I Accompanied Dancers For The First Time

and I love it

I was practising the pieces for my graduation recitals on a peaceful Thursday on the 11th of August until I received another email for a job opportunity from my school. I saw something about needing a pianist to accompany dancers and that immediately held my attention.

I’ve been thinking about venturing into dance accompaniment to combine my passion for dance and music. But most dance studios I know use recorded music instead of live musicians. These range from CD, Spotify, or other music apps for dancers that allow them to adjust the music tempo for practice. The lack of live musicians in the local dance studios limits the market for this role.

Personal context-wise, I’ve also always thought I’m not a good enough pianist. Even more of a not-qualified-enough to try and go for gigs pianist. But I think the opportunity interests me so much that I knew I’d hate to miss it. I don’t know what got into me, but I asked for more details to try my luck and further consider but swiftly got the role.

I panicked a little after I got it, but I knew I had made the right choice. Instead of chickening out and ignoring yet another opportunity to grow my skills and build my portfolio, I took up my first piano performance gig. More on this in another issue.

Anyway, I learned I had to learn 2 new pieces in a week or less. So I did. Without going into further details, I picked two simple waltzes to accompany the ballroom dancers, one confirmed on the next day, Friday (12th), and another only the following Tuesday/Wednesday (16/17th August). The rehearsal with the dancers was on the following Friday (today on the 19th), and filming on Saturday (my time tomorrow as I wrote this on the 20th). So I had 3 days to learn the second piece. Both pieces are simple, but it’s still a challenge considering how I had to put the other repertoires aside to prioritise this gig.

The rehearsal was when I finally got to trial this role that I’ve been thinking about. Accompanists to dancers take on the role of a ‘live CD player’. The teacher/dancer would cue us, and I’ll start playing. They join in after a few bars. I love both dance and music, so being able to produce the music and have the dancers dance along to it is very satisfying to me.

The thing I’ve found challenging though was to recover from mistakes. I mean, it’s not the same when you’re playing solo. Playing solo means you had to recover as soon as you could, even if you missed out on something, and skipping over parts would be okay as long as you own it. But playing for dancers meant you had to strictly maintain the pulse and tempo while trying to join in as soon as you can to not disrupt the dancers.

Generally, I’m more used to playing solo or in a band, where I could pick up where I last left off, either while trying not to repeat my mistakes and somehow move on or listen to someone else in the band and try to catch up accordingly.

The length of the piece also had to be looped or cut short according to the exercises or choreography, which I imagine would be more difficult in a classroom setting with exercises instead of one with a set choreography and duration (in my case). Just a challenge for pianists that I read somewhere.

The filming is tomorrow. Wish me luck. I’ll try to post another update afterwards.

Fun opportunity. It’s a little segment of an episode for a local kids’ show. Yes, I’d be on TV…kinda nervous about that, but okay.

Also, I understood what it meant to ‘allow students to shine’. It’s not a paid gig, which I now see why they chose to employ students due to probably a lower production cost or cut in the budget.

Thinking back, I would’ve probably taken it even knowing that since day 1. That wasn’t at the top of my head and I didn’t think of it until sometime later. I think I should’ve been sharper about this. You know how students can be, some of us don’t mind getting paid in exposure. Whether that’s great or not is debatable, but yeah. Oh well, but I’ll be careful next time.