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Good news--I've just placed a short story with ZYZZYVA, the literary magazine of West Coast writers and artists. I've been working hard on my fiction over the last year and I'm excited to start getting it out into the world. My story "Bolero" (no spoilers here; you'll have to read it to find out why I've titled it thus) will appear in the immediately forthcoming spring issue. It should hit the stands within the next few months. I can promise that it's short, potent, and arrestingly realistic about a titillating tough topic. I'll certainly let you know when to go out and grab a copy.
January 29, 2007 · 08:00 PM · Books · Comments (0)
The Chronicle commissioned me to write a series of articles on African Americans in dance in advance of the third Black Choreographers Festival, which I preview here. I also talked to a sampling of black choreographers from both the Bay Area and beyond about the lingering assumptions behind that old genre label "black dance":
"A lot has changed since Katherine Dunham and Pearl Primus took the 1940s concert dance world by storm, since Arthur Mitchell startled audiences by partnering white ballerinas at the New York City Ballet, since Donald McKayle created "Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder" to protest injustices in the South.
Hip-hop dancing, with its roots in the African diaspora, is an international phenomenon. Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre is now one of the most popular troupes in the world, and contemporary choreographers as distinct as Bill T. Jones and Ron K. Brown are at the forefront of their field.
And yet when UC Davis Professor Halifu Osumare leads a panel discussion next month as part of the Black Choreographers Festival, she hopes to revive an old question: "What is black dance?"
The terminology has long bothered her. "The label buys into the racial divide in America: 'white dance' versus 'black dance,' " she says. "But we're a culture of sound bites and shortcuts. It's so easy to say 'black dance' and think people know what you're talking about. If black choreographers are doing anything and everything in dance, 'black dance' is a misnomer. I say 'dance by black choreographers.' "
Osumare is hardly alone: 'Black dance' as a genre label is no longer used as a crutch as it was through most of the 20th century. But conversations with leading black choreographers suggest that the concept still provokes heated debate.
The Chronicle asked four black dancemakers, working in San Francisco and beyond, a deliberately open-ended question: What do you think are the main challenges to African Americans in dance today? Their answers were as individual as their aesthetics, and yet the recurring themes made clear that the assumptions behind "black dance" may still be with us, even if the label is not."
Click here for the full story.
And I talked with Aesha Ash--formerly of New York City Ballet and now with Lines Ballet--and Ikolo Griffin--formerly of San Francisco Ballet and now with Smuin Ballet--about what it's like to be a black dancer in the American ballet world. Click here for that story, and for a particularly beautiful photo of Aesha. Incidentally, according to my site stats, "Aesha Ash" brings more ballet fans to this site than any other ballerina (strong runners up being San Francisco Ballet's Yuan Yuan Tan, Lorena Feijoo, and Sarah Van Patten, with Nutnaree Pipit-Suksun quickly gaining ground).
The Chronicle, you'll notice if you visit sfgate.com lately, is becoming much more multi-media. One immediate perk is this video footage of highlights from Black Choreographers Festivals past. Click through for some great clips of New Style Motherlode, Jason Samuels Smith, Diamono Coura, and others.
January 29, 2007 · 07:45 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
My review of the San Francisco Ballet gala in today's Chronicle:
"Galas take the temperature of their times, and the tone was subtly sober Wednesday as the San Francisco Ballet started its 74th season. A subdued audience claimed its seats with surprising promptness, depth of feeling marked the most affecting dancing, and individual artistry trumped odd programming choices. The austerity was strangely refreshing: This was a gala in which works of substance, and not the usual sugary bonbons, most satisfied our appetites.
That's not to say there weren't moments over the two hours of virtuosic movement to prompt smiles. Who wouldn't grin at the crisp spontaneity of Kristin Long and Joan Boada in Artistic Director Helgi Tomasson's "Soirees Musicales," or giggle at Tina LeBlanc's whirlwind phrasing in Gerald Arpino's "L'Air D'Esprit"?
Yet an elegiac intensity marked the finest performances. Lorena Feijoo, always a committed artist and often a gala standout, danced the second act pas de deux from "Giselle" with such pathos that even viewers unfamiliar with the story could not help but feel for her Albrecht, the princely Tiit Helimets. He mourned at her graveside with beautifully placed extensions and feather-soft landings; she pleaded for his life with urgent, fluttery jumps and arms gently rounded in the Romantic style. From the worry on her striking face, you could almost picture the full corps of ghostly Wilis behind her, commanding that she dance her lover to death."
Click here for the full review.
January 26, 2007 · 12:06 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
In the midst of all the ballet bustle, my review of Shinichi Iova-Koga's new solo show is also in today's Chronicle:
"It's always heartening, as an observer of the local dance ecology, to find a young maverick artist so gifted that audiences seem to discover him through natural buzz about his talent. Such has been the case with Shinichi Iova-Koga, who divides his time between Berlin and the Bay Area, and who founded his performance collective inkBoat in 1994.
Iova-Koga is part of the Bay Area's butoh boom; he studied with Berkeley's famed Koichi and Hiroko Tamano, themselves disciples of Japan's Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the two progenitors of this darkly absurd, apocalyptic dance form. Like many of his generation, Iova-Koga has cast off butoh's calcified cliches -- the shaved head, the white body paint, the glacial pacing and practically patented look of horrified despair -- and yet retained its expressionistic, grotesque essence. He's also found a circle of brilliant avant-garde collaborators in sound and design. Call what Iova-Koga does butoh or post-butoh or whatever you want; it amounts to great movement theater. And judging from the crowds at his 2005 duet "Ame to Ame," the word seemed to be getting out about that.
So it was surprising, Friday night, to witness the engaged but small turnout at Brava Theater for "Milk Traces." Granted, "Milk Traces," which repeats next month at the cozier NOHspace, is small-scale, a 75-minute solo. But each of its simple elements is deeply thoughtful and apt, from Sheila Antonia Bosco's spine-tingling soundscape to Allen Willner's fog-drenched lighting to Cassie Terman's poetic fragments (printed only in the program). And the images and provocations Iova-Koga conjures with just his body and a few props amount to a worthy teaser for inkBoat's more ambitious premiere with experimental music group Nanos Operetta coming in July, and a brilliant performance in itself."
Click here for the full review.
January 26, 2007 · 12:00 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
Grotto Nights Returns
Mark your calendar: Grotto Nights--the reading series produced by the office co-op where I work--are back:
"Driving Obssession
Grotto Nights is back and it's furious, fast, and free. Join us for a night of reportage, science, and art in the form of a subversive Valentine to our cars.
When: MONDAY, FEBRUARY 5 at 7 p.m. (doors open at 6:30 -- seats available on a first come first served basis -- early arrival is highly recommended). After the event there will be a party for audience and performers.
Where: MEZZANINE (444 Jessie Street@ Mint, San Francisco 94103) -- No-Host Bar/21+.
Fee: Unlike gasoline, it's FREE!!
DRIVING OBSESSION is a fond, provocative look at our obsession with cars and driving, and how it's changing the world.
THE PROGRAM:
Bucky Sinister reads his show-stopping poem on NASCAR.
Lisa Margonelli reads about the unexpected perils of cheap gasoline from her new book Oil On the Brain: Adventures from Pump to Pipeline.
Dr. Graham Fleming of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory explains how he and others are using synthetic biology to create fuels for the future.
Dan Hoyle does a scene from his hit one-man show now playing at the Marsh--Tings Dey Happen-- based on the year he spent studying oil and politics in Nigeria on a Fulbright scholarship.
Baghdad taxi driver/art student Mounaf Shaker's documentary film Omar Is My Friend shows his search for gasoline, a living, and hope in today's Iraq.
Andy Raskin tells a first person story about driving, dating, and the genetic component of parking.
The musical group The Loins (featuring writer Beth Lisick) does a surprise performance of an car-based piece of literature.
JD Beltran shows two short films about love, obsession, and cars from her "Secrets" series.
Ben Baumgartner shows his latest body of NASCAR-themed art.
Matt Jalbert shows his photographs of crashed and abandoned cars."
See you there.
January 25, 2007 · 03:45 PM · Books · Comments (0)
The San Francisco Ballet's 74th season launches Wednesday with the opening gala. Allan Ulrich profiles departing ballerina Muriel Maffre in today's Chronicle. Meanwhile, the paper asked me to highlight some up-and-coming young dancers. I chose Jaime Garcia Castilla, Frances Chung, Rory Hohenstein, Nutnaree Pipit-suksun, Lily Rogers, and Sarah Van Patten. Click here to find out why. And look for my review of the gala in Friday's Chronicle.
January 21, 2007 · 11:31 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
This was a fun little ditty to write for the SF Chronicle--and Penni Gladstone snagged some colorful photos:
"The rest of San Francisco may have been frigid Sunday afternoon, but it was positively tropical in the Palace of Fine Arts' Dressing Room B, where two dozen women in bikini tops and towering headdresses practiced hip swivels and fluffed the pom-poms on each other's grass skirts.
"They're saying it's a good crowd out there," called Lisa Aguilar, director of the Te Mana O Te Ra, a Tahitian dance company. She wore a batik-printed robe and a priestess-style hat, and she looked like she meant business. "You set the momentum. You're going to make this rock 'n' roll for the rest of the afternoon. All right?"
"Five, six, seven, eight," the dance captain shouted as Aguilar looked on sternly, and the room filled with the swish of straw and muffled calls of "Oh sorry, sorry" as the women ran through their steps -- and into one another -- in the too-tight space.
But what are close confines to keep you from rehearsing when an appearance in the 29th annual San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival is on the line? More than 100 dance groups from across Northern California converged to compete for about 25 spots Friday through Monday.
The auditions were packed with "It's a Small World" moments: flamenco dancers in polka-dot shawls charging to their warm-up room, while Indian folk dancers folded sari pleats; a Polish dancer in embroidered black pants stopping a 14-year-old Peruvian star to check out his badge, which bore a picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
Korean performers floated onstage with feathered fans, while Mexican folklorico mujeres high-fived around the water cooler. Tango vixens waved their hands -- the silent backstage stand-in for clapping -- as a Bharatanatyam practitioner rushed for the wings, panting. It could have been a pep rally for the United Nations.
But it was all local. And the pressure was on. The house was nearly full, packed not only with friends and family, but also curious dance fans happy to check out the smorgasbord of styles for just $7 a day. And in the center row sat the eight expert panelists there to decide which groups would win a coveted spot in June's big show."
Click here for the rest.
January 18, 2007 · 10:57 AM · Dance · Comments (0)
This has to be one of the most memorable theater-going experiences of my career:
"You expect wild sights when you go to something billed as a "fire ballet." So it took a while, at Wednesday night's opening of "Romeo and Juliet," to realize that the torrential onstage downpour wasn't just part of the spectacle.
One minute, a giant flaming chandelier draped with aerial dancers was rising toward the ceiling; next thing you knew, attendees of the Capulet ball were strutting through a Category 5 hurricane. The first few rows of audience members remained gamely seated, like SeaWorld visitors who couldn't complain about being splashed by Shamu.
Only when one of the slippery-handed aerial dancers cried out, "Someone let us down!" did it dawn on many viewers that the emergency sprinklers had just been accidentally triggered.
The Oakland Fire Department rushed over to replace the broken sprinkler -- and a large crowd cheerfully waited an hour and a half in a frigid warehouse for the show to go on. Both responses are a tribute to the reputation of Michael Sturtz, executive director of the Crucible.
In 1999, he founded the West Oakland workshop to offer community classes in the "fire arts": welding, blacksmithing and less practical applications like flame throwing and fire swallowing. In 2004, he produced his first "fire opera," "Dido and Aeneas"; he's also since produced "The Seven Deadly Sins." But "Romeo and Juliet" was his first foray into ballet. And it was worth the wetness, and the wait."
There was real dancing, with Maurya Kerr of Lines Ballet as Juliet. Click here for my full review in today's Chronicle.
January 12, 2007 · 10:01 AM · Dance · Comments (2)
"You know how people say, 'crawl, walk, run'? Well, for me it was always 'crawl, walk, ballet'."
--Democratic Caucus Chair and former ballet dancer Rahm Emanuel today on Fresh Air.
January 11, 2007 · 06:52 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
My "forecast" of 2007 dance events to look forward to appeared (much truncated) in yesterday's Chronicle. Three less obvious picks that I'm especially optimistic about:
inkBoat ("The Crow Line": Jan. 19-20, Brava Theater; Feb. 8-11, Noh Space. Nanos Operetta collaboration: July 12-28, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts) Founder Shinichi Iova-Koga is a third-generation butoh artist whose psychological insights reach right into the deepest, scariest parts of your brain. I've been impatient to see more of his work since 2004's explosive duet, "Ame to Ame." Koga is back in a big way in 2007: first with a new solo, "The Crow Line," that will tour to the New York Butoh Festival. Then, in July, a large-scale ensemble collaboration with Nanos Operetta, a San Francisco experimental music group with a macabre wit that should make an ideal fit with the inkBoat sensibility.
David Gordon (May 9-13, ODC Theater) David Gordon, the wittiest of the 1960s' Judson Church rebels, and the Pick Up Dance Company will bring the hit "Dancing Henry V," Gordon's off-kilter take on Shakespeare.
Scott Wells and Dancers (May 17-20, ODC Theater) Scott Wells is one of the Bay Area dance scene's best-kept secrets, a daredevil dancemaker who turns the freewheeling form of contact improvisation into a vehicle for astonishing acts of physical and emotional stuntmanship. For this 15th anniversary show, he'll premiere a new work for eight men, "Wrestling With Affection."
Since space on the web is infinite, here's the stuff that got cut:
Presenter Cal Performances saved all this season’s hot dance attractions for spring: William Forsythe’s new company visits Feb. 22-23; the painterly works of Shen Wei Dance Arts return Mar. 23-24, and superstar French ballerina Sylvie Guillem brings her collaboration with Kathak-trained British choreographer Akram Khan May 5-6.
Diablo Ballet: This Walnut Creek-based chamber troupe’s most promising spring offering presents a new “Hamlet” set to Shostakovich and choreographed by Viktor Kabaniaev, whose previous works have shown an astute musicality and a keen taste for drama. Also on the bill: twin brother Nikolai Kabaniaev’s “Grand Pas D’Action,” to Glazunov; and the pas de deux from Balanchine’s fun and fizzy “Stars and Stripes.” (Mar. 23-24, Dean Lesher Regional Center for the Arts).
ODC Theater director Rob Bailis has assembled a terrific dance slate for spring, with a new work by Shift Physical Theater’s enormously talented Manuelito Biag in February, postmodern luminary Deborah Hay in March, and evenings from local choreographers-to-watch Alex Ketley in May and Mary Carbonara in June.
Joe Goode is the grand finale of a Yerba Buena Center for the Arts-presented lineup that includes African Diaspora-influenced Reggie Wilson in February; a collaboration between local veteran Kim Epifano and Oakland’s AXIS Dance Company that same month; and Chinese-born Yin Mei’s “The River” in March. (Joe Goode: May 31-June 9, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts).
San Francisco Performances also brings the whiplash Stephen Petronio Company in its new work set to Rufus Wainwright music in February.
Other dance events to anticipate: Robert Moses' Kin's 2007 season runs February 8-18. And ODC/Dance brings its 36th season to the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts March 1-18.
January 08, 2007 · 10:21 AM · Dance · Comments (1)
If you've still got last week's New Yorker winter fiction issue, I just love love love that Louise Erdrich story, "Demolition."
January 05, 2007 · 01:13 PM · Books · Comments (0)
Christopher Wheeldon is starting his own ballet company. Nice to see that SF Ballet played a small part in this. From the NY Times:
"The idea began taking shape last summer when the San Francisco Ballet presented one of his pieces at the Lincoln Center Festival. The choreographer William Forsythe had a work on the same program, and the two spoke at length.
“He basically told me that I needed to take a step forward on my own and do something different, and coming from him — he is a man who has continued to invent himself — it was immediately resonant,” Mr. Wheeldon said."
January 05, 2007 · 01:07 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
I was very sorry to learn that Sara Linnie Slocum, lighting designer much appreciated and loved in Bay Area dance circles, died December 27. Appropriately, her memorial service will be held at the Cowell Theater this Sunday.
January 03, 2007 · 10:25 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
My friend Steve Elliott has just announced the following event, which I highly recommend:
"Laughing Liberally and LitPAC Present
Two Hours Of Comedy & Literature; A Benefit for Slain Iraqi Comedian Walid Hassan
When: Monday, January 8, 2007, 7pm to 9:00pm
Where: Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St. at Mission
Comedians and writers will perform to raise money for the family of Walid Hassan who was murdered in Baghdad. Hassan was the creator of the sketch comedy show "Caricatures" on al-Sharkiya television, which made fun not only of the US Army and Iraqi authorities but also the Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias. The benefit at the Make-Out Room at 3225 22nd St. in San Francisco on Monday, January 8 at 7pm will feature subtitled video of Hassan's show.
Price: Donations requested of $10-20.
Who:
Daniel Handler author of Lemony Snicket
Andrew Sean Greer author of Confessions of Max Tivoli
Michelle Tea author of Valencia and Rent Girl
and Tom Barbash author of On Top of the World.
Comedians: headliner Joe Klocek, Sal Calanni of sketch group Tossing Alice, Ali Mafi of the Axis of Evil Comedy Tour, podcast comedy phenomenon Mark Day, Samantha Chanse, Tessie Chua, Arthur Gaus, and Kurt Weitzmann.
The benefit will be hosted by Nato Green of Iron Comic and Stephen Elliott of LitPAC"
I don't know about the comedians, but the writers involved are fantastic, and God knows we could all use a little humor with the bad news coming out of Iraq. See you there.
January 01, 2007 · 06:20 PM · Books · Comments (0)
