Dance

The Philadelphia company’s response to the pandemic was to try to develop online dance compelling enough that people would pay for it. The result is BalletX Beyond, which streams three new concert dance videos every second month on a subscription basis. One of the latest to create work for BalletX Beyond is former NYCB principal and Broadway star Robbie Fairchild, whose The Cycle was inspired by, and filmed at, Longwood Gardens. – Harper’s Bazaar

The video sees Boston Dynamics’ entire lineup of robots — the humanoid Atlas, the dog-shaped Spot, and the box-juggling Handle — all come together in a bopping, coordinated dance routine set to The Contours’ “Do You Love Me.” – The Verge

The New Jersey-based troupe, which presented seasons around the state and in New York City and toured abroad as well, commissioned and performed 17 new works over its eight-year history. The pandemic forced the group to go on hiatus as of April 1; with no performance fees or ticket income, its board decided to dissolve the company as of Dec. 31. – NJArts.net

“Drawing from a lexicon of hip-hop-inspired moves, … the micro-dances of TikTok are typically front-facing and most animated from the hips up, tailored to the vertical frame of a smartphone screen. Governed by time limits of 15 or 60 seconds, they also tend to stay in one place; you can do them pretty much anywhere. While these TikTok dances might seem purely fun and frivolous, there’s an art to creating and performing them in such a way that gets attention.” – Dance Magazine

Enter “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” which had also capitalized on the popularity of “Masked Singer” to create its own “Masked Dancer” stunt. After those segments became viral hits and the “Masked Singer” team saw how well they played, Fox alternative entertainment and specials president Rob Wade said he was finally convinced. – Variety

No, we can’t all have random dance partners this year, so let’s go with a throwback to 1908. “The waltz may have a reputation as the ultimate social dance for partners — the way it is traditionally performed at the balls — but there is another interpretation, one that resonates in this pandemic year of physical distancing. More than a century ago, the Viennese dancer Grete Wiesenthal transformed the waltz into a powerful form of solo movement.” – The New York Times

Tiny Pretty Things is about as realistic as you might expect on every level … except dance. The show “may have outrageous levels of drama, mystery and murder, but the ballet is undoubtedly the best part of the show. That’s likely because nearly every actor playing a ballerina in the show is a trained dancer in real life. Those dancers’ influences are what make the portrayal of ballet so realistic in the show.” – CBR

Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, who’s made more than a dozen short dance films since the COVID lockdowns began, and Corey Baker, creator of the (in)famous Swan Lake Bath Ballet, tell a reporter about how, as Baker put it, “we knew we had to make it all up” and how they handled the snafus they didn’t yet know to expect. – Dance Magazine

“What is the history of this strange protruding skirt which allegedly gets its name from the French children’s word cucu, meaning ‘bottom’? Pointe took a look back at some important moments in innovation,” from Marie Taglioni’s bell-shaped skirt in the 1832 premiere of La Sylphide to the ten-foot-wide social-distancing tutu that the Dutch National Ballet developed this year. – Pointe Magazine

Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, as skillful as its members are, basically performs affectionate parodies of classical ballet, and the dancers all have drag names (including the ones taking male roles). The men in the new San Francisco troupe Ballet22 may sometimes wear tutus, but they dance as themselves and the choreography is serious. – San Francisco Chronicle

As colleagues and fans in other countries look on with either envy or incredulity, ballet dancers in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and other cities keep coming to the theater, rehearsing, and performing. Outbreaks happen regularly within companies and dancers have to quarantine, but onward they go. – Gramilano (Milan)

Wendy Perron makes a list and some recommendations: It’s been a good year for dance history. Most of these books explore the past, deepening and broadening what we know and how we know it. – Wendy Perron

Life for dancers is not great right now, not great at all. A 25-year-old ballerina: “It’s absolutely heartbreaking. Dealing with the changes emotionally has been the hardest part for me. You have to stay motivated without any promise of anything coming up. It takes a lot of mental strength. It’s very isolating.”- San Diego Union-Tribune

Try the contemporary dance version of A Christmas Carol. Yes, Ebeneezer can dance. – Dance Magazine

Considering that it’s not an easy time for dance companies, the Times says, the Ailey is making wonderful choices for its current and future audiences. “Since Dec. 2, the company has been releasing themed programs mixing archival and newly filmed performance excerpts with taped conversations about the dances and the moment.” – The New York Times

“The art of dance is distinct in being the single art in which the body is the most easily decontextualized from the surrounding work—in order to be consumed as if it existed in and for itself. Yet, in the present controversies that swirl about nineteenth-century ballet classics such as La Bayadère, those which display the racial stereotypes of Orientalism, the problem is more complex than that of bodies alone.” – MassReview

“No choreographer has done more to extend their repertoire during lockdown than Amsterdam-based Annabelle Lopez Ochoa. By the beginning of December, she was about to premiere her eleventh new filmed work using Zoom, and another two have been made digitally to be performed on stage.” – Bachtrack

Gia Kourlas reports on how Miami City Ballet took its version of George Balanchine’s staging — given a tropical look for the company three years ago — and reshaped it for outdoor performance, with costume tweaks and new projections. – The New York Times

In February, the Korea National Ballet was on tour in the city of Daegu when a major coronavirus outbreak arose; the company cancelled the remaining performances and ordered its dancers to self-isolate. Na Dae-han, a corps dancer who had achieved some fame on Korean reality TV, skipped off to Japan with his girlfriend instead, and he was sacked. Now the National Labour Relations Commission has ruled Na’s dismissal unfair and told the KNB to take him back. – Gramilano (Milan)

Jamal Sterrett, 24, from St Ann’s in Nottingham, performs a style known as bruk up, which originates from Jamaica. It means thinking about your body broken up in pieces. BBC

And that’s a problem for the future. The Nutcracker is “the production that helps make a lot of others possible. That holiday ballet can account for 20% of many companies’ ticket sales, and, in the case of a major company like Chicago’s Joffrey, about half of its annual earned revenue. Ashley Wheater, the artistic director of The Joffrey, told us the company has lost more than $12 million in earnings during the pandemic and has had to cancel newer works they had planned.” – NPR

There’s little question that Kayoko Everhart is a competent dancer: she’s been with CND for 16 years and a principal for eight. Last month, after a public competition, she was awarded the highest rank, estrella (equivalent to the Paris Opera Ballet’s étoile) — with a 20% pay raise. Then her colleagues found out that she had recently started dating the artistic director, former New York City Ballet star Joaquín de Luz. (in Spanish) – El Mundo (Spain)

Chloé Lopes Gomes, a French citizen, who joined the Staatsballett as a corps de ballet member in 2018, said she had faced recurrent racial abuse from her ballet mistress. In an interview with the Guardian she also accuses the company of institutional racism after managers failed to act even after various incidents were brought to their attention. – The Guardian

It could be an established company with a full-fledged theater and studios, a long-term residency at an institution, a live-work space such as a loft, or even just a regular job with a salary and benefits. Choreographer Kimberly Bartosik explores what the concept means for her and for such colleagues as Bebe Miller, Kyle Abraham, and Jonah Bokaer. – Dance Magazine