Pause And Effect

"It's sometimes nice to take a little pause. You can hear your thoughts..."

Were one to conclude dancer David Ogle's line, he or she would surely add "and imagine a powerful effect." For this is exactly what Ogle and fellow dancers Ryan O'Neill, Carmen Fuentes Guaza and Vasiliki Stasinaki have concocted upstairs at the MAC Theatre during this year's Belfast Children's Festival: Pause And Effect.

Maiden Voyage Dance's latest piece is kind of a family affair, energetically choreographed by Eleesha Drennan, traditionally scored by her father Willie, and stylishly performed by the Maiden Voyage "family" of dancers.

If there were ever a more apt title for a company, I can't think of one; all their works seem to take their cast, crew and audience on maiden voyages of discovery, be they through the exquisite patience in Neither Either, the playful imagery in Quartet For Fifteen Chairs and the poetic uncertainty in Drennan's - the choreographer's, that is - own Tipping Point.

Being a children's festival, Drennan appropriately sidelines the gloomy ambiguity of Tipping Point for a sort of Quartet For Sixty Blocks. That's what Pause And Effect is: four dancers, two musicians (Willie Drennan and accompanist Davy Angus) and – yes – sixty blocks. Scattered around the stage, these props and the music bring the vibrantly dressed dancers to life, injecting colour in their cheeks, craft in their minds, and cheery chirpiness into children and adults alike.

Pause And Effect is arguably Maiden Voyage at their most vocal, their most inwardly expressive and their most outwardly imaginative. Early on, a twenty-five second countdown from Fuentes Guaza is accompanied by a thunderous drumbeat while her dancing partners get to work on building and hiding behind structures.

Structures soon to be knocked down by a very playful Fuentes Guaza, who will soon be stood upon by Stasinaki while Ogle and O'Neill begin rebuilding their own structures.

The sight of Ogle and O'Neill constructing giraffes (surely?) out of blocks, while Stasinaki and Fuentes Guaza gradually synchronize, is both admirable and tantalizing. Throw in the lighting "effect" (there's that word again) of a "moon" shining its way onto the newly built structures and you have a moment that is exciting, funny and smart all at once: the joys and pains from structure and from no structure, encapsulated on a solitary stage.

It's a literal Ode To Joy; need I say that one hears Beethoven's famous symphony at least three times?
And this is only the appetizer for a piece loaded with highlights.

Namely, both dancers and blocks playing dominoes, a wonderfully orchestrated and choreographed movement featuring Ogle on a series of "stepping stones", and a brief reflection of time where the quartet act like multi-dimensional, four handed analogue watches. Following every pause, there is a brand new effect: and the nimbleness, chemistry, flexibility, dedication and musicianship on show makes it all, dare I say it, irresistible.

Moreover, the incoherence and sloppiness in Pause And Effect is deceptive. Pacing and concentration is actually paramount in ensuring that the dancers' natural comic and creative timing hits the spot in a manner neither forced nor artificial. Perhaps also – and I emphasise "perhaps" – Maiden Voyage seem to have their fingers on the pulse of our present-day society, with Pause And Effect another timely and timeless production that speaks to us both as glorious entertainment and a think piece.

It reminds one not to lose the spontaneity and wonder of their childhood in the workmanlike rigidity of adulthood; and, in doing so, brings a tear to the eye in its aftermath. I didn't know they made dance pieces quite like this anymore; I am exceptionally glad that they do.

Simon Fallaha

Image by Joe Fox Photography

Pause And Effect was staged at the MAC in Belfast as part of the Belfast Children’s Festival.