Sadly I missed the opening night of San Francisco?s West Wave Dance Festival (I?m returning from Santa Barbara tomorrow). I?ll post some commentary on the Saturday and Thursday shows here, and I?ll cover the July 31 performance for the San...

In the pink

Brian Brooks Moving Company Summerdance Santa Barbara Center Stage Theater, Santa Barbara July 21, 2004 Brian Brooks?s ?Dance-o-Matic? is, to quote Balanchine, ?a machine that thinks?–but a machine that thinks pink! Everything at the Center...

San Francisco Ballet has announced dancer promotions and hires for the 2005 season. No surprise to subscribers, Liz Miner (she appears to have officially shortened her first name ? la Liz Taylor) is now a soloist. I first noticed Miner four years...

survival of the fittest

Keigwin + Company Summerdance Santa Barbara Center Stage Theater, Santa Barbara July 16, 2004 Keigwin + Company’s Julian Barnett and Nicole Wolcott Summerdance Santa Barbara tends to prize wit in its choreographers, and Larry Keigwin is no...

Ashtonmania

I have to admit that I don?t read dance reviews from New York in a timely fashion; it?s too painful for me not to be able to weigh my own observations against the reviewer?s. But Lincoln Center?s Ashton Celebration and the Royal Ballet’s...

A five-star Aurora

I?m going to say something sacrilegious. I think assigning ratings to dance reviews is not a bad idea. You know ratings: five stars, a scale of one to ten, or at the paper I currently freelance for, a cartoon man in various states of interest...

In the Chronicle today, I am charmed by Oakland’s Artship Dance/Theater. One caveat: I’m not a stickler for rigid categories, but the show is much more theater than dance.

Dancing in Paradise

Brian Brooks Moving Company performs in front of the Santa Barbara Mission as part of Monday’s 13-location “Dance about Town.” I?m in Santa Barbara for the next week and a half on a kind of writing/dance-watching mini-retreat...