Tag: Steve Reich

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Lula Washington Dance Theatre’s Kwanzaa Celebration

 

Last week my friend Debra Levine invited me to another dance performance; this one by Lula Washington Dance Theatre, who were giving their annual Kwanzaa celebration concert. This was one of the most enjoyable dance performances I’ve seen thus far in L.A. There were many pieces on the program – twelve in all! – and we were there for over three hours. The dances were mostly either African or American modern or a combination of the two, with some ballet thrown in, and music ranged from Fela Kuti to Steve Reich to Quincy Jones’ arrangement of Handel’s Messiah, to a live Samba band with a medley of conga drums that really made you want to get up and join the dancers. Most but not all of the choreography was by Ms. Washington, and one of my favorite pieces – a modern dance one from 2005 – was a very moving tribute to American soldiers, For Those Who Live and Die For Us.

 

My other favorite was Washington’s 1995 Harambe Suite (all of the photos posted here are of this dance), which encompassed the entire third act. There were a group of what I interpreted to be head tribesmen and women dancing at the back of the stage, behind a table bearing religious candles and celebratory food. A choir dressed in colorful, flowing African garb stood to the side and sang and danced. Children, one by one, would run onstage holding a corn husk or other item of food, which they would take to the table to add to the feast, before going to the center of the stage and breaking into a celebratory dance. Their dancing was accompanied by the singers as well as a live band, seated on the side of the stage opposite the choir.

Some of these kids were AMAZING – seriously; they are going to be stars! There was one little girl, named Tyler, who was the daughter of a professional dancer in the troupe, who just really blew me away. She had so much rhythm and was a real natural. She’s small now but is going to go far. And there was an older boy, a teenager, who could do some of the highest jumps I’ve ever seen. He also did this incredible back bend, bending his knees to lower himself slowly all the way to the ground, only to lift himself back up again by the strength of his legs alone without touching the floor. People went wild. It was incredible.

After the children, the adults came one by one to center stage and danced as well. They’d dance solos, eventually in groups. The children then came back out as a group, accompanied now not only by the choir and the drums but by the audience’s applause as well. After a while, the audience got up and danced at their seats, cheering all the way through.

Not every dancer was perfect – and some of the little kids you could tell were just embarking on their dance training, but that wasn’t at all the point. The evening was just a pure and simple celebration of movement, of being human. So perfect for the holidays.

 

 

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DANNY TIDWELL ET AL IN FIRE ISLAND DANCE FESTIVAL

Here’s a nice video of clips from the Dancers Responding to AIDS performances, which took place during the Fire Island Dance Festival in July. Watch for Danny around the 1.43 and 3.24 marks. You can also spot Keigwin + Company (in the towels) and members of Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet (around the 1.38 and 3.11 marks), as well as others whom I didn’t recognize. Anyone recognize the classical ballet dancers? They’re good! What a gorgeous setting.

Video via SYTYCDism.

Speaking of Larry Keigwin: I’d really really really wanted to see this at the Guggenheim — his new piece set to Steve Reich’s Pulitzer-prize-winning score from 2007, Double Sextet. Unfortunately I was horribly sick with a cold-turned sinus infection-turned several days-long TAC attack and just couldn’t make it. Anyway, Keigwin and ballet choreographer Peter Quanz each created dances to the same piece of music. Their creations, which were performed by members of their dance companies, varied greatly, showing the different interpretations and approaches dance artists can take to one piece of music. In addition to the Macaulay review in the NYTimes (which I linked to above), here is fellow blogger Evan’s take (with lots of pictures).

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TAKE DANCE PREMIERES FOOTSTEPS IN THE SNOW

 

 

 

 

TAKE Dance Company began its season at Dance Theater Workshop on Thursday night. There were four dances on the program — all choreographed by artistic director Takehiro Ueyama: two pieces from last year (the upbeat Linked, and Love Stories, a haunting duet about three stages in the life of a relationship that was inspired by a Magritte painting); the New York premiere of Shabon; and the world premiere of Footsteps in the Snow, both rather abstract pieces that I found a bit unsettling.

 

 

Shabon, set to Steve Reich music, is bookended by a solitary woman walking across the stage blowing bubbles. Bubbles are blown onstage throughout the dance, by bubble machines, which would seem to make the mood of the piece playful. But there’s a lot of intense partnering and the dancers seem to be characters who struggle somewhat with each other. During the climax of the piece, a small woman walks atop the shoulders of the other dancers, who together make a kind of human pyramid. She does this twice, then falls backward, hoping the others will catch her, which they do. But it still made me jump, because it doesn’t seem like she’s really trusting them so much as that she doesn’t care about her own well-being any more, like she’s given up. Then, in the end, when the solitary woman is walking across stage blowing her bubbles again, it’s like she’s in her own world. To me, it was about the solitariness of human existence or the fragility of connection.

The last piece, Footsteps, seemed to echo those themes as well as hint at the impermanence of human existence. Set to the rain-drop-like music of Arvo Part (the same used by Christopher Wheeldon in his famous After the Rain pas de deux), the stage was covered with fake snow (confetti) and there were some “snow-blowing” machines used from time to time to cover the dancers’ tracks, which made me think of the way it’s impossible to leave a lasting footprint in the snow. The dancers danced by turns in solo, in pairs, and in ensemble, the mood shifting between violent, tender and pensive. In one part, Francisco Gracinao (who regularly dances with Paul Taylor and was guesting with TAKE) throws himself violently to the floor, ending in a balance on the side of his neck, his legs in the air. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone throw himself down that way and then basically land on his neck. It made me jump. In other places, the men dangle the women upside down. In one moment — my favorite – -a man and woman, both crawling on the floor, find each other, and rub necks, entwining them and kind of locking them into place, fitting together perfectly like the pieces of a puzzle. It’s a beautiful image and at first I was hoping the piece would end there, but no, the pause in the music and the dimmed lights were only a pause; there was another, more disconcerting section that followed. I guess, thinking it over, I’m glad it didn’t end there — it would probably have been too pat, too happy, and I don’t think Take does happy endings!

I really like TAKE’s dancers. Ueyama has a good, diverse group — about half of them are kind of  “all American” in a Paul Taylorish way (Ueyema danced with Paul Taylor before forming his own group) — kind of carefree and sunny and spacious in their use of the floor, and then the other half are these really intense Asian women who captivate you with the depth of their gaze and the small details in their movement. They’re kind of opposites in a way but both are equally compelling and together I think make for a really unique company.

This is a good, varied program. It runs at DTW through this Sunday afternoon.Visit the DTW website for details and video excerpts, and see Philip’s blog for more pictures by his friend Kokyat.

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ABT, LARRY KEIGWIN, AND DANCES INSPIRED BY KANDINSKY AT GUGGENHEIM THIS FALL

 

 

The Guggenheim Museum has just released its Works & Process events schedule for the fall and there’s some good stuff coming up.

On October 11 and 12 ABT will give a program, entitled, The Art of Adaptation, in which dancers will perform portions of the company’s upcoming contemporary season, held this year at Avery Fisher Hall, and panelists will discuss how they’re adapting work for a non-dance venue. (The company is performing at Avery Fisher this year because City Center, where they usually have their fall season, is going to be temporarily closed for remodelling). It hasn’t yet been revealled who the dancers or moderators will be, but I’ll let you know when I do!

On September 23 and 25 there will be a new dance / music commission inspired by artist Vasily Kandinsky’s Blue Rider Almanac of 1912, performed at the Miller Theater at Columbia University. Music is by the Brentano String Quartet, soprano Susan Naruki, and pianist Sarah Rothenberg; the dancing will be by Armitage Gone! Dance. This, along with a couple of art installations in the museum and another music piece, is commissioned in conjuction with a Kandinsky retrospective to show in the main museum.

On September 11 and 12, young choreographers Larry Keigwin and Peter Quanz are each showing a piece they’ve made to Steve Reich’s Pulitzer-winning Double Sextet. Dancers will be from Keigwin + Company and the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. Reich will participate in the panel discussion on the 12th.

And, finally, on October 24 and 25, Shen Wei Dance Arts will perform in celebration of the company’s 10th anniversary and Shen Wei will discuss his creative process.

There are other, non-dance events as well, including a talk on “Sex Stress and Music,” a world premiere by composer Charles Wuorinen, and a spoken word performance inspired by Kandinsky’s Yellow Sound (1912) in which actress Isabella Rossellini will read and Mexican artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer will generate an array of colors from the sound of her voice. Very cool-sounding!

The schedule’s not yet on line but it’ll be here when it is.

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New York City Ballet’s Tribute To Nureyev and New Lee Ballet

 

Last Thursday (Balanchine’s birthday), New York City Ballet celebrated with a tribute to Nureyev and the premiere of a ballet, Lifecasting  by young choreographer Douglass Lee.

The evening began with two films of Nureyev, the first of him dancing on PBS’s The Bell Telephone Hour (do wish they still had that show!) with Maria Tallchief in the pas de deux of August Bournonville’s Flower Festival in Genzano.  After the little film tribute, out came Kathryn Morgan and Allen Peiffer who danced just that. I really get so much out of seeing the same thing danced twice back to back — I love it when Christopher Wheeldon will do that at Morphoses or when City Ballet does it with a tribute to Robbins, or, like here, Nureyev — and will show a clip of someone rehearsing a dance, and then the dancers come out and do it for real. You get different artistic versions of the same movement patterns, maybe a less polished then more polished version, you kind of remember the movement and see it through the dancers’ eyes as s/he struggles to perfect the same set of steps.

Anyway, interestingly, when I first saw these dancers doing the same steps, I thought, how much would I NOT want to be poor Allen Peiffer right now! To be compared to Nureyev like that!

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