for renown dance companies including English National Ballet, Pina Bausch, Matthew Bourne and The Australian Ballet. Thank you, Meg, for sharing your musical artistry!
And finally, we are thrilled to have the return of a guest Dance for PD teaching artist back in the studio with us. Malika Berney joins us after having finished her second tour with Norwegian dance troupe Jo Strømgren Kompani. Along with tea-time stories about her dancing throughout Europe, Malika has led some super fun drumming exercises that we do on exercises balls with drum sticks. Malika and I also got to attend the opening of The Australian Ballet’s highly anticipated new ballet Oscar. Welcome back to Melbourne Malika!
