Musical Theatre Credits
The Wiz: A New Imagining (La Jolla Playhouse)
Musical Theatre
The Wiz: A Re-Imagining:, In preproduction workshops
with dance arrangers Ron Melrose and Kenny Seymour,
associate choreographer Kelly Devine and two dancers, Trujillo experimented with movement vocabularies and came up with a structure for the number. When Trujillo decided he needed 16 bars of a dance break, Seymour and Melrose would throw out ideas on piano, “would work things through to syncopate it or swing it, or place an accent where Sergio wanted it in the dance,” says Seymour.
Seymour provided an intermediate step in the dance-making process that McAnuff dubbed "synthestration." After he and Melrose agree on a basic arrangement, Kenny uses his computer to create a rough orchestration of that day's work; that gives the performers a sturdier "musical floor" for the next day's rehearsals. Once the length, style, rhythms and mood of the dance arrangements and choreography are set, the music goes to Broadway legend Harold Wheeler, who does the final orchestrations.