Royston Maldoom

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Royston Maldoom, 2005

Royston Maldoom , OBE , (born March 25, 1943 in London ) is an English choreographer and dance teacher. Maldoom became known for its dance pedagogical work with young people. He has been initiating and leading dance projects for everyone around the world for over 30 years, regardless of talent, experience, age, gender, skin color, ethnicity or social origin, and is considered a co-founder of the community dance movement. He has received numerous awards for his social commitment and artistic work. Royston Maldoom has lived in Berlin since 2007.

life and work

Early years

Maldoom is the son of an army officer who was frequently stationed abroad. His mother was in poor health, was bedridden, and died when he was four years old. His father then sent him to an orphanage, although he himself had suffered from being at home. Since his father remarried shortly afterwards, Maldoom was taken from the orphanage by his stepmother six months later.

Royston Maldoom grew up in a rural household with pets. At the age of seventeen, he started training as a draftsman in an urban planning office. At one farmer's house he took a liking to herding sheep and stopped working in the office after a year. A year later, the farmer recommended a farm with many youngsters near Cambridge . He liked to work here and, like others there, began studying agriculture. One day the group decided to watch a ballet film with Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev and to go to the pub afterwards . Maldoom didn't believe in ballet and only went with him to go to the pub. He burst into tears during the film and decided to become a dancer the next day.

dance

At the age of 22, Maldoom began training as a classical ballet dancer. With scholarships he was able to study at the Royal Ballet and at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater . He got to know the basic principles of expressive dance and the amateur dance movement («Community Dance»), as taught by the German emigrant and dance teacher Rudolf von Laban and spread by his students. As early as 1975 he received first prizes for his work as a choreographer. This was followed by productions for the Dance Theater in Harlem and the Peruvian National Ballet, among others . From 1980 to 1983 Maldoom worked for the Fife Regional Council in Scotland. There he organized workshops, summer courses and festivals and set up communal dance groups for young people and adults.

Maldoom then decided to combine his love for country life and dance with free, project-oriented work. In the 1980s and 1990s he drove a camper through most of European countries and organized dance projects there. He concentrated his choreographic projects more on the social area. For example, he developed Carmina Burana with a hundred street children in Addis Ababa in 1996 and choreographed together with Protestant and Catholic youth in Northern Ireland or in Hamburg with young men without a secondary school diploma. In Addis Ababa, he succeeded in initiating an ensemble with the Adugna Dance Company, which in turn is now training Ethiopian young people in dance.

In 2009 he developed with support from the choreographer Tamara McLorg at the invitation of the German School in Tenerife and the Symphony Orchestra of Tenerife, the dance project Big Jumps / Grandes Pasos , the 185 German on 27 June 2009 and Spanish students along with 35 African immigrant youths in the Auditorium of Tenerife listed has been. Another project with the German School Tenerife , Pequeños pasos! or how small steps can be made into a dance , he presented with children in the 3rd to 8th grade on April 1st, 2014. In addition to the dance groups, he also works with symphony orchestras, in the meantime (2008) it came alongside the London Symphony Orchestra , Ulster Orchestra and the Scottish Symphony Orchestra in fifteen co-productions with major orchestras.

His internationally best known dance project came about on the initiative of Simon Rattle . With 250 Berlin children and young people from 25 nations and the Berliner Philharmoniker under the direction of Simon Rattle, Maldoom worked on Igor Stravinski's ballet Le sacre du printemps in 2003 . The documentary film Rhythm Is It! recorded this work and made it known internationally. A film review by Rainer Gamsera said: “The most exciting moments, however, are shown by choreographer Royston Maldoom during rehearsals with the young people. Maldoom is the heart of the film: a magician, an alchemist of enthusiasm, who provocatively reveals himself to be a strict teacher at the beginning. ”After this unexpected success, Maldoom became a much sought-after dance teacher who in Germany asked for support from schools and social institutions was asked. Maldoom then moved from London's East End to Berlin.

Maldoom attributes his success with young people to his special way of imparting discipline, which he prefers to call “focus”, since this is self-discipline that happens voluntarily and on one's own responsibility. At the same time he shows them his respect for their potential and their worth. The young dancers would not be ambitious and competitive with the others, but with their own performance. The desire for common ground would arise quickly: "Dance sticks together, lets people experience the feeling of being part of the group, it makes them support each other and develop more empathy for each other and for the teacher."

Fonts

  • Dance for your life. My work, my story. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2010, ISBN 978-3-10-047390-5 , autobiography.

literature

  • Jovana Foik: Dance between art and mediation. Community dance using the example of the dance project “ Carmina Burana ” (2006) under the choreographic direction of Royston Maldoom (Cultural Education Volume 6). kopaed, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-86736-036-4 .
  • Jacalyn Carley: Royston Maldoom. Community Dance - Everyone can dance. Henschel Verlag, Leipzig 2010, ISBN 978-3-89487-658-6 .

Documentaries

  • Royston Maldoom. Talk, Germany, 2010, 13:11 min., Moderation: Annette Dasch , row: 3 to 9 , production: NDR , first broadcast: March 19, 2010, announcement , photo .
  • Dance for Your Life - Royston Maldoom. Documentation, Germany, 2008, 43 min., Directors: Angela Scheele, Marion Kollbach, production: NDR , first broadcast: November 30, 2008, summary: by arte , review:.
  • Rhythm Is It! You can change your life in a dance class. Documentation, Germany, 2004, 100 min., Directors: Thomas Grube and Enrique Sánchez Lansch .

Awards

Web links

Interviews

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Julia Schaaf: Choreographer Royston Maldoom: “You have to love her.” ( Memento from August 2, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung , March 13, 2010.
  2. ↑ In the documentary: Dance for Your Life - Royston Maldoom. NDR, 2008.
  3. ↑ a b Film review “Dance for your life” by Klaus Witzeling: Dancing changes your life ( memento from February 11, 2013 in the web archive archive.today ). In: Hamburger Abendblatt , November 27, 2008.
  4. ^ Page by Royston Maldoom: Project Support ( Memento from April 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) (archived)
  5. ↑ Big Jumps / Grandes Pasos. On the website of the German School Santa Cruz de Tenerife | German School Tenerife, March 18, 2014.
  6. ↑ a b arte : Dance for Your Life - Royston Maldoom. ( Memento of the original from December 5, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. November 30, 2008 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.arte.tv
  7. ↑ Rainer Gamsera: Kino: “The Rhythm is it.” Some like it heated. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , September 19, 2004.
  8. ↑ Annette Bruhns: On the way to school: "I challenge children". In: Spiegel Special , November 18, 2008, interview.
  9. ↑ Gabriele Michel: "I give you the belief in your worth." ( Memento of the original from January 21, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Psychologie heute , compact issue 16, 2007: Changing schools! @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.royston-maldoom.com
  10. ↑ Alexandra Lavinia Zepter: An interview with Royston Maldoom. In: worthaus.com , October 24, 2006, p. 8, (PDF; 115 kB).
  11. ↑ Reading sample (PDF; 110 kB) on the publisher's website.
  12. ↑ Review by Sandra Luzina: Pacemaker with a heart. Royston Maldoom writes autobiography. In: Der Tagesspiegel , March 11, 2010.
  13. ↑ Golden pea. In: Märchenland - German Center for Fairy Tale Culture, accessed on April 14, 2015.
personal data
SURNAME Maldoom, Royston
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English choreographer
DATE OF BIRTH March 25, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH London