Compass Arts Retreats in Rural Spain
Intensive training for performers who love what they do so much, they want to do it on holiday!
Like summer camp (but in a beautiful country home in the mountains in Spain), and drama school (but without all the drama) put together in one amazing week-long getaway.
Your creativity will explode, your skills will level-up, your community will grow, and you’ll leave feeling relaxed, inspired, playful, confident, and supported.
Upcoming retreats:
August 25-31
September 22-28
Picture this…
You wake up at 7am in the beautiful Los Angeles de San Rafael (LA, but Spain style), breathing mountain fresh air, listening to the birds, and you head down to the kitchen for a coffee. You join a small group of other actors, who you now call friends, and walk a nature trail down to the lake to wake up your muscles and your minds, greeting the horses in the field on the way.
You come back after a stroll through nature, have some breakfast, and head out to the garden or up on the terrace for a physical warm-up for the day, Kendo for sword skills, breath work, and physical strength and conditioning. Then we move into a voice warm up and training, followed by a break for more coffee and breakfast for those who haven’t had it yet.
After that, the day is full of surprises. You explore, move, learn, create, sing, build, discover, develop, laugh, play, say goodbye to the comfort zone, write, expand, and get to have a professionally filmed scene to take with you. You eat delicious home-cooked meals with new friends followed by relaxing breaks in the pool and dozing in the warm Spanish sun until it’s time to get acting again. You watch the sun set over the horizon, having spent the entire day training, learning, and creating. Reviving your spirit, renewing your energy, expanding and resetting yourself from sun up to sun down. You are immersed in what you love with wonderful people who are going to continue to support and encourage you every step of the way. You fall into your comfy bed, and rest well, looking forward to doing it all over again the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that…
Your Compass Coaches
Holly Renaut
Holly has had an extensive international career in theatre, film and voice over spanning the last 23 years. She works full-time in the industry as a performer and as a highly regarded dialect and acting coach, director, and writer, working with thousands of performers all over the world individually and in production. In production she was recently the Acting and Dialogue coach for HBO’s When No One Sees Us (Cuando Nadie Nos Ve), and she also recently worked as Dialect coach for Chiwetel Ejiofor and Naomie Harris in the Man Who Fell to Earth. As an actor, you can catch her alongside Eva Longoria in Land of Women on Apple TV, and you’ll hear her voice in video games like Nintento’s Metroid Dread, the animated series Joy Eternal, dubbing countless roles for Disney and Netflix, as well as in hundreds of international campaigns. She has performed and toured in 6 different countries, including two seasons at the RSC's outdoor summer venue. She was trained in the Linklater voice method both by Linklater herself, as well as extensively at Shakespeare & Company in the USA.
Yago Cardalda
Yago has spent his life in the arts, having performed, composed, and toured at an international level from a very young age as a musician, director, and actor. He has also been training actors and singers for nearly 21 years. Yago’s experience is extensive, from Musical Directing productions and festivals, to performing in the cast of countless musical theatre productions and on TV, to writing, composing, and directing a hit musical on Gran Vía, (Madrid’s Broadway) and collaborating with artists all over the world. He has performed with artists such as Mika and James Arthur, music directed festivals such as Mad Cool and groups including Marlena, and has coached competitors in programs such as The Voice, Operación Triunfo, and Got Talent. He is a martial arts expert and fight coordinator, and as a Thai medicine practitioner, and once found himself the unofficial go-to physiotherapist for Cirque du Soleil. Yago is also a highly sought-after producer and composer, collaborating with international artists, and helping actors make incredible voice reels.
Your Investment and what’s included?
Your Compass retreat costs just €1120 (roughly £940 GBP, or $1290 USD)
This includes:
6 nights accommodation in our retreat home
Nutritious, delicious meals for the duration of the program (excludes an optional wrap-up lunch by the lake)
55+ hours of professional training and active work
A professionally shot and edited showreel scene (and memory from the retreat!)
All necessary equipment / materials
Transport tickets from Madrid to the our retreat home
It does NOT include:
Travel to Madrid
Travel insurance
Additional nights in Spain
Ready to join us? We hope so! We would love to have you. Fill in the form below, and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can with your next steps.