Product Description

Combining how-to information with voices of working artists, Poor Dancer's Almanac is an essential resource tool and source of inspiration for all independent artists—choreographers, performance artists, dancers producers, managers. Created in 1975 and revised again in 1984 this handbook has come to serve as one of the most crucial references for the arts community. In the most up-to-date and comprehensive edition yet, a broad range of issues affecting performers and producers is addressed, interwoven with newly added, more personal contributions from major figures in the performance world.
Organized and compiled by Dance Theater Workshop in New York and authored by more than fifty leading professionals in the field, Poor Dancer's Almanac offers in-depth discussions of everything from personal livelihood to professional career development, from medical care, housing, and unemployment insurance to management, touring, and legal issues. Each chapter is followed by an appendix containing extensive and varied listings, giving names and addresses for finding internship programs, videotaping, flooring, grant-writing, and reference publications. Although centered on New York the Almanac includes lists of resources and contacts for many other states—California, Washington D.C, Illinois, Minnesota, North Carolina, Texas, Florida, and Ohio. An entirely new section has been added dealing with health issues and the crisis of AIDS.
In personal anecdotes and essays various performers offer their own insights and stories—both of struggles and of successes—to bring to life the practical realities of working in the arts. We hear from Merce Cunningham, Eric Bogosian, Karen Finley, Paul Zaloom, and Bill T. Jones, among others. Illustrated with original drawings by Janie Geiser, this thoroughly revised and updated edition of the Poor Dancer's Almanac will continue to serve as one of the leading sources for those concerned with managing life and work in the performing arts.

Selected contents
The Financial Realities of Performance Art
From Studio to Stage
Promoting Your Performance
What is Management?
Budgeting
Funding
AIDS Explained
Action Medical Insurance for the Arts
Psychological Issues for the Dancer

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #614737 in Books
• Published on: 1993-12
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 380 pages

From Library Journal
Originally published in 1976 and revised in 1983, this third expanded and updated edition is particularly relevant today. With keen competition for limited arts dollars, independent performers need all the advice they can get. This book should help. More than 50 professionals present detailed information on topics ranging from how to locate performing space to writing a press release to filing tax forms. Interspersed with the nitty-gritty of production, management, personnel, finances, and healthcare are personal glimpses of the life of an artist as written by established performers like Eric Bogosian, Guillermo Gomez-Pena, and Karen Finley. Each chapter is followed by an appendix listing additional resources. Although this book is a project of the Dance Theatre Workshop in New York City, it will be useful to any independent performer in any region. Recommended.
- Joan Stahl, National Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Midwest Book Review
Combining how-to information with voices of working dancers, Poor Dancer's Almanac: Managing Life and Work in the Performing Arts is an essential resource tool for all independent dancers. Organized and compiled by Dance Theatre Workshop and authored by more than fifty leading professionals, Poor Dancer's Almanac offers in-depth discussions of everything from personal livelihood to career development, from housing and unemployment to management, touring and legal issues. Poor Dancer's Almanac features a special section dealing with health issues and the AIDS crisis.

Review
“The array of tools offered for managing [careers] is vast; from producing to funding to retirement plans, it’s a whole factory.”
--Jae Gruenke, Village Voice

Customer Reviews

A very good resource for dancers
This book should be required reading for aspiring dancers, particularly those who lack the administrative know-how to manage money, funding, etcetera. It teaches you everything they neglected to tell you in dance class. Makes a great gift!