I am in creative heaven.

I think every director I know needs to beg, borrow and steal to come to this program if the last two days are any indication.

Yesterday morning, we had a walking tour of Spoleto, with a light luncheon of regional specialties including black truffle tapenade...YUM. We will go back to Spoleto on Saturday afternoon to see some of the Spoleto Festival dei Due Mondi and to celebrate the birthday of one of the particpants.

Workshops began yesterday afternoon, with the classes taking place both in a studio with huge skylights and also on the outdoor canopied stage. Yesterday afternoon and this morning's classes were with Meredith Monk. She worked with us on the voice and body connection, and developing the ritual of performance, doing so through isolating elements of that performance: image, social gesture, sound (not words), abstract movement, and finally words (no movement!). We also explored creating a shrine out of a place - what does that mean...What is a ritual gesture? What is a ritual song? How do these elements create mystery and attach significance to what we do as artists.

This afternoon, Liz Diamond began her 5 session workshop which dovetailed nicely into the work we did with Meredith. We are examining The Winter's Tale with Liz, and as such, there is a question of faith that needs to be explored as an important theme and turning point of the play. Some fantastic improvisations came out of this work.

This evening, Paco, our resident helper as well as video artist, created an interactive performance piece for Meredith, who leaves our company tomorrow. Using a headlamp, we could wave the light at a computer screen, and it would create ripples in the image projected on the wall, and change the sounds being played. Incredible. And his tiramisu ROCKED.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.