Joe’s teaching reflects a dedication to establishing our relationship to the earth and to the roots necessary to anchor our freedom of movement. His desire is to have the participants experience this connection as well as how we can discover the very important transitions of weight. Coordination, rhythm, focus and, above all, authenticity in movement will be some of the goals.
The principles of movement are taken to a higher, more complex level of coordination of the hands, arms, legs and torso as well as rhythmic changes, weight shifts and dynamic transitions. Embracing the connection to the earth, allows us to reach upward to heights, always necessary when our goal is to achieve high performance level dance training.
In my desire to distinguish the differences between my personal evolution in dance and my work with the José Limón tradition, I chose to categorise my work as: the Alegado Movement Language. This was done to give more substance to the fact that the foundation of all my somatic experiences since childhood to the present, have contributed to the movement vocabulary in my dance.
Going further, and even deeper, below this somatic foundation are the roots, which extend further down into the very soul of our Earth. And because, we as humans, are in constant movement through the Earth’s landscape, I have chosen to further define my work by renaming it – Shifting Roots.
Joe Alegado