Lola Miles, one of Dance Consortium’s Autumn 2024 LIPA Placement students, reflects on her experiences while on tour for a week with The QDance Company and Dance Consortium in October ’24.
My time on placement with Dance Consortium was both eye-opening and incredibly enjoyable to be a part of. I didn’t really know what to expect going into it, other than being given the brief overview of the week by email beforehand. I found that there was definitely a range of back and front-of-house jobs to do, as well as working with the dancers/company and outside staff. The range was definitely very helpful in gaging a proper understanding of how touring works and all the moving parts that make it a possibility.
One of the most notable points of things that I learnt was the process of the get-in and load out at each venue as this was totally new to me. Experiencing the process of unloading all the equipment and aligning it on stage as per the drawn-out plans showed me how incredibly specific all the tech equipment had to be in order for the show to run. Whilst I had vague ideas of how this all worked beforehand, seeing it in person reinforced how important all the physical preparation (that often goes unnoticed) for the show was.
As well as this, doing the budgeting exercise for Chief Executive Joe Bates was also very informative when looking at the tour from a finance perspective. Having planned hypothetical events before, it was a massive jump to then try and replicate the budgeting and finance on a much larger scale. It definitely put into perspective the cost of what could be considered a ‘smaller’ tour with relatively few dancers over six weeks. Learning about all the extra costs and expenses that I usually wouldn’t consider was highly interesting, as well as gaging a better understanding of how a budget would be split into the different areas of the tour: accommodation, travel, marketing, etc.
This leads onto one of the other main areas of touring that I learnt about; that being the difference between commercial work, and the work of Dance Consortium. Understanding this difference was vital in my wider scale understanding of the industry and the way it relies on the balance between the two types of work. This made me consider a lot about the kind of future work I may want to go into in the industry and whether it would be focussed more on the commercial or artistic/charitable area of dance and theatre.
This being said, one of my favourite parts of the week was being given the opportunity to speak to new people already in the industry and find out about their experiences and what led them to where they are today. It was notable that most people had very different entrances into their job and quite different takes on the wider Arts industry. Speaking to people such as Eckhard [Thiemann – Programming Associate: Dance at The Lowry] who had been around dance for a while was incredibly informative, especially on the work of programming for The Lowry. Dissecting the different ways art would be chosen to be presented in the theatre, and the lack of personal bias that was allowed to come into play, was really interesting to me and, once again, finding the important split between the performances that would sell, thereby allowing for the performances that were needed for the sake of diversity, representation, and creativity.
The QDance Company performing "Re:INCARNATION"
To add to this, watching the actual dancers and performances themselves was definitely a highlight. I felt that I had never really seen work like this before and it was filled with so much passion and creative risk that I had no problem watching it multiple times. When paired with listening to Qudus Onikeku speak about his journey and inspiration in creating the piece, I found it really captivating to see the build to the final performance with all the costuming, tech, and dancers full out. The energy and passion were so obvious on stage, it made captivating to watch. Similarly, it was also enjoyable to see the dancers in a more relaxed environment during the workshop with younger students. It was nice to recognise that amongst the ‘chaos’ of touring, time was still being made to help engage others with dance, especially a younger audience.
Personally, I found that my time with the company closer to the end of the tour felt a little easier than at the beginning. I felt more settled having got used to the rhythm and timings of things whilst also knowing the people I was working with slightly better. It was definitely an adjustment to get used to spending so much time away from my flat and in hotels, but as stated, it got easier throughout the week as I learned to pace myself more and set a routine. This was notably one thing that I became aware of when considering touring as a future career, and how easy it would be to adjust my lifestyle to one on the road. Having a ‘sample’ of what that would be like though was incredibly useful and insightful into the wider picture of touring.
Despite this, I did see many of the benefits to touring. As someone who does like to travel, seeing different parts of the UK, new venues, and the people that work there was so fascinating and really pushed how closely interlinked the whole industry was with connections between people from all different areas.
Overall, I really enjoyed my time working alongside Dance Consortium and their tour with the QDance Company. It was a very insightful experience and incredibly helpful in giving me ideas for my own future placements and careers beyond LIPA. Seeing how they are personally contributing to keeping the arts diverse and challenging was so important to me and inspired me to look into similar areas of work in the future. I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity and would love the chance to work with them again, or others I met, if the possibility arises.
Pictured (left to right): Lola Miles, Wisdom Henry Bethel, Katie Davies and Victor Lawani
Pictured: Our 2024 LIPA Placement students (from left to right) Lola Miles, Julia Lewanczyk, Erin O'Connell and Katie Davies
