Able and willing to take the first steps

By MALCOLM BURGESS

Jeremy Poi is a dancer with oodles of ability - and attitude. That's not "an attitude", mind you, although you might also expect that from a well-built 20-year-old sporting a Mohawk hair-do. His modus operandi is quiet confidence and openness - qualities that have brought this young man of Cook Island and Niuean descent to where he is today.

Not only is he the youngest full-time member of Auckland-based dance company Black Grace, but he is also the first product of its new approach to developing dancers in the style and of the calibre their unique grouping demands.

Last weekend, Poi graduated from his apprenticeship to join the ranks of a troupe whose name epitomises the best of New Zealand and international dance; remarkable for a lad who "didn't actually intend to be a dancer only a few short years ago".

Before joining Black Grace's younger sibling, the Urban Youth Movement, in 2000, Poi had performed only as part of school cultural groups, as well as dabbling with breakdancing and the Brazilian dance-martial art known as capoeira.

He was still in the sixth form when he successfully auditioned for a spot in the youth dance group. With such a full dance card, as well as school, it's a wonder he managed to finish bursary.

Sharing the same rehearsal premises and choreographer as Black Grace, Poi found being in the Urban Youth Movement was the ideal way to attract the attention of artistic director Neil Ieremia. "Neil invited me to be an apprentice the following year. So he said, 'Finish off the year and start afresh the next'."

Before that, Poi's sights were set on getting into teachers' college. However, teaching has now slipped to the back of his mind. "Maybe if I was to break my back and not be able to walk," he says.

During his two-year apprenticeship, he has toured Australia and Europe with the main company, which he describes as "a very scary experience", since he had never performed overseas.

Despite his confidence, Poi is still a young man in a group of older dancers with reams of life experience. "It's real funny," he says, "when I first met the guys, I was the youngest of three boys. And then when I came here it was like having older brothers again."

Indeed, in the first couple of months of his apprenticeship, they told him not to grow up too fast, he recalls.

"It's really hard to try to do that, especially here, because everyone's lived and got a lot of knowledge. I don't know how you could not develop."

For now, he plans to continue developing his technique and to be the best dancer he can be. "Not in an arrogant way but by looking at the senior members and trying to strive to be where they are."

If all this sounds an effortless progression, it wasn't all plain sailing. He describes the first year of his apprenticeship as the hardest year of his life. "Coming straight from college and not having a strong formal training background, I never thought I'd make it through."

Black Grace's artistic director Neil Ieremia says the reason he chose Poi for the programme was not so much his dancing ability as his attitude and determination.

"My philosophy in the past when I've come to work with people is that their attitude is one of a high calibre of human - someone who has greater interests than just being a dancer."

He says technique is something you can teach and learn - but it's very difficult to undo an attitude once you've learned it. "I think when it comes to trying to excel at something, it's important the person understands they can achieve a lot just by saying yes first of all - and being open to the process."

Ieremia is proud of the progress his former apprentice and latest company member has made.

"Jeremy's come such a long way in such a very short period of time and if you stand him up next to other graduates of other schools and institutions he holds his own. Which is a really encouraging thing for our first apprentice."

And he has no reservations about Poi "growing up" in a dance company. "I would have killed to be in his shoes, to be brought into a company environment like this one and be taught on a daily basis and get exposed to all of these things - the rate of growth is incredible."

He says Black Grace - which is not "your typical dance company, for a start" - offers many chances for young people to grow, beyond dance alone.

"Black Grace has always been about life, never just about making dance. Dance is fantastic and that's our passion, but we're not the kind of people who are going to slit our wrists if we can't dance tomorrow."

As it happens, Ieremia stumbled upon dance only as a substitute for sport, which he wasn't allowed to play when he was younger. He didn't have any formal training until the age of 19. "In my second year of training, I got invited to join the Douglas Wright dance company, where I worked for six years as a dancer."

This led him to an idea: "If I can do that for someone else, and put them in an environment that is more conducive to that kind of standard of learning, then that person should really develop."

Ieremia says that while Poi has progressed well, he has also had some difficult times. "The first few days he was falling asleep at 3pm - I had to wake him up, he just wasn't used to the workload."

As part of the process of formalising its new programme of dancer development training, Black Grace now has four new trainees - two men and two women - rehearsing with the company.

"We invite them to train, then after a year we assess them, and we invite the ones back who we need, and if they do that year really well, they'll be an apprentice for a year."

Ieremia says this emphasis on training is also about expanding the company - something he says is necessary because of a lack of suitable male dancers coming from other institutions.

He says this fact of life is frustrating - "not just for us, but for the dance community in general".