The frog

           "The frog" is the first internet distributed performance project that will be done as part of the class “Collaborative projects in the performing arts” taught by Professor Tom Beyer at NYU/Steinhardt, Music Technology Program.

            This project is a collaborative choreography between Maria Piedad, choreographer, Paula Nuñez and Lucía Cortez, students at Danzas Ballet School in the city of Ambato, Ecuador. Additionally, Mario Cortez, musician, will play the keyboard during the performance. The name of this project came up because Ambato is a word derived from the indigenous term “jambatu” which means frog.
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            We emailed each other several times before starting rehearsals and we established one common objective: to get connected through the internet and explore the use of the screens in order to create our choreography. Furthermore, other ideas also appeared: to show that friendship between ballet classmates is strong; to show it is possible to be connected in spite of the distance. Moreover, the relationship teacher-student could be enhanced through new artistic experiences such as this project. As a personal objective, I wanted to introduce my former students in the field of internet distributed performances which is totally unknown in Ecuador.

            This cross generation collaboration has the advantage that we can have novel ideas from two generations. Paula and Lucia found the location in Ambato and the song that we will use in the performance. Lucia’s brother, Mario was invited by her to play alive. Maria Piedad directed the brain storm in order to define what style we are going to dance and what kind of devices we will be able to work with for choreographing this piece.

          We had our first internet meeting to define the artistic concept, technical requirements, time table and other details about “the frog”. At this meeting, we came up with the following:

What kind of artistic project will be presented?
This is an exchange performance between three dancers and a musician

Time Table
We discussed the time table based on the availability of all performers giving priorities to the Ecuadorian team´s needs since they are majority.

What kind of technological devices will we use?
Ecuador set up:
Computer for the VoIP (Voice over internet protocol) connection for audio and video
Keyboard

New York set up:
Computer for the VoiP connection for audio and video, video camera, anycast, screen projector, audio mixer, canopus

**Other important elements: Conference rooms, tables, chairs costumes, make up


        After defining these important aspects for our project we had our first choreographic rehearsal in which we lived a total new experience.