this week in dance

TRISHA BROWN DANCE COMPANY’S 50th ANNIVERSARY

TBDC fiftieth anniversary celebrates collaboration between Trisha Brown and Robert Rauschenberg (photo by Jack Mitchell)

Who: Trisha Brown Dance Company
What: Fiftieth anniversary season
Where: The Joyce Theater, 175 Eighth Ave. at Nineteenth St.
When: May 24-29, $51-$71
Why: “I feel like this is the one time I can let the cat out of the bag and let you know just how dear this man is to me,” Trisha Brown said about her friend and longtime collaborator Robert Rauschenberg. “Bob understands how I construct movement.” Bob returned the compliment: “Particularly with Trisha, it’s always a challenge because she remains so unpredictably fresh.” Founded in 1970, Trisha Brown Dance Company will be celebrating its fiftieth anniversary — delayed two years because of Covid — with a special program at the Joyce celebrating the work Trisha and Bob did together.

Beginning with the fundraising UnGala on May 24, TBDC will present 1990’s Foray Forêt, which kicked off the Back to Zero cycle, a twenty-eight-minute piece of “delicate aberrations” for nine dancers, with costumes and visual design by Rauschenberg, set to marching band music; and 1991’s Astral Converted, part of Brown’s Valiant Cycle, a piece for eleven dancers, with motion-activated metal frame towers by Rauschenberg, set to John Cage’s specially commissioned hourlong “Eight,” for which Cage explained, “Intonation need not be agreed upon.” The works will be performed by former and current dancers including Cecily Campbell, Marc Crousillat, Kimberly Fulmer, Hsiao-jou Tang, Leah Ives, Amanda Kmett’Pendry, Kyle Marshall, Patrick McGrath, Jennifer Payán, and Stuart Shugg. There will be a curtain chat with members of the company following the May 25 performance.

DanceAfrica 2022: HOMEGROWN

Asase Yaa African American Dance Theater will perform at BAM’s annual DanceAfrica festival

Who: Asase Yaa African American Dance Theater, Bambara Drum and Dance Ensemble, Farafina Kan, Harambe Dance Company, LaRocque Bey School of Dance, BAM/Restoration Dance Youth Ensemble, DanceAfrica Spirit Walkers, more
What: DanceAfrica Festival 2022
Where: BAM Howard Gilman Opera House, 30 Lafayette Ave.
When: May 21 – June 2, many events free, Gilman dances $12.50 – $85, film screenings $16
Why: The coming of summer means the arrival of one of the best festivals of every year, BAM’s DanceAfrica. The forty-fifth annual event features the theme “Homegrown,” with five companies making return visits to BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House: Asase Yaa African American Dance Theater, Bambara Drum and Dance Ensemble, Farafina Kan, Harambe Dance Company, and LaRocque Bey School of Dance, along with the BAM/Restoration Dance Youth Ensemble and DanceAfrica Spirit Walkers, highlighting movement and music from Nigeria, Ghana, Guinea, Mali, and the Caribbean, accompanied by Arkestra Africa. Curated by artistic director Abdel R. Salaam, the festival also includes the Tribute to the Ancestors, Community Day, a Memorial Room, the DanceAfrica Bazaar with more than 150 vendors, dance workshops and master classes in Brooklyn Bridge Park and the Mark Morris Dance Center, the Water Your Roots Youth Dance Expo & Talent Show, the Council of Elders Roundtable “Legacy & Preservation,” Christopher Myers’s stained-glass work Be Lost Well (Stay in the House All Day), and a late night dance party with DJ YB.

FilmAfrica runs May 27 to June 2, consisting of more than two dozen films, from Moussa Touré’s 1997 TGV (followed by a Q&A with Touré and Amy Andrieux), Raymond Rajaonarivelo’s 1996 When the Stars Meet the Sea, and Amleset Muchie’s 2019 Min Alesh! to Mahamat-Saleh Haroun’s 2008 Sex, Okra, and Salted Butter, Balufu Bakupa-Kanyinda’s 2006 Juju Factory, and Dumisani Phakathi’s Don’t F*** with Me, I Have 51 Brothers and Sisters.

THE GREAT DUMBO DROP

THE GREAT DUMBO DROP
DUMBO, Brooklyn
Saturday, May 21, free, 3:00 – 8:00
dumbo.is

DUMBO Drop 2022 is set for May 21, a block party with live music, food and drink, art, prizes, the testing of the wind, and elephants falling from the sky. Among this year’s performers and activities are a sing-along with the New York City Kids Club, tap-dancing by Camila Aldet, Glam Expressway, cheerleading, a fashion show, dancing to a brass band, DJ Kyndal Marie, jugglers, an FDNY photo zone, Melissa Joy Manning, Fogo Azul NYC, wine tastings, boxing demonstrations, face painting, archery, biking, and more. Such galleries as A.I.R. Gallery and Undercurrent Gallery will be hosting exhibitions and walkthroughs, along with an art wall curated by CAM and Jaimie Walker (who designed the 2022 souvenir elephant parachute), Talking Portraits with Doménica García, and raffles benefiting DUMBO’s Title I public schools, the Dock Street Middle School and PS307 Elementary School.

Among the participating eateries are Seamore’s, Superfine, Westville, Butler, Randolph Bar, Bread and Spread, Em Vietnamese Bistro, and Time Out Market. Be sure to get there by 5:00 when the elephants float through the air around Washington St., followed at 7:45 by the Disco Drop. You can get raffle tickets from $20 to $3,000 here, making you eligible for such prizes as a shopping spree, an ice-cream party, jewelry, a hotel staycation, and a rooftop party.

“BACK TO THE STREETS” DANCE PARADE

Who: Eduardo Vilaro, Heidi Latsky, Rich Medina, more
What: Sixteenth annual Dance Parade and DanceFest
Where: Parade starts at Twentieth St. & Broadway, DanceFest in Tompkins Square Park
When: Saturday, May 21, free, noon – 7:00
Why: After two years off because of Covid, Dance Parade has returned. On May 21 from noon to seven, more than ten thousand dancers and musicians will participate in the sixteenth event, aptly dubbed “Back to the Streets.” The 2022 grand marshals are Eduardo Vilaro of Ballet Hispánico, Heidi Latsky of Heidi Latsky Dance, and DJ Rich Medina. “I’m proud to headline New York City’s largest dance event focused on cultural representation and diversity,” Vilaro said in a statement. “Movement and community is so vital to our well being which the pandemic stole from us. We look forward to being a part of Dance Parade’s citywide celebration.”

The parade kicks off at Twentieth St. & Broadway, with the viewing stand located at Fourth Ave. & Eighth St. DanceFest takes place from three to seven in Tompkins Square Park, with dozens of performers on three stages from across the dance spectrum and the globe (Ukranian folk dance, Afro-Brazilian percussion, Argentine tango, Chinese classical, hip-hop, street jazz, breakdancing, flamenco, belly dance, Afro-Caribbean, majorette, Indonesian, Bolivian, Mexican, ballet, Bollywood, more) along with dance demonstrations, education outreach, dance battles, a Soul Train line, and other activities, all free and open to everyone.

DANCE WITH BACH

After two years, Dance with Bach is back (photo courtesy the Sebastians / Christopher Caines Dance)

Who: The Sebastians, Christopher Caines Dance
What: Music and dance celebrating Johann Sebastian Bach
Where: Good Shepherd-Faith Presbyterian Church, 152 West Sixty-Sixth St. between Amsterdam & Columbus Aves.
When: Friday, May 20, and Saturday, May 21, $20 virtual, $30-$50 in-person and virtual
Why: In 2014, the Sebastians, a chamber ensemble named after Johann Sebastian Bach, joined forces with Christopher Caines Dance to present Henry Purcell’s 1692 opera, The Fairy Queen, an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, merging baroque music with modern dance. Following a two-year delay because of the pandemic, the two companies are back together for Dance with Bach, a trio of Bach suites choreographed by Christopher Caines, taking place May 20-21 at the Good Shepherd-Faith Presbyterian Church by Lincoln Center as well as streaming online, photographed by multiple cameras. The program begins with Jean-Marie Leclair’s Ouverture from Deuxième récréation de musique d’une execution facile, Op. 8, followed by Bach’s Cello Suite No. 6 in D major, BWV 1012, performed on viola da spalla; English Suite No. 5 in E minor, BWV 810 for harpsichord; and Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, BWV 1067 for flute, strings, and continuo.

“We are thrilled to finally bring Dance with Bach to fruition,” Sebastians artistic director Jeffrey Grossman said in a statement. “Christopher and the dancers had put in countless hours of rehearsal when we were forced to cancel our May 2020 performances. We discussed ways of producing the project virtually, with recorded music and dancers wearing masks, but decided there would be too many compromises. After such a long journey, the experience of being back in the same room with the dancers, to feel their energy and respond musically to their physicality, is incredible.” Caines added, “I am one lucky choreographer to have had this band really throw down the gauntlet by asking me to choreograph three iconic masterpieces by their namesake master composer. What a challenge! And my dancers could not be more thrilled at the prospect of taking the stage backed up by one of the finest baroque ensembles anywhere.”

The works will be danced by CCD members Michael Bishop, Elisa Toro Franky, Genaro Freire, Jeremy Kyle, Michelle Vargo, and Leigh Schanfein in addition to student dancers from New York Theatre Ballet School (Charlotte Anub, Audrey Cen, Josephine Ernst, Madeline Goodwin, Clara Rodrigues-Cheung, Emely Leon Rivas, Eva Sgorbati). The ensemble consists of David Ross on flute, Nicholas DiEugenio on violin, Daniel Lee on viola da spalla and violin, Jessica Troy on viola, Ezra Seltzer on cello, Nathaniel Chase on violone, and Grossman on harpsichord.

STEPHEN PETRONIO COMPANY AT THE JOYCE

Stephen Petronio Company rehearses at Snug Harbor for Joyce season (photo by Lance Reha)

STEPHEN PETRONIO COMPANY
Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at 19th St.
May 17-22, $10-$71
212-645-2904
www.joyce.org
petron.io

“What does it mean to be out in front of you tonight, to show up for you after so long?” Stephen Petronio asks in a program note for his company’s upcoming season at the Joyce, running May 17-22. “SPC has been coming to the Joyce each spring for almost forty years — a rite, a contract as celebration. To have that interrupted by Covid is like having our oxygen taken away. We are back and breathing now! We come before you tonight to show you that we have survived, that we are still here, in some ways stronger than ever, and that dance is a kind of social glue that keeps us all connected.”

SPC’s Joyce program begins with the world premiere of New New Prayer for Now, created as a virtual piece for the company during the lockdown to celebrate online collaboration, set to original music by Monstah Black and renditions of “Balm in Gilead” and “Bridge Over Troubled Water” recorded with the Young People’s Chorus of New York City (YPC), directed by Francisco J. Nuñez; the costumes are by Marine Penvern, with lighting by Ken Tabachnick. Following a pause, SPC continues its “Bloodlines” series honoring important choreographers who influenced Petronio with his mentor Trisha Brown’s 1973 Group Primary Accumulation, restaged by Shelley Senter. The online version with four dancers in white on a wooden bridge was breathtaking, so it will be fascinating to see it now live indoors.

After an intermission, the company presents a restaging of Petronio’s Bloom, which premiered at the Joyce in 2006 and features music by Rufus Wainwright based on the poetry of Walt Whitman (“Unseen Buds,” “One’s-Self I Sing”) and Emily Dickinson (“‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers”) and the Latin Mass, sung live by YPC, with choral arrangements by Nuñez; the costumes are by Rachel Roy, with lighting by Tabachnick. The May 19 performance will be followed by a Curtain Chat with members of the company, which consists of Jaqlin Medlock, Kris Lee, Larissa Asebedo, Liviya England, Mac Twining, Nicholas Sciscione, Ryan Pliss, Tess Montoya, and Tiffany Ogburn. “It’s an emotional time,” Petronio says in the above preview of the Joyce season. If you haven’t yet seen this extraordinary company, you have only yourself to blame.

DONNA UCHIZONO COMPANY: WINGS OF IRON

Donna Uchizono’s Wings of Iron will have its world premiere this week at BAC (photo courtesy Donna Uchizono Company)

Who: Donna Uchizono Company
What: World premiere of Wings of Iron
Where: Baryshnikov Arts Center, Howard Gilman Performance Space, 450 West 37th St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
When: May 18-21, $25, 7:30
Why: For more than thirty years, Donna Uchizono has been creating innovative dance works that dig deep into the mind and human emotions while exploring the limits of our physical body. In such pieces as State of Heads, Thin Air, longing two, and Out of Frame, Uchizono, who was born on a US Army base in Tokyo and is proudly “the first and only American-born choreographer of Asian ancestry in the history of modern dance,” has developed a unique movement language that is as unpredictable as it is thrilling.

Her latest evening-length piece, Wings of Iron, has been in the works since 2017 and was originally scheduled to premiere at Baryshnikov Arts Center in May 2020 but was delayed because of the pandemic. A copresentation with the Chocolate Factory, Wings of Iron will now have its world premiere May 18-21 at BAC’s Howard Gilman Performance Space. “Listening is a key to my creative practice,” Uchizono said in a statement. “My creative research takes two to four years to develop a new work with its own physical vocabulary and structure. Dedicated to charting new territory with each dance, my process involves ‘hearing’ the work. I shape conceptual ideas into a physical language specific to each piece, carefully ‘listening’ as the dialogue with the dance itself is revealed. As that dialogue unfolds, a new dance vocabulary emerges that has the imprint of my own history while remaining highly specific to the work itself. My work demands a physical and mental rigor and I am drawn to a redefined sense of ‘virtuosity’ that extends the markers of skill and excellence to push against human standards of patience, duration, and minute, intensely detailed movement. My embrace of unseen undercurrents leads to the unexpected that traverses a spectrum of the discovery of the extraordinary in the vulnerable human experience.”

Wings of Iron will be performed by Bria Bacon, Natalie Green, Molly Lieber, and Pareena Lim, with an original score by okkyung lee and lighting by Joe Levasseur. The visual design features chairs and giant portraits of the dancers. “It is with worried excitement, hopeful relief, and a tinge of cautiousness that we announce the world premiere,” Uchizono wrote in an email blast. Wings of Iron “examines what it takes to remain humane in these charged times, providing a forum for both performer and audience to share in the weight of a vulnerability that is simultaneously public and private.”