Danny Tidwell and some other SLSG male faves — like Marcelo Gomes, and Jamar Roberts of Alvin Ailey — are going to be performing in Dancers Responding to AIDS’ winter 2010 benefit, “Dance From the Heart / Men,” on January 11th at Cedar Lake’s performance space.
Here are a couple more breathtaking pics of Danny Tidwell dancing at the Fire Island Dance Festival last weekend, taken by photographer Fred Hecker who graciously sent me a link to them. Visit his full flickr album of the Festival for some gorgeous photos of the other dancers as well. Apparently Keigwin + Company performed “Water” (I love that piece!), and Karole Armitage performed, as did Miami City Ballet (Alex Wong’s company), and Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet. Danny danced “The Eternal Vow” by Lauren Adams, to music by Tan Dun and Yo-Yo Ma. Thank you so much, Mr. Hecker!
Speaking of Cedar Lake (of which fellow SYTYCD alum Sabra Johnson is, or at least was, a new member – she’s not currently on their dancer roster…), here’s an enticing video of excerpts from their recent performance of Orbo Nova at Jacob’s Pillow, which they’ll repeat in New York at the Joyce Theater in October.
And, speaking of the Joyce Theater, Haglund is excited about the Tulsa Ballet coming there August 10th. I plan to see them too, especially since they’re performing a MacMillan work I haven’t seen! Read up on that company and their upcoming Joyce program on Haglund’s blog.
You guys! I missed So You Think You Can Dance again last night! I thought it was on on Thursdays (wasn’t it on Thursday last week?) and was all set to tape tonight when commenter Jonathan sent me an email asking me what I thought of the second week of auditions. Argh. Trying to find somewhere online to watch re-runs…
Can’t they wait till ballet season is over?! Seriously, it wasn’t on this early last year right? I don’t remember it conflicting with Blackpool, ABT, and NYCB like this.
Anyway, in lieu of a post on this week’s show, I thought I’d just link to this Rickey post (which is where I got the pic above from), which commenter Jonathan sent me. Thank you, Jonathan!
Apparently, Danny Tidwell will be in the Broadway cast of Memphis, which is scheduled to open in the Fall, and will be in Fire Island over the summer for the Fire Island Dance Festival.
It’s always interesting to keep up with the SYTYCD dancers and see what becomes of their careers, if and how the show has helped them. So far we have Danny and Neil Haskell on Broadway, Sabra in a very cool NY-based contemporary ballet company, Chelsie Hightower and Dmitry Chaplin on Dancing With the Stars… I wish Danny would come back to ABT but I know that’s not going to happen. But it’s okay — there are plenty of fabulous dancers there to keep me in a pretty constant state of awe 🙂
For others who missed last night’s show, I find Ballroom Dance Channel does a good job of straight-forward reviews.
Next Monday evening, May 11th.
See my earlier post for more info.
Ridiculously, I won’t be able to make it; I’m going out of town and won’t be back yet. But I met a very nice guy, DJ McDonald, in the Facebook Dance Bloggers group and he’s going to cover it for me!
I’m really interested to hear — of course what Pasha and Anya do, and Travis, and Twitch, and Sabra, and Eugene and Maria — but also how audiences like David Parsons’s Caught. I’m sure they’ll go absolutely wild over it. This may be a way to bring modern dance and ballet to a wider audience, integrating it with forms of dance that are more popular and accessible right now, like ballroom! So I’m really glad Tony and Melanie are exposing fans of ballroom and SYTYCD to something like this. Big huge kudos to them! And with Sabra now a part of Cedar Lake, who knows what future collaborations could happen…
Anyway, if anyone else is able to go (Shim?! — or any other fans of ballroom, SYTYCD, or Parsons — or modern dance — expose yourself to ballroom!, and it’s on a Monday night, so is not going to interfere with most other dance performances in the city), please please let me know what you think and I will post your thoughts!
Go here for tickets.
This may be old news, but I just found out last night when I went to a friend’s book launch party and met a writer from Pointe magazine (how small is this world!) Anyway, wow! Hooray for Sabra; hooray for Cedar Lake; hooray for New York audiences!
UPDATE: I have been told by a representative of Cedar Lake that Sabra is no longer with the company, unfortunately. This is as of August 2009. I will definitely let you all know when I hear anything further about.
Today I, along with several other bloggers, was invited to a studio rehearsal of Pascal Rioult’s The Great Mass, which will premiere at the Joyce Chelsea in two weeks. Set to Mozart’s Mass in C Minor, it looks like it will be really glorious. Today all the dancers were in workout clothes, and Rioult (who is from France, and a former Martha Graham dancer) gave them instructions, but I can’t wait to see the fully costumed final product onstage.
I really like these rehearsals and am so glad dance companies are inviting us to view the process. First to begin inviting (that I know of anyway) was Cedar Lake Contemporary Dance, then TAKE Dance, Elisa Monte Dance Co., now Rioult, and perhaps Dances Patrelle, upcoming in two weeks as well. The process of dance-making is, I feel, unlike the creation of any other art because of its collaborative nature, and I feel like being allowed into the process a bit allows me to understand the art form better. I wish choreographers would let us to watch even earlier on, when they’re very first conceiving a work! As long as my schedule is flexible, I love coming to these things. I feel like Edwin Denby watching Balanchine! 🙂
Anyway, more to come on Rioult as soon as their season begins in two weeks. In the meantime, visit their website for info and a video of his dance set to Maurice Ravel music.
Wednesday night I went to see the popular Israeli dance troupe, Batsheva Dance Company, at Brooklyn Academy of Music. My main experience with Batsheva has been taking a Gaga Class (artistic director and choreographer Ohad Naharin’s unique movement training) by Gaga-trained dancers at Cedar Lake Studios, and then seeing that company perform Naharin’s DecaDance ( a collection of his works over the past 10 years). This was the first time I’ve ever seen a piece by Naharin on his own dancers.
Maybe because I loved DecaDance so much (see above link), I was a bit disappointed with Max. The dancers are absolutely incredible with what all they can do with their bodies — making distinct, highly evocative gestures, then changing to another gesture at immense speed, bending and contorting their bodies into impossible-looking shapes, throwing themselves to the floor, insanely fast high battemants, etc. etc. — and you can really see how much Gaga technique, taken over a period of time, can allow you to move. My problem was more with the overall piece. It didn’t seem to go anywhere, just seemed to be the same extremely intense movements — sometimes evoking horror, sometimes prayer for forgiveness or peace, sometimes shock, with brief moments of tenderness, attempts to connect to one another, thrown in.
Naharin made the soundscape himself (under the pseudonym Maxim Waratt), and it was very intense. At times a deep-voiced man would sing in Hebrew (I think), his guttural crooning creating at times a threatening, portending feel, at times a bluesy one, similar to Leonard Cohen. At other times, the sound would resemble an ambulance siren, an earthquake, a whistle, raindrops or a leak — some kind of falling water, sometimes a person breathing heavily, at times there would be utter silence.