Fua Dia Congo raised the roof at the opening night of the first annual Black Choreographers Festival. I reviewed for the Chron:
“Feet were tapping and voices were yipping Friday night — and the dancers of Fua Dia Congo hadn’t even left the wings. The musicians, standing tall behind 4-foot-high drums, began to pound. The company stamped on in an explosion of furious rhythms, shaking more muscles than anyone ever knew the human body possessed. Oakland’s Malonga Casquelourd Center for the Arts erupted in helplessly excited screams.
It was a triumphal finish for the first annual Black Choreographers Festival, and one 10 years in the making. A decade ago, a similar showcase called Black Choreographers Moving Toward the 21st Century took its final bow in the Bay Area. This new festival recovers what was lost but stands adamantly in the present. At show’s end, Halifu Osumare, founder of the Black Choreographers Festival’s precursor, offered a telling benediction. “What I have seen on this stage is all contemporary,” she said. “It is all happening here and now, in this moment.” “
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