Chapter 257: Clamber Collective

Clamber Collective. What a great name.

A collective noun. A clamber of circus artists? There is a certain onomatopoeia about the word. It brings to mind a climbing human tower, like the Catalan castellers, and a hint of anarchy too. The roots of the contemporary circus scene that stretch back to the early days of Archaos. The promise of stomp, a riot. 

I very nearly missed them.

Life had been busy, and, queen of the power nap that I am, I had grabbed a siesta. I came to and, daydreaming, made myself a cup of tea and started doodling in bed. A whisper came first. I have somewhere to be, what day is it...? Then the sledgehammer hit.

Crap. It's Friday. Jacksons Lane. 5pm.

Still groggy, I jumped out of bed and grabbed the most colourful clothes I could find. Tangerine orange, paired with a float of patterns threaded through with royal blue. It just felt right, and I had no time to second guess myself, making it to the theatre with minutes to spare.

This is my first summer back at Jacksons Lane for a good decade, at their new Circus Hub, where you can see a sharing of work in development each Friday for a quid, so I am a bit out of the loop. Familiar faces for sure, but so many new companies on the scene. Like this one. Clamber Collective is the brainchild of Bendy, Freddie and Ellie, and this was their first performance in a venue of this size. I didn't know quite what to expect.  As it turned out, neither did the performers as what followed was a gem of pure improv, as I was later to find out, between circus artists and musicians on stage.

I slid into a seat without registering anyone around me. A first, really! That's good, I thought. I like seeing new crowds mixing things up. But for a moment it did make me think: if this is the next generation of circus artists, where is the next gen of chroniclers?

I recognised a couple of faces on stage though, albeit from things I've seen just this year. Aerialist Leah, from seeing her graduation piece at the National Centre for Circus Arts, and acrobat Toffy, one half of Brainfools Duo, whom I caught at Ensemble Festival. Both operate at such a precise level of brilliance, that I was glad to be seeing more of them.

What followed was an innovative dialogue between musicians, circus artists and a dancer. They listened to each other and responded wherever the mood took them, riffing off each other like a piece of physical jazz.

There was Bendy as the swing in a human cradle, Freddie's fluid acro, Leah exploring the possibilities offered by the dance trapeze with a kind of graceful curiosity. The inclusion of Shulah as a dancer reminded me of the collaboration between Gandini Juggling with ballet dancers in Ephemeral Architectures. And the musicians didn't just accompany the movement, they goaded it, teased it, sometimes challenged someone on stage to find the answering shape.

Sometimes there was comedy. Toffy bringing the rigging centre stage, turning it into a character to play with. Alex's superb juggling slipping playfully into the music, with a downward whistle informing the drop from a high throw, or following it. There was an understated humour to that, a quality that reminded me of Onni Toivonen, who performed in Shhhh!, a cabaret I curated.  Then Leah became the Pied Piper in turn, her recorder orchestrating an increasing number of performers into a relaxed, loose, swinging skip across the stage.

Sometimes more pensive reflection. Leah and Toffy in a hand-to-hand duo, acting out Bendy's spoken-word narrative of a couple navigating the highs and lows of life. 

Afterwards, I discovered that every element of the performance was improvised, so no two rehearsals during the week were the same. It reminded me of those warm-up exercises at National Circus where you have to move around at speed without bumping into anyone else. Only here they were throwing circus skills and dance moves into the mix, picking up a clue or a cue from each other, throwing it back and trusting that someone else would catch it, musically or physically. 

It was clear what a gift the week of research together at Jacksons Lane had been, giving them the space to really listen to each other, and so build the confidence to take these risks and learn from each other. Impressive too, quite how many people were on stage.

There is danger in this, because the uncertainty of what comes next brings the possibility that they could simply fall flat on their feet. In the audience, I appreciated that same mixture of apprehension and wonder in the same way I would watch a tightrope walker manage the balancing act. That was part of the reward of watching the show. And it was a huge success. 

Clamber Collective is a self-funded company, so I was delighted to see afterwards that they'd brought some merch with them. It was creatively done in their inimitable style, with the same doodling energy running through the design of their handmade prints and hand-printed T-shirts. I picked up a piece of art that I am going to frame from a Valentine's piece, so hearts all over it. Perfect for LucyLovesCircus! And I also picked up a t-shirt for my daughter about to go to uni, who saw the grad show with me at National Circus and has been talking about picking up aerial skills there. Bendy and Freddie showed me the notebook they have kept through the creative process. I was fascinated. Each page was an artwork of mind maps, ideas and connections blended with art. 

You could see the collective brain at work on the page, as on the stage, where the musicians were reading bodies as closely as the performers were reading sound

And suddenly the performance made even more sense. The state of mind behind it all,  flexible and hypermobile. There was a kind of jazz dissonance to it, without a jarring note.

Which brings me back to the name.

A clamber can be messy, a little unruly. It suggests bodies piling in, potentially getting in each other's way but somehow making space for one another. 

And that is the essence of Clamber.

Not simply a group of circus artists and musicians sharing a stage, but different bodies, brains, disciplines and instincts, listening closely enough to make something together without knowing exactly what it will be.

A clamber of artists.

A surprise of performers.

Maybe that's another collective.