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Events & Forthcoming Meetings

Central London |  Projects

London AT Friends

Tuesday 15th June

6:30-8:30pm, Friends Meeting House, 8 Hop Gardens,
St Martins Lane, WC2N 4EH.
Entrance fee: £5 (concessions £3)

Guest Speaker: Peter Ribeaux

Everything you wanted to know about the Alexander Technique but were afraid to ask: an evening with Peter Ribeaux

Peter is an Alexander Technique Teacher of some 45 years standing, having qualified with Patrick Macdonald in 1965.  He is co-director of a teacher-training course in the Alexander Technique and has taught in Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Israel, Switzerland and the USA.  For many years he combined his Alexander work with teaching occupational psychology at Middlesex University Business School in London.  He still teaches short courses in this area which are increasingly slanted towards the AT in stress management, back pain prevention and fulfilling one’s potential in work of all kinds.  He is fascinated by all aspects of the Technique, mental and physical, in particular working out what it really was that Alexander discovered.  He loves working with others to improve their work (and his own). 

About this evening, Peter writes:

 

For this evening please come armed with questions about the Technique.  I will offer my thoughts on the subject and hopefully this will open up discussion.  I dislike giving formal presentations as one is never sure who the audience is and what they are interested in.  Therefore I will limit myself to a short introduction, at which point you may ask, state, wonder anything you like within reason.  I hope this will not turn out to be a talking shop and would welcome the opportunity to discuss, with hands-on work, practical aspects such as working with the whole versus the parts, the nature of the primary control, variations in method, etc, etc, etc……  I look forward to meeting you. 

If you would like to come to this event then please contact Friends administrator Julia Pritchett by emailing julia@atfriends.org

For map click here.

Projects

The Performing Self

The Alexander Technique has for many years been firmly established in colleges of music, drama and, more recently, dance. We have within our community many experienced teachers working in those fields and there have been several special events with an opportunity for teachers interested in working with performing artists to exchange with others and develop their knowledge: the International Congresses and the Conferences for Alexander Teachers in Music Institutions particularly come to mind.

However, these events are very ‘in-house’ and give little scope for sharing our knowledge and experience with people outside the profession. AT Friends is keen to play a part in raising awareness of what the Technique has to offer to performing artists and also to provide a forum in which we can exchange with and learn from others working in that field: voice coaches, speech trainers and therapists, performance psychologists, movement teachers, etc.

We plan therefore to host an event entitled The Performing Self, offering themed workshops for performing artists and a forum for exchange with people who practise and teach other disciplines. To explore ideas around this theme, we are bringing together people experienced in this field to form an ad hoc steering committee: John Hunter, Dorothea Magonet, Peter Buckoke, Judith Kleinman and Penny O’Connor. We would be pleased to hear from anyone wishing to get involved with this exciting project: as an organiser, a presenter, with a good idea, or suggesting a good contact who might be interested to join us.

Alexander Orchestra

An ongoing project is to form an "Alexander Orchestra", made up of musicians who are teachers or pupils of the Technique, which will perform at a Friends Event. Judith Kleinman and Peter Buckoke are beginning to gather together names of potential participants, so if you are a musician and would like to become involved please contact Judith at judeklein(at)blueyonder(dot)co(dot)uk