Fernando Hernando Magadan

A few years ago, I had to travel to The Hague in Holland, to learn the piece “Shutters Shut” by Paul Lightfoot and Sol Leon. “Shutters” as we called it (because saying both is too hard), was to be performed for Gauthier Dance’s new program “Lucky Seven” and we had the pleasure of working with one of the original dancers, Fernando. I have to start by saying that Shutters is one of the most challenging pieces I have ever danced. I had no idea what I was in for. The piece is only four minutes long, but it is packed with challenging movement phrases and memory tasks. The music for this piece is actually a poem by Gertrude Stein called “If I Told Him : A Completed Portrait of Picasso”. Each word in the poem has a physical movement. Sound simple? Not exactly. Let’s just say we were lucky to have Fernando. When we were stressed, his energy was always calm and encouraging….and calm is what we needed.

It comes as no shock that Fernando is excellent at breaking down movement with great detail. I have seen Fernando perform with NDT a few times and as a dancer on stage, you can see that he is a natural, beautiful mover. In rehearsal, I would just watch in amazement as he demonstrated a phrase… very inspiring. I started to think differently about how to execute movement in a relaxed way, and how to use my energy in the right moments. Fernando was also very encouraging. He pushed us to go farther then we thought we could go and gave excellent images for the movement. We worked intensely, it was a great process and we had fun also.

Working with Fernando was a wake up call for me. He gave me so much information… I left with a new sense of awareness. To this day, whenever I come across something challenging, his words pass through my head, I calm down, and do my best.

Fernando is a freelance choreographer and a long time dancer with Netherlands Dance Theater……………………….

When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up? Did you always want to do what you’re doing now?