Dance Improvisation in Saskatoon:
KSAMB Dance Company, co-directed by Kyle Syverson and Miki Mappin, formed in 2009 from a friendship woven through several Saskatoon dance threads.
Patricia Dewar trained contemporary dancers and orchestrated site-specific dance performance in Saskatoon from 1980-85. Patricia’s The Moving Collective performed locally and nationally, including at the Dance in Canada conference (Toronto). She worked in an inclusive way, with interdisciplinary collaborations, such as with poet Anne Szumigalski, artist Elyse Ste. George, and sculptor Bill Epp. She believed that “dance has as much power to communicate as theatre or music.” Miki worked with Anne and Bill at that time, and saw some of this work.
The In Progress Dance Collective danced in the Albert Community Centre from 1984 to 1987. It included friends of both Kyle and Miki; Wendy Roy, Miranda Jones, Rebecca Van Sciver, and Joanie Sass. They met regularly, performed in public, and had dance exchanges with groups in Regina. The performances were usually not improvised, although they were choreographed using improvisation.
Synergy Movement Workshops was established in Vancouver in 1971 by Linda Rubin, who also taught at Simon Fraser University, where she taught Peter Bingham, a pioneer of Contact Improvisation in Canada. Both Kyle, and to a lesser extent Miki, have studied with Peter. Linda taught dance improvisation for performance from 1982-1993 in Saskatoon, under the name Synergy. Over the years, the group performed improv dance under her direction several times a year, including the River Dances (partly improvised), and the Wanuskewin opening in1992 (again, partly improvised). When she left to teach at the University of Alberta, her students formed the Saskatoon Improv Dance Collective which met weekly, on Thursdays, to continue the work. Kyle joined the group in the early 1990s, Miki joined in 2008.
It was in this community practice that Kyle and Miki met, in 2007. In 2009, Kyle and Miki formed KSAMB Dance Company, and while their first performance for Back Alley Antics was choreographed, their second, for LUGO at the Mendel in 2010, was scored improvisation — a score of falling and catching... or not. In 2013, Kyle and Miki took over the direction of the Saskatoon Improv Dance Collective as founding members retired, eventually changing the name to Thursday Night Improv and amalgamating with KSAMB. From 2020-21 the group chose the name Wild Card Movement for this weekly improvisation practice in an outdoor adaptation for the pandemic. For over 30 years this practice has continued in Saskatoon, presently as a class every Thursday – Contact Improvisation and ensemble improvisation, taught by Kyle, and sometimes Miki.
Free Flow Dance Theatre Company has played an important role in KSAMB's development. Formed in 1995 in Ontario by Jackie Latendresse, the company began operating in Saskatoon in 2002. Both Kyle and Miki have taken classes and performed for Free Flow. Improvisation is taught in Jackie's Modern classes, and used by Jackie and the dancers in developing choreography. KSAMB as a company has been given the opportunity to perform at Free Flow events, from the first show by Kyle and Miki in 2009 at Free Flow's Back Alley Antics, to several Works In Progress showings of new work, including improvisation. In recent years Kyle has worked and performed as principal dancer for Free Flow.
https://freeflowdance.com/
The Big Fat Ass Dance Class®: Improvisational Dance for Ordinary Women, was a weekly improvisational dance group for women, started by Aileen Hayden in the 2000s, with emphasis on expression and healing rather than performance. Aileen also gave classes, which Kyle and Miki attended, and Aileen sometimes participated in KSAMB activities. The group continued after Aileen left Saskatoon. In the summer of 2020, an average of 10 participants danced together weekly for an hour and a half in Albert Park. http://bfadc.com/
Ecstatic dance has an ancient history in ritual, and is improvisational. A form of ecstatic dance, 5 Rhythms, was popularized by Gabrielle Roth in the US. In Saskatoon, Karla Kloeble organized 3 weekend 5 Rhythms workshops, with instructor/facilitator Evangelos Diavolitsis in 2015, 2016, and 2017. For several years, the Unitarian Church hosted a weekly 5 Rhythms practice; it was suspended during the pandemic. Miki has practised 5 Rhythms in these events, and Karla Kloeble dances with KSAMB.
In Saskatoon in 2012-13, Mischa Davison began a weekly practice called Dance Church, a form of ecstatic/aerobic nonjudgmental group dance to music. It originated in the US, and is registered as a trademark by an organization begun by Kate Wallich in 2010 in Los Angeles. It has been meeting on Sundays in Saskatoon since 2012. In 2013, Kyle and Miki took over the direction of Dance Church. Dance Church had been a weekly indoor winter activity, but since 2015 it moved outdoors in summer and operated year round. In 2018 Kyle and Miki changed the name to Not Church Just Dance and incorporated it into their other KSAMB dance activities. In late March 2020, it moved outdoors for the pandemic restrictions, and continues outdoors, every Sunday, in all weather. Not Church, Just Dance
A weekly event similar to Just Dance, but with more contemporary and rhythmic music, was begun in 2016 by a group of young people. The direction of this group was inherited by KSAMB in 2018. In 2020, it moved outdoors, to an East Side park, as Buena Vista Boogie. In 2022, we moved it to City Hall Square as Downtown Boogie, introduced an open mic, and began interacting directly with the unhoused people frequenting the square and the library.
2018's Time Shapers, a 45 minute performance of dance and music improvisation with 12 dancers, ages 5 to 91, with percussionist Duane Dorgan, marked the beginning of a stronger commitment to performing improvisation.
Observations of the utility and efficacy of improvisation skills in maintaining awareness and responding to changing circumstances, has led to a locally engaged community practice that blends from dance, through social activism, to direct actions around food and gardening. KSAMB is developing an aesthetic where the engagement, proprioceptive and/or intellectual, of the viewer encourages an awareness of the live time decision-making of the performers, informing the emotional reaction and creation of narrative by the observer. In recent investigations, we have experimented with framing, audience participation, increasing use of live music, and improvised work with differently abled performers. While still maintaining a non-linear poetics of narrative, we have experimented with preplanned and spontaneous responses to current political events.
Some thoughts on the history and relevance of Dance Improvisation,
and its connections to Saskatoon
Relevance of Dance Improvisation:
Dancers dedicated to improvisation working far from major centres struggle to gain acceptance, recognition, and support for the practice at the heart of their work and art.
KSAMB Dance Company, like other contemporary companies, uses improvisation to generate new material for scored and choreographed performances. More than most, we use improvisation as our core practice, and especially, Contact Improvisation (CI.) Unlike most modern dance companies, KSAMB also performs improvisation.
Movement improvisation as a recreational activity and as performance is inclusive. It can involve virtuosic dance technique but, “…it is not the extent of the formal movement technique that impresses one watching these performers in action; rather it is the attention and air of simplicity given equally to all moments of moving” (Louise Steinman.) Influential American improviser and founder of Action Theater, Ruth Zaporah, calls it “the art of skillful being.”
In improvisation performance, elements of time, space, shape, and impulse are explored in real time. The processes of perceiving, discovering, and choosing are witnessed by the audience. “Improvisation is a process by which the evolving nature of the world around and within the artist is revealed by their actions. […] Improvisation is a form of immediacy, a discipline of spontaneity and awareness.” (Louise Steinman)
Improvisation, and particularly movement improvisation as performance, is devalued. With strong ties to play, improvisation is seen as frivolous and pointless. It is considered an activity of children, also devalued in our society. It is not considered conducive to production and commerce – ignoring the fact that play is essential to learning, social development and creativity. Improvisation is seen as an activity done by people who are not skilled. Exceptions are Improv stand-up comedy, and Free Jazz. The skills of improvisation are as difficult to learn as any other skills, and are invaluable in daily life and all disciplines.
(See—Reverence for Uncertainty, Chaos, Order and the Dynamics of Musical Free Improvisation by David Borgo, UCLA, 1999)
Dancers battle the general suppression of dance as a valued art form in places of English colonial heritage, such as Western Canada. The liberating, playful, sensuous, and ritual potential of dance is threatening to puritanical, ordered systems. In a misogynist, patriarchal system, dance has been disempowered – by being positioned as an activity and interest of oppressed cultures, classes, and women. In our society, women and girls are expected to dance when they are young, but to give up their vocation at marriage. Training systems and mass media exploitation patterned after competitive sports discourage the artistic and ritual potential. The sensual power is warped by patriarchal insistence on adult social dance as a means of courtship and seduction, and together with commercialised dance music is closely tied to the alcohol consumption industry. The lack of financial support for dance artists, compared to other art forms, is well documented. To all this is added the stigma of improvisation.
Improvisation in performance has a long history in the arts, movement, jazz, clown, comedy performance, site specific and political theatre, and post modern dance. The skills of improvisation can apply to many different faculties, across all disciplines. The Free Jazz movement of the late 50s and 60s had a massive influence on jazz music and parallels the relation of dance improvisation to contemporary dance. Dance Improvisation is an important performative art, in the past and today. From Isadora Duncan to Steve Paxton, dance improvisation has greatly impacted the development of modern dance, and continues to be inspiring performance material.
Though more common in the 1970s and 80s, the present unfamiliarity with dance improvisation can make it difficult for contemporary audiences, unless directed by the frame of fame, and presentation in a reputable institution. Artists such as Steve Paxton and Yvonne Rainer did gain international followings. Even in Saskatoon in 2019, Rainer drew capacity audiences for two improvised performances by her company at the Remai.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yvonne_Rainer
Judson Dance Theatre, based in Judson Church, New York, in the 60s was a famous experimental performance group. ‘Grand Union’, emerging from Judson Dance Theatre, was a movement improvisation performance group founded by Trisha Brown and Yvonne Rainer. Barbara Dilley and Steve Paxton, both famous performers and teachers of improvisation, were members of Grand Union. Though Judson Dance Theatre and Grand Union have long dissolved, Judson Church remains an important cultural centre for presenting dance improvisation.
Contact Improvisation is the core practice of KSAMB, and was begun by choreographer and dancer Steve Paxton, evolving with Nancy Stark Smith. In January 1972, Steve Paxton was in residence at Oberlin College with Grand Union. For several weeks, he offered Oberlin students two sets of practices, the Small Dance, a meditation on standing, and later in the day, training in modern dance, in aikido and in gymnastics. In 1972, they performed the first experiments of contact improvisation in the John Webber gallery.
This culminated in Magnesium. Paxton described the movements in Magnesium as using "the body as a whole, where all parts are simultaneously unbalanced or thrown against another body or into the air". The piece ended with a performance of the Small Dance. Kyle has worked extensively with Nancy Stark Smith, and has done workshops with other early pioneers of CI Nita Little and Daniel Lepkoff. Both Kyle and Miki have studied with teachers who learned with these early practitioners and teachers, including Karen Nelson and Martin Keogh, and Canadian pioneers Peter Bingham and Andrew Harwood.
Kyle and Miki have both played small, but pivotal roles in the recent Canadian history of CI, Kyle through residencies and teaching at Leviathan Studio on Lasqueti Island, BC, and Miki with involvement in the movements around consent and accessibility in Toronto and Montreal. They have brought teachers of CI and dance improvisation to Saskatoon, and have organised workshops and maintained connections with the CI practicioners in Edmonton, Calgary, and Regina.
A recent experiment in improvisation in community was held during the 2 week KSAMB residency at La Troupe du Jour Theatre in 2024, Carte Blanche, culminating with a performance of Sans Retour. KSAMB continues investigations in the framing and relevance of dance improvisation, during their 2025–26 residency with the Remai Modern.
KSAMB Dance Company, co-directed by Kyle Syverson and Miki Mappin, formed in 2009 from a friendship woven through several Saskatoon dance threads.
Patricia Dewar trained contemporary dancers and orchestrated site-specific dance performance in Saskatoon from 1980-85. Patricia’s The Moving Collective performed locally and nationally, including at the Dance in Canada conference (Toronto). She worked in an inclusive way, with interdisciplinary collaborations, such as with poet Anne Szumigalski, artist Elyse Ste. George, and sculptor Bill Epp. She believed that “dance has as much power to communicate as theatre or music.” Miki worked with Anne and Bill at that time, and saw some of this work.
The In Progress Dance Collective danced in the Albert Community Centre from 1984 to 1987. It included friends of both Kyle and Miki; Wendy Roy, Miranda Jones, Rebecca Van Sciver, and Joanie Sass. They met regularly, performed in public, and had dance exchanges with groups in Regina. The performances were usually not improvised, although they were choreographed using improvisation.
Synergy Movement Workshops was established in Vancouver in 1971 by Linda Rubin, who also taught at Simon Fraser University, where she taught Peter Bingham, a pioneer of Contact Improvisation in Canada. Both Kyle, and to a lesser extent Miki, have studied with Peter. Linda taught dance improvisation for performance from 1982-1993 in Saskatoon, under the name Synergy. Over the years, the group performed improv dance under her direction several times a year, including the River Dances (partly improvised), and the Wanuskewin opening in1992 (again, partly improvised). When she left to teach at the University of Alberta, her students formed the Saskatoon Improv Dance Collective which met weekly, on Thursdays, to continue the work. Kyle joined the group in the early 1990s, Miki joined in 2008.
It was in this community practice that Kyle and Miki met, in 2007. In 2009, Kyle and Miki formed KSAMB Dance Company, and while their first performance for Back Alley Antics was choreographed, their second, for LUGO at the Mendel in 2010, was scored improvisation — a score of falling and catching... or not. In 2013, Kyle and Miki took over the direction of the Saskatoon Improv Dance Collective as founding members retired, eventually changing the name to Thursday Night Improv and amalgamating with KSAMB. From 2020-21 the group chose the name Wild Card Movement for this weekly improvisation practice in an outdoor adaptation for the pandemic. For over 30 years this practice has continued in Saskatoon, presently as a class every Thursday – Contact Improvisation and ensemble improvisation, taught by Kyle, and sometimes Miki.
Free Flow Dance Theatre Company has played an important role in KSAMB's development. Formed in 1995 in Ontario by Jackie Latendresse, the company began operating in Saskatoon in 2002. Both Kyle and Miki have taken classes and performed for Free Flow. Improvisation is taught in Jackie's Modern classes, and used by Jackie and the dancers in developing choreography. KSAMB as a company has been given the opportunity to perform at Free Flow events, from the first show by Kyle and Miki in 2009 at Free Flow's Back Alley Antics, to several Works In Progress showings of new work, including improvisation. In recent years Kyle has worked and performed as principal dancer for Free Flow.
https://freeflowdance.com/
The Big Fat Ass Dance Class®: Improvisational Dance for Ordinary Women, was a weekly improvisational dance group for women, started by Aileen Hayden in the 2000s, with emphasis on expression and healing rather than performance. Aileen also gave classes, which Kyle and Miki attended, and Aileen sometimes participated in KSAMB activities. The group continued after Aileen left Saskatoon. In the summer of 2020, an average of 10 participants danced together weekly for an hour and a half in Albert Park. http://bfadc.com/
Ecstatic dance has an ancient history in ritual, and is improvisational. A form of ecstatic dance, 5 Rhythms, was popularized by Gabrielle Roth in the US. In Saskatoon, Karla Kloeble organized 3 weekend 5 Rhythms workshops, with instructor/facilitator Evangelos Diavolitsis in 2015, 2016, and 2017. For several years, the Unitarian Church hosted a weekly 5 Rhythms practice; it was suspended during the pandemic. Miki has practised 5 Rhythms in these events, and Karla Kloeble dances with KSAMB.
In Saskatoon in 2012-13, Mischa Davison began a weekly practice called Dance Church, a form of ecstatic/aerobic nonjudgmental group dance to music. It originated in the US, and is registered as a trademark by an organization begun by Kate Wallich in 2010 in Los Angeles. It has been meeting on Sundays in Saskatoon since 2012. In 2013, Kyle and Miki took over the direction of Dance Church. Dance Church had been a weekly indoor winter activity, but since 2015 it moved outdoors in summer and operated year round. In 2018 Kyle and Miki changed the name to Not Church Just Dance and incorporated it into their other KSAMB dance activities. In late March 2020, it moved outdoors for the pandemic restrictions, and continues outdoors, every Sunday, in all weather. Not Church, Just Dance
A weekly event similar to Just Dance, but with more contemporary and rhythmic music, was begun in 2016 by a group of young people. The direction of this group was inherited by KSAMB in 2018. In 2020, it moved outdoors, to an East Side park, as Buena Vista Boogie. In 2022, we moved it to City Hall Square as Downtown Boogie, introduced an open mic, and began interacting directly with the unhoused people frequenting the square and the library.
2018's Time Shapers, a 45 minute performance of dance and music improvisation with 12 dancers, ages 5 to 91, with percussionist Duane Dorgan, marked the beginning of a stronger commitment to performing improvisation.
Observations of the utility and efficacy of improvisation skills in maintaining awareness and responding to changing circumstances, has led to a locally engaged community practice that blends from dance, through social activism, to direct actions around food and gardening. KSAMB is developing an aesthetic where the engagement, proprioceptive and/or intellectual, of the viewer encourages an awareness of the live time decision-making of the performers, informing the emotional reaction and creation of narrative by the observer. In recent investigations, we have experimented with framing, audience participation, increasing use of live music, and improvised work with differently abled performers. While still maintaining a non-linear poetics of narrative, we have experimented with preplanned and spontaneous responses to current political events.
Some thoughts on the history and relevance of Dance Improvisation,
and its connections to Saskatoon
Relevance of Dance Improvisation:
Dancers dedicated to improvisation working far from major centres struggle to gain acceptance, recognition, and support for the practice at the heart of their work and art.
KSAMB Dance Company, like other contemporary companies, uses improvisation to generate new material for scored and choreographed performances. More than most, we use improvisation as our core practice, and especially, Contact Improvisation (CI.) Unlike most modern dance companies, KSAMB also performs improvisation.
Movement improvisation as a recreational activity and as performance is inclusive. It can involve virtuosic dance technique but, “…it is not the extent of the formal movement technique that impresses one watching these performers in action; rather it is the attention and air of simplicity given equally to all moments of moving” (Louise Steinman.) Influential American improviser and founder of Action Theater, Ruth Zaporah, calls it “the art of skillful being.”
In improvisation performance, elements of time, space, shape, and impulse are explored in real time. The processes of perceiving, discovering, and choosing are witnessed by the audience. “Improvisation is a process by which the evolving nature of the world around and within the artist is revealed by their actions. […] Improvisation is a form of immediacy, a discipline of spontaneity and awareness.” (Louise Steinman)
Improvisation, and particularly movement improvisation as performance, is devalued. With strong ties to play, improvisation is seen as frivolous and pointless. It is considered an activity of children, also devalued in our society. It is not considered conducive to production and commerce – ignoring the fact that play is essential to learning, social development and creativity. Improvisation is seen as an activity done by people who are not skilled. Exceptions are Improv stand-up comedy, and Free Jazz. The skills of improvisation are as difficult to learn as any other skills, and are invaluable in daily life and all disciplines.
(See—Reverence for Uncertainty, Chaos, Order and the Dynamics of Musical Free Improvisation by David Borgo, UCLA, 1999)
Dancers battle the general suppression of dance as a valued art form in places of English colonial heritage, such as Western Canada. The liberating, playful, sensuous, and ritual potential of dance is threatening to puritanical, ordered systems. In a misogynist, patriarchal system, dance has been disempowered – by being positioned as an activity and interest of oppressed cultures, classes, and women. In our society, women and girls are expected to dance when they are young, but to give up their vocation at marriage. Training systems and mass media exploitation patterned after competitive sports discourage the artistic and ritual potential. The sensual power is warped by patriarchal insistence on adult social dance as a means of courtship and seduction, and together with commercialised dance music is closely tied to the alcohol consumption industry. The lack of financial support for dance artists, compared to other art forms, is well documented. To all this is added the stigma of improvisation.
Improvisation in performance has a long history in the arts, movement, jazz, clown, comedy performance, site specific and political theatre, and post modern dance. The skills of improvisation can apply to many different faculties, across all disciplines. The Free Jazz movement of the late 50s and 60s had a massive influence on jazz music and parallels the relation of dance improvisation to contemporary dance. Dance Improvisation is an important performative art, in the past and today. From Isadora Duncan to Steve Paxton, dance improvisation has greatly impacted the development of modern dance, and continues to be inspiring performance material.
Though more common in the 1970s and 80s, the present unfamiliarity with dance improvisation can make it difficult for contemporary audiences, unless directed by the frame of fame, and presentation in a reputable institution. Artists such as Steve Paxton and Yvonne Rainer did gain international followings. Even in Saskatoon in 2019, Rainer drew capacity audiences for two improvised performances by her company at the Remai.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yvonne_Rainer
Judson Dance Theatre, based in Judson Church, New York, in the 60s was a famous experimental performance group. ‘Grand Union’, emerging from Judson Dance Theatre, was a movement improvisation performance group founded by Trisha Brown and Yvonne Rainer. Barbara Dilley and Steve Paxton, both famous performers and teachers of improvisation, were members of Grand Union. Though Judson Dance Theatre and Grand Union have long dissolved, Judson Church remains an important cultural centre for presenting dance improvisation.
Contact Improvisation is the core practice of KSAMB, and was begun by choreographer and dancer Steve Paxton, evolving with Nancy Stark Smith. In January 1972, Steve Paxton was in residence at Oberlin College with Grand Union. For several weeks, he offered Oberlin students two sets of practices, the Small Dance, a meditation on standing, and later in the day, training in modern dance, in aikido and in gymnastics. In 1972, they performed the first experiments of contact improvisation in the John Webber gallery.
This culminated in Magnesium. Paxton described the movements in Magnesium as using "the body as a whole, where all parts are simultaneously unbalanced or thrown against another body or into the air". The piece ended with a performance of the Small Dance. Kyle has worked extensively with Nancy Stark Smith, and has done workshops with other early pioneers of CI Nita Little and Daniel Lepkoff. Both Kyle and Miki have studied with teachers who learned with these early practitioners and teachers, including Karen Nelson and Martin Keogh, and Canadian pioneers Peter Bingham and Andrew Harwood.
Kyle and Miki have both played small, but pivotal roles in the recent Canadian history of CI, Kyle through residencies and teaching at Leviathan Studio on Lasqueti Island, BC, and Miki with involvement in the movements around consent and accessibility in Toronto and Montreal. They have brought teachers of CI and dance improvisation to Saskatoon, and have organised workshops and maintained connections with the CI practicioners in Edmonton, Calgary, and Regina.
A recent experiment in improvisation in community was held during the 2 week KSAMB residency at La Troupe du Jour Theatre in 2024, Carte Blanche, culminating with a performance of Sans Retour. KSAMB continues investigations in the framing and relevance of dance improvisation, during their 2025–26 residency with the Remai Modern.