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The Torrent of Energy That Is Shelley Washingtonposted Monday, May 12 I was lucky to be able to step into a rehearsal at the Joffrey Ballet run by Shelley Washington. She was setting Tharp’s Waterbaby Bagatelles (1994) on the company, and I happened to be in Chicago for a shoot. Washington’s exuberance, playfulness, demanding-ness and sheer aliveness coaxed the dancers into a knock-out studio perf… |
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Excited. Touched. Stimulated. Taken aback. Revved up. Honored.posted Thursday, Apr 24
I felt all these things watching Akram Khan’s Bahok at City Center tonight. The last feeling, honored, is because I got to moderate a Talkback with him afterwards o… |
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I Can’t Get Ekaterina Kondaurova Out of My Mindposted Friday, Apr 18 She’s the ultimate Forsythe dancer—wildly articulate, casually slinky, visibly reckless. She shows the pleasure of his work. She danced three of the four pieces on the Kirov’s Forsythe program at City Center. The last one, In the Middle Somewhat Elevated, well, she just took it away. Even when she wasn’t dead center,… |
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Can Dance and Science Merge Artistically in Performance?posted Monday, Apr 14 Well if anyone can do it, Liz Lerman can. I just saw her Ferocious Beauty: Genome at the Kasser Theater’s Peak Performances series at Montclair State University in NJ. It’s amazing how she lets the piece teach you stuff about science. I learned that we have three trillion cells in our bodies, that death is programmed in every… |
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Why Are We Seeing So Few Fokine Ballets?posted Wednesday, Apr 09 Judging by the reps of current companies, you’d think there was nothing between Petipa and Balanchine. But in between those two giants was Michel Fokine. His ballets had the breath of life in them, compared to the mere pageantry of Petipa. I know, I know, Petipa was a great and prolific choreographer who gave us the whole grand tradition of Ru… |
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How many dance dynamos does it take to turn a company around?posted Monday, Apr 07 In the case of Ballet Nouveau Colorado, two. This tiny company in Broomfield, which is north of Denver, grew out of a thriving dance school and outreach program. But I gotta admit I hadn’t heard of it until Garrett Ammon and Dawn Fay came along last June. Principals at Memphis Ballet who had worked extensively with Trey McIntyre, they’d … |
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What’s so great about Appalachian Spring?posted Monday, Mar 31 It’s one of those hallowed masterpieces, but what really is it that allows Martha Graham’s Appalachian Spring (1944) to last so long? Watching the Juilliard students perform this masterpiece, along with two other ballets that are also no slouches (Tudor’s Dark Elegies and Limon’s There Is a Time) I … |
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I Couldn’t Help Doing the Merengue at ACDFAposted Tuesday, Mar 25 Last Saturday morning Pam Plagge was teaching a class in Latin dance to about 80 students in the Great Hall of the University of Wisconsin—Madison as part of the North Central Regional Conference of ACDFA. I was there to chair a panel on Dancing in Higher Education, but when I wasn’t’ doing that, I was class hopping. And for this p… |
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Fearlessly funnyposted Monday, Mar 24 What does it take to be really funny onstage? Two very different performances made me think about this question: Christopher Barksdale of Kansas City Ballet, and David Neumann in Adrienne’ Truscott’s genesis, no! |
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Koresh Brightens a Rainy Dayposted Tuesday, Mar 11 Well, “brightens” isn’t exactly the word, as all three pieces were in pretty dim light. But I was happy to find artistry, humor, and energy in the 15th-anniversary program of Koresh Dance Company. And Philly is only an hour and a half train ride from NYC. (I knew that but it still seemed far away before.) This season inaugurated th… |
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Can Ballet Look Good in a Small Space?posted Monday, Mar 03 I recently saw performances of two small ballet companies in small, informal spaces. In both programs, the dancers were excellent and the choreography was just OK. But one company looked great, the other didn’t. |
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Beautiful Vishneva, Poor Vishnevaposted Thursday, Feb 28 Diana Vishneva is such a sublime dancer that you expect to be transported when you see her dance. Her own concert, “Beauty in Motion” at City Center (see our cover story this month) fell short. I guess if you are a choreographer who is commissioned to make a dance for this gorgeous creature, you have two choices: either challenge yoursel… |
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Paris Opera Ballet and Pina Bauschposted Tuesday, Feb 19 I got out of the metro and turned around and was stunned by the sumptuous facade of the Palais Garnier—actually only half of it, since the other half was under construction. I felt like I was in another century. The halls inside are wine red, and the orchestra seats are red velvet armchairs that must be a hundred years old. Every inch of wall … |
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West Side Story Heavenposted Wednesday, Dec 26 Tears rolled down my face the minute the Jets started their jazzy, twitchy dance last week at the 19th Annual Gypsy of the Year. The opening number, a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the original West Side Story on Broadway, was designed for maximum nostalgia for people like me who saw the musical at an impressionable age. Yes I love… |
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Why Is Everything Different Once You’re Onstage?posted Monday, Dec 17 I thought I knew the Nutcracker music cold, but when I was out there, everything was different. (I was playing the Maid in Irine Fokine’s 50th Nutcracker with just one rehearsal under my belt—see previous blog.) There is one part where the Maid, with coa… |
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Broadway Cares and So Does the Whole Dance Communityposted Thursday, Dec 13 Before there was DRA there was just a lot of memorial services and tributes for our friends and colleagues who died of AIDS. I remember one such performance for the wonderful dance writer Barry Laine in 1988. I was preparing to dance in it (since I had known him pretty well), and Arnie Zane (who himself had AIDS) was preparing to speak, so we were … |
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Re-entering My Childhood Nutcrackerposted Monday, Dec 10 Call me crazy, but I agreed to perform in the first act of Irine Fokine’s Nutcracker—after 40 years. Her 50th Anniversary production is coming up this week in Hackensack, NJ (see story in our Dec. issue, page 103). Back in the 60s, I played a naughty little boy in the Party Scene before I graduated to the Maid, which is th… |
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What happens when a good show doesn’t know when to end?posted Friday, Dec 07
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Why Does One Improviser Rock and Another Falls Flat?posted Tuesday, Dec 04 It’s hard to tell, but I think it has something to do with the mind-body connection. If the dancer is deeply concentrated and her body has its own imagination, you are taken on a fascinating ride. If the dancer is doing simply what she already knows and not going beyond, you just have to wait it out. Last Friday, in a program that Movement … |
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They Define Excellence in Male Dancingposted Thursday, Nov 29 At two recent galas, Daniel Ulbricht at NYCB and Matthew Rushing at Ailey took my breath away. In completely different idioms, they both glowed with the mastery of their forms. They made you sit up, they made you keep up, they made you realize the completeness of great dancing. |
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Ohad Naharin at BAM Blew Me Awayposted Friday, Nov 16 Naharin’s piece Three at BAM was so beautiful I could almost not bear it. Simple and complex, soft and powerful, giddy and solemn, it was the kind of piece you want to linger over. |
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Mentoring on a Global Scaleposted Tuesday, Nov 13 It dawned on me that the Rolex Initiative not only matches up interesting artists of different generations, but it is creating a real exchange between industrialized countries and developing countries. On Sunday night at DTW, Rolex presented the first three years of protégés: San Jijia from China, mentored by William Forsythe; Junaid J… |
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Stillness in Mexicoposted Wednesday, Oct 31 When the stars are in the right place, stillness can be as exciting as movement. I was in Monterrey, Mexico, at a dance festival last week, and I saw stillness used powerfully by two companies: Beijing LDTX Modern Dance Company, and Grupo Krapp from Argentina. (Both companies were outrageously good and radically different from each other.) |
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It was Wheeldon’s opening at City Center and I’m gushing.posted Thursday, Oct 18 All the duets were beautiful, strange, interesting. But what really knocked me out was Fools Paradise, Wheeldon's latest group piece. It has a mysterious elegiac quality and it just keeps coming…in twos, in threes, in sixes, and finally in nine. Half way through, there’s even a sort of danger, a little like his piece |
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Wondering About Wheeldon’s Morphosesposted Monday, Oct 15 As the anticipation builds up toward the NYC debut of Christopher Wheeldon’s new company at City Center this week, The Guggenheim’s Works & Process series invited him to show and tell last night (and tonight). |
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Falling for After the Rainposted Friday, Oct 05 If I close my eyes, I can still see Wendy Whelan dancing After the Rain. I can see her being lifted in the air like a floating tree branch. I can see her unfolding like a butterfly and reaching out and forward like the prow of a ship (sorry about the mixed metaphors). I can see her being lifted in a bridge position with flexed feet, as flat… |
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Graham Today: Pros and Consposted Tuesday, Sep 25 Seeing the Graham classics is like seeing a museum exhibit, but there are moments that break through that dustiness, and they can be thrilling. |
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I Brake for Boston Balletposted Thursday, Sep 20 Boston Ballet is going places. One place, last weekend, was the Guggenheim Museum’s Works & Process program. They showed two ultra contemporary pieces and the White Swan pas de deux. The best was, subjectively speaking of course, Jorma Elo’s Brake the Eyes. It has nicely bizarre, distended movement, surprises in the ensemble… |
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That Was Fun!posted Monday, Sep 17 As Richard Move has discovered, Martha Graham is an irresistible target for both reverence and ridicule. It could have been his idea to do an edition of “"From the Horse’s Mouth” with 27 Graham dancers, past and present. But it probably wasn’t. The matinee at the Joyce on Saturday (Sept. 15) sent everyone out into the st… |
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Give Me Music or Give Me Silenceposted Thursday, Sep 13 The most arresting part of the Graham company’s opening night (Tuesday) was the 1932 film of Martha shown in slow-motion. And in utter silence. She was doing Lamentation, in silver-screen close-up. The house was mesmerized. Every iconic movement was there: the torquing torso that seemed to wring emotion from her; a contraction that th… |
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Does the Worst Affect the Best?posted Monday, Aug 27
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And While I'm Talking About Merceposted Tuesday, Aug 07 I just saw a wonderful exhibit that's up at the NY Library of Performing Arts at Lincoln Center. It’s called “Invention: Merce Cunningham & Collaborators” and you can easily spend a couple hours wandering around among the beautiful photographs, posters, plans for dances, fabric samples, and encased costumes. To see the bulk… |
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A Brave, Illuminating, Terrific New Bookposted Thursday, Aug 02 For anyone who has devoted herself to a choreographer and still wonders what he/she thinks of her, |
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Slow Dancing as Religious Experienceposted Friday, Jul 27 Where can you see Elizabeth Streb, in boots and black-rimmed glasses, dancing next to Allegra Kent, in an ethereal gown with flowing sleeves? Where can you see Shen Wei, aiming his arms and legs like calligraphy, next to Trisha Brown bringing her hands to her throat and bursting upward through her hands? Where can you see Mira Hunter, a Turkish derv… |
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The Unabashed Sexiness of Susan Marshallposted Friday, Jul 20 Why hasn’t anyone thought of putting Susan Marshall’s work in a cabaret setting before? Her dances, especially since last year’s Cloudless, have the intimacy, the brashness, the overt sexuality that would fit. In the Spiegeltent at Bard College’s Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, people could sit at the outer ed… |
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An Appealing Darknessposted Thursday, Jul 12 Seeing two Dutch companies at Jacob’s Pillow last weekend reminded me of what’s sometimes missing in American dance, especially ballet: a willingness to be dark in mood. The companies were Netherlands Dans Theater II (the youth company of NDT), and Club Guy and Roni. |
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ABT’s Home Runposted Monday, Jul 02 Nina Ananiashvili and Angel Corella knocked it out of the park in Swan Lake at ABT last Thursday. They dazzled, they glowed; they were rooted in their technique but also gave us a good show. As Odette, she was not only an object of pathos but a bold presence that radiated outward toward the audience. Those long arms have a hint of wing-like… |
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Three Russians Moving Beyond Classicismposted Thursday, Jun 28 Russia is changing and so is the dancing. The “pure” Russian ballet that we know and love is opening up to contemporary influences, and the modern/postmodern scene is thriving. Last weekend I saw the work of three Russian dance artists who are making a difference: choreographers Olga Pona and Yuri Possokhov, and ballet superstar Nina Ana… |
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What Makes a Ballerina Great and Why Do We Have to Lose Her?posted Tuesday, Jun 26 Alessandra Ferri is a beautiful and exquisite dancer, but her greatness lies in how much she makes us feel, not how much she makes us admire. When she dances Juliet, you feel her childishness in the first scene with her Nurse; you feel her attraction to Romeo at the ball, her embarrassment at dancing with him in public. She takes you along with her … |
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Does It Matter If You Know the Story?posted Thursday, Jun 21 I always get excited to see a new Wheeldon ballet, so before I went to see The Nightingale and the Rose at New York City Ballet, I read the Oscar Wilde story that it’s based on. It’s about a Nightingale who sacrifices her life for a young man’s hope of love. A thorn must pierce the bird’s heart as she sings all night… |
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Starting to Say Good-bye to Ferriposted Friday, Jun 15 I was so choked up that I couldn’t bravo or whoop. Alessandra Ferri had just done Macmillan’s Manon with Roberto Bolle. She had transformed from powerful to passionate to pathetic. A feast for the eyes and the heart. This is what you go to see ballet for: the possibility of being utterly transported. When you watch her dance, yo… |
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Wendy Perron's First Blogposted Tuesday, Jun 12 Why Is Naharin's Work So Mesmerizing? |
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