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James Chance & Les Contorsions - Contort Yourself (2007)
James Chance & Les Contorsions "Contort Yourself" live at Auditorium FLOG, Firenze, Italy may 12 2007
Length: 300
Rating: 4.90 (20 ratings)
Tags: James Chance Les Contorsions no wave funk
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James Chance & The Contortions - Contort Yourself
PUNKCAST1416-13 James Chance & The Contortions performing live at the PS1 Warm UP in Queens, NYC on Aug 30 2008.
http://ps1.org
Length: 304
Rating: 3.80 (6 ratings)
Tags: punkcast james chance contortions PS1 nyc no wave punk funk ROIR
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Students of aerial fabrics climb and contort in pursuit of f
By APRIL DEMBOSKY
The Patriot Ledger
ROCKLAND -- They say it feels like flying. They say it's frightening, liberating and painful. Winding themselves up in colored fabric hanging from the rafters and twisting themselves into living sculpture, Cirque du Soleil style, is a kind of fun -- and suffering -- students of a new exercise class in Rockland have learned to revel in.
"It makes me feel like a kid climbing trees and hanging off rope swings," says Jason Zlogar, 29, of Whitman. "I feel clumsy on the ground, but up there, it's like gravity doesn't exist."
And it doesn't, until a trick goes awry and he hits the floor with an "umph," and detangles himself from the black fabric.
But a quick breather and a few deep gulps of water are as good as pushing his internal reset button. In no time, he and the other amateur aerialists are all back at it, winding their feet in the fabrics, arching their backs and twirling upside-down in the air.
Aerial fabrics gained notoriety when professional daredevils performed on them in Cirque du Soleil and other traveling circuses. But Heather Crosby was the first in the area to shift the art from a Las Vegas marvel into a hip alternative workout for South Shore residents.
When the owner of the Liquid Movement Center -- a yoga, Pilates, and belly dancing studio in Rockland -- first saw aerial performers at the circus in Abington last year, she wanted to give it a try. She did a workshop in Vermont that fall, then after months of practice, she added the aerial fabrics class to her studio's schedule in June.
Her goals go beyond fitness, especially for her older students.
"People have this stereotype of what you should be like when you're older," she says. "I think you enjoy your life more the older that you get and the freer that you get in your mental capacity. So why shouldn't you enjoy that kind of freedom in your body?"
Most of Crosby's students had never heard of aerial fabrics before she started the class. They had come to the studio for Pilates and belly- dancing, so when she started the new class, they gave it a shot.
"I like to try new things," said Christine Bazzinotti, 19, of Rockland.
"Who can say that they do this?" says Andrea Corrieri, 21, also of Rockland.
Looking at her and other slender young women -- with their particularly slender arms -- it is a wonder how they hoist themselves up and around the unwieldy dangling cloth. But that's the deceitful beauty of the art form.
"People come in here all the time and say, 'I can't touch my toes,' 'I have no upper-body strength,' 'I can't climb,'" Crosby said.
Her job then becomes to break down the defeatist attitude: "Anyone can do this," she said.
She makes sure of it, starting each class with a half-hour of yoga stretches and core-strengthening exercises. It's sit-ups and sun salutations rather than bicep curls and squats.
So when Corrieri pulls a Spider- Man up the fabric, it's her abdominal muscles doing all the work. When she contorts herself into a suspended arabesque, her body is motionless, but each of her muscles is firing.
"It's a full-body workout," she said.
Corrieri is a radiology student at Massasoit Community College. After long days in the hospital X-ray labs, she needs more than a treadmill can provide to unwind.
"I can't just go to the gym. It's boring," she says. "This is my release."
But along with the physical invigoration and graceful poses comes the pain.
"My first week, I felt like I couldn't walk," Corrieri says. "It was a different kind of burn than I had ever felt."
Lindsay Bogart, 15, points to a nasty rope burn on her arm and describes the unique scabbing that will take effect in the next few weeks.
The most common complaint from aerialists are callused and blistered hands and feet that get roughed up from gripping and winding up in the polyester fabrics.
"You get used to the pain, though," Bogart says.
Special aerial fabric manufacturers sell their swaths in various weaves and knits to create different levels of stretchiness and strength. Firm fabrics are easier to climb and good for beginners. Stretchy fabrics are more comfortable for advance moves, like drops, when aerialists wind themselves up several feet in the air, then release a knot and come tumbling down in a flurry of flips until they hover in a fairy pose a few feet above the ground.
Most of Crosby's students haven't reached this level yet. They finished their first six-week class series last Tuesday, then topped it off with a master class from visiting Cirque du Soleil alumnae last weekend. Crosby plans to offer classes and practice sessions all year and invite the experts to town quarterly to keep Rockland's bevy of tricks growing. She'll even showcase some of her aerial fabrics students in her regular fall belly dance show.
For now, her students are focused on firming their grips and widening their splits.
"I have no plans to run off and join the circus," Corrieri says. "But who knows, it might be an outlet to more exciting things."
Bogart is in it for the long haul. The Arlington resident travels to Colorado for an aerial fabric festival every year and practices in Rockland regularly. She jokes with her classmates about an aerial arts T-shirt she wants to buy.
"Don't worry about the fear," it says, "worry about the addiction."
April Dembosky may be reached at adembosky@ledger.com.
Length: 189
Rating: 4.10 (10 ratings)
Tags: ghsvid ghsnevid Patriot Ledger Quincy
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training contortionist
me training again. here's that website everybody
http://how.to/contort
Length: 434
Rating: 4.60 (27 ratings)
Tags: contortion training
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