Footlights
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Wednesday, October 5, 8:00 p.m.
Paul Taylor Dance Company, $25
Paul Taylor is the last living member of the pantheon that created America’s indigenous art of modern dance. At an age when most artists’ best work is behind them, Taylor has continued to win acclaim for the vibrancy, relevance, and power of his recent creations as well as for his classics.
The Company makes its third Williams Center appearance with a program that showcases Taylor’s landmark Beloved Renegade. Inspired by Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass and set to Poulenc’s Gloria, this dance was praised by The New York Times critic Alastair Macauley as “The best new choreography in 2008. Deeply moving…a work of philosophic as well as dramatic power.”
The program also features Taylor’s loving tribute to sensuous tango culture, Piazzolla Caldera, called “stunning” by Financial Times of London critic Clement Crisp, who praised it as a dance that “seethes and flares with sexuality and develops a huge erotic charge. One of Taylor’s most astonishing (even for him) creations.” And finally there’s Mercuric Tidings (1982), described by Clive Barnes as “danced for the sheer joy of it, the controlled expenditure of animal energy, poetry expressed as a time and motion of study, young people cavorting with the kinetic propensities of young godlets,” set to the symphonic music of Franz Schubert.
Wednesday, November 9, 8:00 p.m.
Aszure Barton and Artists: Busk, $18
Class of 1973 Concert
From her wildly eclectic musical choices (ranging from French Canadian folk and Gypsy tunes to Klezmer and Slavonic choral hymns) to the casual and conversational tone of her original dance vocabulary, Aszure Barton creates dances that are joyful, exuberant, sassy, playful, and quirky, and like nothing else you’ve ever seen before. Her work possesses wonderful musicality—Mikhail Baryshnikov once compared it to that of the young Mark Morris—and her athletic and dramatic dancers own the movement so completely that it appears they are orchestrating the music as they dance.
The word busk comes from the Spanish root word buscar, meaning “to seek.” With original and evocative music by Russian violinist and composer Lev Ljova Zhurbin along with musical source material from Slavic lands, the thrillingly unpredictable Busk retains Aszure Barton’s signature style of pondering the thin line between humor and sadness.
Saturday, January 28, 8:00 p.m.
Illstyle & Peace Productions, $18
Albert Seip Concert
This Philadelphia-based multicultural dance company, founded in 2002 by Brandon “Peace” Albright, of Rennie Harris Puremovement, and Forrest “Getumgump” Webb, of the Illstyle Rockers, creates work rooted in contemporary and old school hip-hop. The current repertory, Same Spirit Different Movement, celebrates the urban spirit of hip-hop with a dynamic overlay of innovation and verve.
The New York Times dance critic Roslyn Sulcas wrote, “the ensemble displayed some of the most dazzling breaking techniques I’ve ever seen, while Mr. Albright’s choreography possessed a sly humor and an adept sense of spatial composition. Watching these dancers was like watching the greatest ballet virtuosos, each fighting gravity and the appearance of effort, and demanding and getting the impossible from the human body. They were fabulous.”
Sulcas cited the company’s performance at Chuck Davis’s Dance Africa Festival at the Brooklyn Academy of Music as one of her “top five” dance events of 2010.
Wednesday, March 21, 8 p.m.
Spirit of Uganda, $25
With the melodic pulse of standing drums, enthralling traditional dances, and gorgeous call-and-response vocals, Spirit of Uganda brings to life the sounds and movements of East Africa. This touring ensemble of 22 Ugandan youth shares histories, legends, and traditional beliefs, along with contemporary music and dance, of their homeland. Ambassadors for Ugandan’s two million orphans, these children personify the resilience and courage of Africa’s next generation, as they promote awareness of Uganda’s rich cultural heritage and its struggles to surmount today’s many challenges.
The Village Voice wrote: “These are young, proud, and marvelously spirited musicians and dancers. Whatever these performers do, in whatever different bright attire, they do with discipline, fervor, and joy….The pounding feet and agile bodies, the drums and vibrant human voices, all send a message—one of courage and hope.”
(Also listed in Sound Alternatives series.)