MRI + 3 Cellos
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KSJD Artist in Residence Interview, Arts+Science click to listen
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"In February of 2008, as I saw my dream project ‘A Journey of Creation’, fall into place, and greeted audience members who were profoundly moved by their experience of the performance, I knew that my personal goals had been expanded forever. Up until this point my hopeful view of the future had been to be a professional chamber musician and teacher, but I found an additional path and passion creating integrated performances and exploring creative process."
Dialogue Project
At Guildhall Esther participated in a project with conservatory students, poet Francesca Beard, young people and teachers from London schools and Urban Sounds band. Esther's part of the project focused on bringing together Strings and Electronics.
 click the picture to visit the artist What about Visual Artists? Esther has found that working with visual artists opens up entirely new possibilities and ways of seeing the world. Esther has worked with artists to create new art pieces around ideas, to create ideas around pre-existing art pieces, and to do both at the same time. While Esther was in residence with the Aldo and Leopold Wilderness project she worked closely with artists and explored musical composition influenced by visual work styles.
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Does Esther Work with Actors?
Esther had her first brief taste of working with actors one-on-one in 'A Journey of Creation' at the Hartt School in Hartford, CT, in which she incorporated film, dance, painting, acting and classical music together into a performance about creating art. Two years later Esther dove head first into working with actors at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. In her third term at Guildhall she studied storytelling under tutor Ken Rae, participated in a Sound Drama production of Hansel and Gretel by Kieta Kiuchi at Trinity College, London, and spent Wednesday afternoons observing Christian Burgess directing Anton Chekhovs ‘Uncle Vanya’. Esther also took mask classes with Wendy Allnut and began exploring acting through sound and movement as a classical musician. In 2011 in a huge step out into the unknown Esther wrote and directed her own dramatic full production titled ‘Death of (An) Artist’. The play was performed in the Guildhall Studio Theatre in 2011 and at the Rochester Fringe Festival in 2012. Death of (An) Artist Esther directing rehearsal. Lighting design and photo by Adam Dallman. Click the photo to see more of Adam's work.
Dance
Esther began working with dancers at the Hartt School firstly as an improvised experiment with the Bach Cello Suites and then as a collaborative project in ‘Journey of Creation’. In San Francisco Esther sought out Professor Cathleen McCarthy at San Francisco State University and began observing her classes at Lines Ballet Dance Center. Cathleen and Esther co-created ‘Questions’ in ‘Summer Postcards’. Thrilled by these encounters Esther continued to expand her work with dancers playing cello for a composer/choreographer collaboration between the Guildhall School and London Contemporary Dance School. After that she began showing up for contact improv classes at LCDS and experimenting with ways of playing with and against movement. In her own project in response to an exhibit at the Barbican Art Gallery, Esther worked with two composers and two dancers exploring the themes of Laurie Anderson, Trisha Brown, and Gordon-Matta Clark, 1970. In this composition the ensemble explored the possibilities for choreography between dancers and musicians, through accumulation, composition based on impressions of urban life and personal past culminating in a live performance in the gallery. Esther has continued to develop her connection with dance (rs) through private study and observation, continuing to include movement in her original collaborative work.  |