Jonathan Goddard
Award Winning Dancer, Choreographer and Movement Director
The Voice of His Gremlin
“I need time to fix this on my own”
I remember being about 8 and doing a solo on stage and forgetting my steps. I blanked. I stood there and they just left the music playing.
I realised no-one is going to turn the music off, no-one is going to save you, you have to keep going and you have to sort it out.
There have been times in my career when I have been happy with my ability, and myself but at the same time had no idea what I’m actually doing because the pace of work left me feeling like a machine. It made me wonder where the trade-offs in a career should be, how can I own my own development and decide which sacrifices I will make to achieve a goal.
I can often find dance classes and rehearsals embarrassing – even though I have spent my life doing them. I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I could have trained on my own, possibly I might have understood things quicker by working them out at my own pace. I find ‘the group’, being in a group and working in front of a group quite exposing.
I want to fix it and then come back in. If I can sit down alone, analyse and rehearse myself, I know can work it out.
Now I love dancing a solo… if I’m on stage on my own; I have this feeling that I do the choreography because I choose to. There’s an anarchy that I feel, I can choose to do something or not. There’s a power to that choice, it helps to make me feel free