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Recommended this Week
I know, I know--I've been remiss about posting here. I've been out of town, I've been working on last revisions on a short story, and on my novel. But I've got lots of dance-going recommendations up my sleeve, starting with this: the Nrityagram Dance Ensemble Friday and Saturday at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Contemporary stagings of classical Odissi dance from India.
I haven't seen this company yet, but I've been hearing about them all year. The New Yorker's Joan Acocella loved them (scroll down toward the bottom), and so did Dance View Times' Leigh Witchel, along with a raft of other trusted sources. I'm looking forward to seeing for myself Saturday. See you there.
February 28, 2006 · 11:08 AM · Dance · Comments (0)
Joanna Berman's Mistaken Identity
I'm in Santa Barbara taking a much-needed mini-vacation with my husband, walking along the cliffs above the beaches, and checking out from email and this website and professional life in general until Monday. But I am in the Chronicle today with a story about retired San Francisco Ballet principal Joanna Berman returning to the stage for ODC/Dance's upcoming home season:
"A love story is playing out in a first-floor studio of the ODC Dance Commons, where two dancers push and pull and fretfully embrace as the strains of Mozart's clarinet concerto waft through the room. The man walks toward the studio mirror and lies on his back, bent legs in the air; the woman climbs atop them and curls up like a cat. Then she stands again and, never taking her eyes off the man's, takes slow, tender, regretful steps away.
"That was perfect at the end," ODC/Dance Artistic Director Brenda Way says, clasping her hands with pleasure. "But don't walk back like this." She bows her legs like a duck and waddles, an unmistakable parody of the ballet dancer's customary turnout.
"Really?" Joanna Berman says teasingly. "I was going to ask if I could finish like this." She rises high on her toes, arms forming a halo around her face, and takes tiny nibbling steps, bourreeing like a perfect toy dancer in a jewelry box.
It's an image many dance fans would pay dearly to see: Berman, one of the most beloved ballerinas in San Francisco Ballet history, looking like "The Sleeping Beauty's" Aurora reawakened by a kiss. Or perhaps the role her gently tilted torso and enormous, kind eyes most vividly evoke at this moment is Giselle, which is fitting. She danced "Giselle" for the final performance of her 18-year career at the Ballet, gliding like a benevolent spirit across the Opera House stage in 2002.
She was 36 then -- young to retire, even by ballet's unmerciful standards. But she wanted to have a family with her husband, violinist Rene Mandel. "I just knew the days of full-length ballets and pointe shoes and all that pressure were over," she says after rehearsal, her soft voice a breathy whisper. "I was a little fatigued and didn't want to deal with it anymore."
But she never said she wouldn't dance again. And so here she is four years and twin sons later, having traded a tutu for jazz shoes, dancing the central duet in Brenda Way's "Part of a Longer Story" for ODC/Dance's 35th anniversary season. "
Too bad the Chronicle photo department seems to have a hard time ID'ing their photos these days. The dancer in this shot, which ran with the story, appears to be Tina LeBlanc. Thanks to David Hicks, Diablo Ballet marketing manager and longtime Joanna Berman watcher, who gave me the heads-up even before I knew the story had run.
See you back in San Francisco.
February 23, 2006 · 09:34 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
SF Ballet's Joyous "Rodeo"
San Francisco Ballet's "Rodeo" is a must-see. From my review in the Chronicle:
"Mirth and whimsy reigned in all of the offerings on San Francisco Ballet's third program Thursday night, but rarely has the War Memorial Opera House been filled with so much sheer joy as upon the return of Agnes de Mille's "Rodeo." Bighearted, unabashedly theatrical and not performed by the company in more than a decade, it's the kind of work that makes dancers put aside the pyrotechnics and get back in touch with their basic humanity. The whole cast looked as if they were having a hoedown of a time in it.
They just don't make them like "Rodeo" anymore. Premiered in 1942, de Mille's tale of a loveless cowgirl was created when ballet in this country was reaching toward realism and American themes, when dance could be as much about storytelling as about steps. Today's choreographers would blush at the idea of ranch hands chasséing around on invisible horses. And yet still today when the waddle-legged dancers skip across the stage, we see the broncos and the dust.
Just as magical is Aaron Copland's stirring score, with the orchestra sounding appropriately mythical under Martin West's baton. Little wonder "Rodeo" is also enjoying renewed popularity in New York, as part of American Ballet Theatre's current season.
In recent years, San Francisco Ballet, increasingly more accustomed to dancing Balanchine and the 19th century classics, has looked self-conscious in this earnest kind of early 20th century work. To get a truly chilling take on Lew Christensen's "Jinx," for instance, you had to cross the bay to Oakland Ballet. But Thursday the dancers, directed by noted past Cowgirl Christine Sarry, seemed to relish the change of mode. "
For the full review, click here.
February 18, 2006 · 09:00 AM · Dance · Comments (0)
Allan Ulrich reviewed San Francisco Ballet's program 2 for Voice of Dance:
"The scent of revolution, ancient and modern, hovered in the air Tuesday (Feb. 14) at the War Memorial Opera House, where the San Francisco Ballet opened its first mixed repertory program of the season. Juxtapose George Balanchine’s Apollo, a virtual manifesto of neoclassicism, with the American premiere of Christopher Wheeldon’s Quaternary, a peek at the shape of neoclassicism in the 21st century, and you’ve already got a substantial banquet. In the middle and somewhat overshadowed by the titans surrounding it, came the world premiere of artistic director Helgi Tomasson’s Blue Rose, an affable trifle danced by a sextet of A-Team wonders. The program runs in alternating repertory through Feb. 25."
Janice Berman's review will appear in the Chronicle tomorrow; criticism-wise, I sat this out. I will say frankly that I was almost glad not to be writing about this program. It was one of those slates that was impossible to be passionate about, either positively and negatively. Aside from Gonzalo Garcia's turn in "Apollo," which was absolutely scintillating, I found this to be rather dull going. Unsurprisingly, all the dancers were wonderful. But Tomasson's "Blue Rose" can't hold a candle to his better recent works, like "7 for 8" and "Concerto Grosso." The music by Elena Kats-Cherin is for piano and violin, a mash of tango, ragtime, Baltic influences and more in which all the flavors blend into blandness. Tina LeBlanc has some wonderful whirling top solos, and Nicolas Blanc and Pierre-Francois Vilanoba have a high-flying showdown that throws off some sparks. But where are these people? In a dance hall or out in the fields? What's the milieu? Judanna Lynn's busy and gaudy silk calico dresses and Lisa J. Pinkham's dated lighting design don't help.
I was also less than bowled over by Christopher Wheeldon's "Quarternary," which I found also strangely dated. The final section, set to Steve Mackey, reminded me of some Joffrey rock ballet resurrected from the 1970's. I suppose I might not have minded this if there had been some sense of irony, of knowing quotation, but as it was I felt I'd entered a time warp. The saving grace was Katita Waldo, looking young and fiery. Muriel Maffre and Yuri Possokhov were exquisite in "Summer," which has several compelling images, though I've seen this Arvo Part music more movingly handled by other choreographers (the Bay Area's Janice Garrett among them). The Bach "Spring" was a wash of vague pastoralism for me, redeemed by top-notch dancing. "Winter," set to one of John Cage's crazy-clockwork-sounding prepared piano scores, was the strongest section to my mind, with its waggling hips and arms and its rather Alwin Nikolai-like, other planet atmosphere (Yuan Yuan Tan and Damian Smith danced the leads). But though I'm a steady admirer of Wheeldon's talents, I don't think this ballet is one for the ages.
I'm keeping my remarks short and inadequate because it's late, because I've just returned from a very helfpul critique of one of my new short stories at my writers group and I want to think about my fiction, and because Allan Ulrich makes the pro- case for "Quarternary" more animatedly than any objections I can raise here. So it's onward to program three, which contains one of my favorite ballets, Agnes de Mille's "Rodeo," and opens tomorrow (Thursday) night. Look for my review in the Chronicle on Saturday.
February 15, 2006 · 11:20 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
Yannis Adoniou's up-and-coming experimental dance company Kunst-Stoff made its debut at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theater over the weekend. As I write in my necessarily succinct review for the Chronicle:
" "As we close their eyes," created with input from two representatives of the LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired, had moments of promise. At one point Kara Davis and Jose Campos danced a clingy duet while Sheldon Smith and Nicole Bonadonna provided absurdly inadequate verbal descriptions. At another, Austin Forbord traced Bonadonna's body with a video camera, the live images imitating the sensation of touch. Jennifer Vogt's stage design drew a red string above the audience like a laser beam. It was anchored to the stage by a red drum that made mysterious noises when the string was touched.
But for most of the work, the effects remained too distant to compellingly engage the senses. When four mikes lowered to amplify the dancers' panting breath, when sounds continued as they moved through darkness, the ideas were understood rather than felt. I wondered if Kunst-Stoff weren't having trouble transferring their avant-gardism to a larger venue. "As we close their eyes" might have worked better as an installation at one of the more intimate spaces Kunst-Stoff usually plays, where the dancers are so close that you can feel their energy and smell their sweat. "
Click here for the full review.
February 13, 2006 · 02:18 PM · Dance · Comments (1)
Oakland Ballet Post-Mortem
Allan Ulrich analyzes the factors behind Oakland Ballet's demise in today's SF Chronicle, giving a vivid catalogue of the company's past glories, and sparing artistic director Karen Brown no criticism:
"For those of us who experienced the Oakland Ballet in action during its heyday, those of us who remember the significant chapter in Bay Area dance history written by founding Artistic Director Ronn Guidi, the mourning is mixed with rage. This didn't have to happen . . .
Guidi frequently ran up deficits, and by 1999, the board reportedly balked. But he had a vision and had left a substantial repertoire behind for his successor.
Brown was an unusual choice for the job. Although she had danced for many years with Dance Theatre of Harlem, she had never run a company (neither had Helgi Tomasson at the San Francisco Ballet, but that organization's extensive infrastructure provided a cushion). She does not choreograph, and, from all reports, rarely gave company class. It was disappointing that, at the beginning of her tenure, Brown tapped so little of Oakland's existing repertoire, but it wasn't entirely her fault. The stage at the Paramount Theatre, where the Oakland Ballet then performed, was always too narrow to accommodate many of Guidi's reconstructions.
Still, any company that radically changes its artistic personality overnight flirts with failure. Ironically, Brown's last season opener in October, an evening that juxtaposed revivals of Loring and Nijinska with her own commissions from Michael Lowe and Donald McKayle, was exactly how she should have programmed during her first season. She had made no previous attempt at imposing continuity and leading a gradual evolution, and if Guidi's wisdom was sought, it wasn't much heeded. Is it any wonder the dance crowd and funding sources were confused?"
Click here for the whole commentary.
February 08, 2006 · 09:50 AM · Dance · Comments (0)
Arrived early at the Main SF Public Library Tuesday for Michelle Tea's completely absorbing and highly recommended RADAR reading series (next one, with Chelsey Johnson, David Larsen, Joan Jett Blakk and Tina D’Elia, March 22 6 p.m.). Started browsing the Friends of the Library bookstore to kill time and picked up imperceptibly use copies of:
Big Cats, by Holiday Reinhorn
Esther Stories, by Peter Orner
Shine On, Bright and Dangerous Object, by Laurie Colwin
Primitive People, by Francine Prose
Grand total: $18. Four nearly-new books for the price of one, and the profit benefits the library. Why haven't I done this more often?
February 06, 2006 · 09:55 PM · Books · Comments (1)
Reading List
Recently my old paper of employ, the SF Examiner, asked 11 writers to dish on their latest reading passions. Regular readers of this site won't be surprised (and might be a little wearied--I'm moving on, I swear!) to learn I recommended the short stories of Laurie Colwin:
“I’ve become a mad proselytizer for Laurie Colwin after hearing her story ‘The Lone Pilgrim’ (Harper Perennial) on the public radio show ‘Selected Shorts.’ Colwin died at age 48 of a sudden heart attack in 1992, but all of her 10 books remain in print thanks to ardent word of mouth. I love her because she writes about the deeply private passions of outwardly sensible, buttoned-down people. To her, it seems, part of the charm of life is how we try and fail to neatly shape it. I’ll probably read her novels and even her cooking memoirs eventually, but of the short-story collections I’ve devoured, ‘The Lone Pilgrim’ is best.”
Scroll down in the story to learn why Daniel Handler is fired up by Jim Shepherd, Beth Lisick is raving about the new novel by Michelle Tea, and Peter Orner is rediscovering Joseph Mitchell.
February 05, 2006 · 05:03 PM · Books · Comments (0)
The Black Choreographers Festival is back for 2006. I wrote about it in today's SF Chronicle:
"Laura Elaine Ellis' face is bright with energy, and her glow has more to do with innate optimism than with the sunlight pouring into the lobby at Dance Mission Theater. "It's all about legacy," she says, leaning deeply.
"Longevity is just part of the African American culture," her colleague Kendra Kimbrough chimes.
"Each one teach one," Ellis says.
"And responsibility to the community," Kimbrough finishes.
These women know whereof they speak. Last year they took a dormant festival that had once galvanized the African American dance community and brought it roaring back to life. The Black Choreographers Festival: Here and Now picked up where the discontinued Black Choreographers Moving into the 21st Century had left off a full decade earlier -- and the new festival hit the ground running.
BCF 2005's two weeks of shows, overflowing with everything from hip-hop to Congolese tribal dancing, nearly sold out. Master classes and symposia were packed with eager and intrigued dancers. The new festival turned a profit: the seed money that would allow it to thrive, not just survive.
Now it's back for 2006, and it's bigger. Two slates of dancing -- featuring top Bay Area talent like Joanna Haigood and Robert Moses, along with hot visitors like prodigy tapper Jason Samuels Smith -- will run two weekends, first in San Francisco and then in Oakland. Ellis and Kimbrough also have cooked up a Dance on Film series, a symposium and a photography exhibition. And because so many artists were clamoring to participate, they've created a Next Wave Choreographers Showcase for African American choreographers just starting their careers. "
Click here for the full story.
February 05, 2006 · 04:59 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
Thanks to those who have written to me to express gratitude for being listed in the A-Z guide, and equal thanks to those who were not listed but wrote to bring their companies or studios to my attention. It's just further testament to the size and vibrancy of the Bay Area dance community. Here are a few more groups that didn't make it into the guide, but are well worth checking out:
City Dance Studios
Company C contemporary ballet
Mark Foerhinger Dance Project
Mahea Uchiyama Center for International Dance
Nancy Karp and Dancers
Click through to their websites to discover even more Bay Area dance.
February 02, 2006 · 08:57 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
My take on Ron K. Brown/EVIDENCE, in the Chronicle:
"To appreciate the stir Ronald K. Brown's "Grace" made when it premiered at Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in 1999, you have to understand the situation the company was in. For more than a decade since Ailey's death, the predicament remained the same: fabulous dancers, unworthy new dances. And then Brown's movement exploded onto the stage. Urgent and reverent, streetwise and soulful, it took the deep spirituality that makes Ailey's "Revelations" so enduring, and allowed it to speak in a completely contemporary tongue.
Talents of that magnitude don't announce themselves every day, and Brown reasonably became a great new choreographic hope. But last weekend's engagement of Brown's own New York-based company, Evidence, at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts worryingly suggested that Brown's promise is not being fully realized. To be sure, his work should be seen more often in San Francisco, and in longer runs (these two performances, presented by the center's performing arts series, sold out). But this was not the revelation of a bold American voice at its most articulate or eloquent. Most of the works looked like they had nothing much specific to say.
If speech metaphors come to mind, it's because Brown's movement language is so dazzling, and never more stunning than in "Grace," which the exceptional eight-member company danced as a closer. Imagine if heaven were a New York City nightclub, where the angels danced their way toward salvation to bass-thumping house music. Now imagine their steps seamlessly blend the earth-consecrating stampings of African tribal forms, the rhythmic fierceness of hip-hop, the polish and expansiveness of modern technique, and the ecstatic throes of gospel. Can't picture it? Then you know why Brown is such a phenomenon.
The problem is that even the most arresting new aesthetic, if rolled out by the yard and not anchored to ideas or shaped by formalism, becomes mind-numbing after a while. The only significant way to differentiate the two newer dances on the program, 2005's "Order My Steps" and 2003's "Come Ye," is to say that one was danced mostly to eerie string music by Terry Riley (heard taped), and the other to Nina Simone tunes; that one was costumed in street clothes, the other in white T-shirts and denim pants."
Click here for the full review.
February 01, 2006 · 02:59 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
Oakland Ballet's Demise
Monday I got a call from Oakland Ballet artistic director Karen Brown asking me to attend a meeting the next morning at which the company had "important news" to announce. I went, naively hopeful that she was about to unveil a major new grant or sponsorship. The meeting was in a small conference room with only four journalists present, and the mournful atmosphere made it immediately clear that the news was bad.
Here's my report in today's Chronicle, in which I tried to provide some context for the bigger-picture history being lost:
Oakland Ballet, the spirited troupe once internationally acclaimed for rousing revivals of rare classics, announced its dissolution Tuesday. The decision comes after a critically lauded 40th anniversary season intended to mark the company's comeback from financially troubled times.
"We're all heartbroken about it," artistic director Karen Brown said Tuesday in a meeting at downtown Oakland's East Bay Foundation. "We chose to look at our situation realistically. And coming off of an artistically successful season, it was a hard thing to look at."
Brown described the factors behind the closure as a "perfect storm." Ticket sales at the company's November shows fell $129,000 below target. The insolvent Calvin Simmons Theater, which Oakland Ballet had moved to for its fall season, is being closed by the city, leaving the company without a suitable home . . .
The dissolution came as sad news to many who followed the company's storied past. Oakland Ballet began as a scrappy community troupe in 1965, but entered the annals of dance history when founder Ronn Guidi decided to mount neglected American classics and lost milestones from Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. Working with legends like Leonide Massine and Agnes de Mille, and with key historical figures like the daughter of Bronislava Nijinska, he brought Oakland Ballet international renown for resurrecting major ballets with attention to detail and theatrical flair.
"This news (of the closure) wasn't unexpected, sadly," Guidi said, reached by phone. "My life's work is not gone -- the Joffrey Ballet, American Ballet Theater, the Royal Ballet and the Kirov all dance these works we brought back. Of course it's disappointing to see the home where we brought them back to life disappear. But I do understand times change."
Click here for the full story.
February 01, 2006 · 02:34 PM · Dance · Comments (1)
