When Janet Eilber, artistic director of the Martha Graham Dance Company, stepped through Jacob’s Pillow’s front curtain to introduce the group’s performance, she mentioned that this was the 94th year of the MGDC, which made it the oldest dance company in the United States. Actually Graham’s history travels twistily backward even further, when she and the Pillow’s founder, Ted Shawn, danced … [Read more...]
Born in Vail
Vail Dance Festival: Re-Mix NYC performs at City Center, November 3 through 6. Damien Woetzel is celebrating his tenth year as director of Colorado’s Vail Dance Festival. And whatever you might have expected from a former principal dancer in the New York City Ballet, Vail Dance Festival” ReMix NYC is probably not it. Still, you may have had glimpses of others of Woetzel’s projects before … [Read more...]
Dancing as the Leaves Fall
Fall for Dance returns to New York City Center for the eleventh time. Every autumn, as the leaves change color and begin to consider falling, Fall for Dance defines the verb differently: New Yorkers and savvy visitors buy bargain-price tickets and fall in love with dance—or at least with some of the twenty companies, small ensembles, pairs, and soloists who fill five mixed-bill programs at … [Read more...]
Martha Graham and her Heritage
The Martha Graham Dance Company brings new and old works to the Joyce. I only recently realized that Martha Graham must have been choreographing her evening-length Clytemnestra and Embattled Garden at more or less the same time. Both premiered during her company’s 1958 season. Perhaps she needed a respite from the marital quarrels, passions, and jealousies that precipitated the Trojan War. … [Read more...]
Foot Music
Dorrance Dance taps out a world premiere at Jacob's Pillow July 16 through 27. These days, we’re all wired. Or wirelessly connected. Sometimes walking down the street, I play a private game called “What would Mozart think?” Would he, for instance, worry that people walking along the street with things in their ears, talking loudly into the air, were lunatics? On the other hand, would he get … [Read more...]
Worlds Apart
L-E-V from Israel and Dorrance Dance debut at Jacob’s Pillow, July 24-28. Who are these creatures emerging from smoky dimness? Ghosts? Robots? Ghosts of robots? They can move in tiny jerks or so fluidly that they appear boneless—pale, androgynous, undulating figures assembling for. . .what? Viewed from another perspective, they are the stunning members of L-E-V, a dance company founded … [Read more...]
Oh Those Feet!
Silence doesn’t play a large role in Michelle Dorrance’s SOUNDspace. In the Danspace performances of Dorrance Dance/New York, the choreographer treats St. Mark’s Church as an acoustic instrument, and the building is happy to comply. Back in 1795, when its cornerstone was laid, ministers had no microphones, and the voices of parishioners hymning their lungs out could make it seem as if the high … [Read more...]