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Similarities

ICONS Choreographic Institute Thesis Dance Concert 2022
Dance Loft on 14
Washington DC
Sunday 15 May 2022 at 2 PM

by George Jackson
copyright 2022 by George Jackson

It is not surprising that there were resemblances among the dance works shown on this program. Vladimir Angelov was, after all, the teacher of all the choreographers and performers who were being presented. Angelov's pupils seem to think that dance is an unfolding of the human body - as if were a piece of clothing that had been wrapped up and needed to be unrolled before being worn. Some of the unfoldings on this bill were emotional, others were mechanical.

The most fascinating unfolding was a solo - Mimi Hoorami's "Richard" as danced by former child prodigy and later teen terror Rasta Thomas. "Richard" is this dance soliloquy's title and it is based on Shakespeare;s drama of King Richard. Thomas shows the king as royal, refined, thoughtful, capable of being evil and of noble actions. What a great performance!

 Other choreographers iwere Elizabeth Watson, Millicent Parker and William L. Miller Jr. but it was easy to confuse the dances, especially those in which the unravelling motions tended to become routine. One fine new dance per program, though, is a true gift! Thank you, Mr. Thomas and Ms, Noorami !

Architecture

Preview
Hylton Performing Arts Center
Manassas, Virginia
May 12, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Amazing that buildings planned before the big crash of 2008 are still being constructed! The city of Washington is full of them, especially in Near Northeast near the bus terminal and in Near Southeast near the baseball stadium. Mostly they remain vacant on completion but a few adventurous owners are letting theirs be used for the arts as free gallery space or as performance venues. It seems to pay off insofar as prospective tenants prefer a lively place to the haunted feel of empty rooms and corridors. Now, out of town in the middle of wherever, a new facility intended for the arts is opening its doors. The Hylton Performing Arts Center is located amidst stretches of forest and grassy slopes on a small campus of George Mason University in Virginia's Prince William County. In the distance towards the north and west are the Blue Ridge Mountains. 

Trajectory

"Dancing Across Borders" -  a Film by Anne Bass
Theater 2, E Street Cinema
Washington, DC
April 30, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Anne Bass did not set out to make a movie. She had acquired a video camera and was learning to use it when she was taken with the idea of documenting one of her projects: turning a Khmer dancer into a  classical ballet dancer. To tell the story from the start, even her earliest footage was needed and that it serves so well shows her aptitude for being a film maker. Does, though, the project itself - the transformation of a performer - make sense? 

Of Melancholy

"Wunderland", "Brahms on Edge", "Bolero"
The Washington Ballet
Harman Hall
Washington, DC
April 15, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

The Washington Ballet's artistic director, Septime Webre, does not strike me as a gloomy sort of guy. Prior to each performance, he steps jauntily in front of the curtains. There's a smile on his face as he says something snappy as well as informative to welcome the audience. Is that, though, merely a facade? Does he, in the dark of the night when drafting choreographer contracts, demand that additions to the repertory contain big doses of melancholy? This program certainly made it seem so, especially Karole Armitage's brand new Brahms ballet.

Scope

"Little Adorations", "+1/-1", "Entangled", "Last Look","Images"
CityDance Ensemble
Lansburgh Theatre, Harman Center for the Arts
Washington, DC
March 14, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Adding a second Paul Taylor work, "Images", to City Dance's repertory and performing it alongside Taylor's "Last Look" was this program's big news. Pieces by two of the company's own choreographers - Paul Gordon Emerson and Christopher K. Morgan - preceded the Taylor dances. One of these homegrown pieces - there were three in all - was a late addition to the program. I didn't know the work and missed seeing the program insert announcing it but when, instead of an intermission, the performance continued and a pair of dancers appeared on stage, I found myself certain that it was more Emerson choreography we were seeing. Indeed, it was - which woke me up to the realization that he must have achieved something akin to a signature style. 

Joy

Joy of Motion's Classical Repertory Dance Theatre
Lang Theater, Atlas Performing Arts Center
Washington, DC
March 13, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Love is at the root of the word amateur. Is there, though, a place for such love in today's world of high tech ballet performances by not just full fledged professional companies but also by professional student groups?

Hushed

"Haieff Divertimento", "Afternoon of a Faun", "A Midsummer Night's Dream" Duo, "Apollo"
The Suzanne Farrell Ballet
Eisenhower Theater
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
March 3, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Like good students dutifully doing homework in the campus library, Suzanne Farrell's dancers went through the motions of four exemplary pieces of 20th Century choreography. Above their heads one could almost see a sign requiring silence - at least on this opening night of the Farrell company's 5-day home season. Even the music, conducted by Emil de Cou, sounded muted. This isn't what one expects from Farrell, who became one of George Balanchine's most exciting dancers and also worked with the theatrically savvy Jerome Robbins and the extravagant Maurice Bejart!

Provenance, Protests, Promise

"Don Quixote"  & Triple Bill
The Israel Ballet
The Takoma Park / Silver Spring Performing Arts Center of Montgomery College
Silver Spring, Maryland
February 26 & 27, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Protests outside and inside the theater on opening night greeted the company due to its provenance in the state of Israel. The protests outside were vocal but well behaved; inside, one intense woman circulated through the incoming audience and handed out what looked like a program for the performance but instead was a pamphlet. Printed on its cover was a quote from Cervantes about illusion. At least three different issues were at the crux of these political actions. Israel was accused of war crimes in Gaza, legal apartheid between Jews and Non Jews, and using cultural exports like dance as manipulation. I'm all for civil demonstrations. Why, though, have there been none at performances of dance companies from Arab lands that practice political terror, gender apartheid and propaganda? 

Power

"Spartacus"
The Bolshoi Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
February 17, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

Refinement? Perfection of the body's line and pristine finishes to each and every motion? A rich and varied vocabulary of steps linked melodiously with one another and harmoniously to the music in order to hint at ideas and evoke emotions? Abandon all such values at "Spartacus", Yuri Grigorovich's block buster ballet. On opening night, February 16, the public's response mounted steadily to culminate in rounds of bravos and rhythmic applause. The second night's house, holding back a while, succumbed at the final curtain calls to express its fervor. Reports throughout the week were that audiences for all three* casts of Grigorovich's Soviet Communist propaganda piece approved vociferously of what they were seeing. Why? And especially why today in America? 

Dawn and Dusk

"The Sleeping Beauty"
The Maryinsky Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
February 11, 13 Matinee & 9 Public Dress Rehearsal, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

The Maryinsky Ballet used to be the bastion of "employ", the practice Hollywood in its heyday called type casting. Top talents, from Nijinsky and Pavlova to Baryshnikov and Makarova, were deemed unsuitable for certain sorts of parts due to their personality or anatomy. Our ballet too, when it was new, often adhered to the idea that aptitude depended in large part on appearance.  Americans, though, always liked to experiment and so set Saturday afternoons aside for casting dancers against the grain. Once in a while it paid off powerfully. During this "Sleeping Beauty" run at Kennedy Center, the Maryinsky has opted for experimentation with a vengeance. Odd casting wasn't reserved for just the Saturday matinee.   

Carats

"The Sleeping Beauty"
The Maryinsky Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
February 9, 2010

by George Jackson
copyright 2010 by George Jackson

How  a treasure is displayed tells lots about its custodians. One hopes it also reveals the treasure itself. That "The Sleeping Beauty", made for the Maryinsky Ballet 120 years ago by choreographer Marius Petipa and composer Peter Tchaikovsky, is the company's crowning achievement has become a matter of nearly absolute consensus. The production the Maryinsky performed on Tuesday night, to a house by no means empty despite another snowstorm, is said to date from 58 years ago when different aesthetics and politics dominated Russia than those which shaped the ballet's birth. What the audience actually saw, I suspect, involved decisions made not only in 1890 and 1952 but more recently. This current "Beauty" is streamlined - less than New York City Ballet's commuter friendly version - but certainly so compared to the "complete reconstruction" the Maryinsky brought us a few seasons back. Admirable on Tuesday was some of the performing and the music's and dancing's symphonic sweep. What was omitted, however, turned out to be more than mere ornamentation.