Category: Ballet

More Paul Taylor @ City Center

Saturday February 25, 2011 evening – DUST, set to Francis Poulenc’s Concert Champetre. opened the evening at City Center as Paul Taylor Dance Company continued their exciting season there. In the collage-photo above by Tom Caravaglia, the dancers are Laura Halzack, Jeffrey Smith, Michelle Fleet and Parisa Khobdeh.

In this work, first performed in 1977, Taylor hobbles his dancers with various physical infirmities. While the movement suggests struggle and despair, the Poulenc music with its eerily tinkling harpisichord – which the great Wanda Landowska who premiered the piece in 1929 said made her feel “insouciant and gay” – sounds in direct contrast of mood to what we are watching onstage. This is one of those cases of a choreographer going against the grain of the music and making something unique out of it.

One of the most memorable sequences in the darkly unsettling DUST is a solo danced by the majestically lovely Laura Halzack where she is surrounded by blind people moving hesitently around her. There were extraordinary performances by Annamaria Mazzini and Amy Young as well, with the ensemble completed by James Samson, Robert Kleinendorst, Michelle Fleet, Jeffrey Smith, Eran Bugge and Jamie Rae Walker.

One of Paul Taylor’s newest creations, THREE DUBIOUS MEMORIES, evolves around a romantic triangle. Anyone who has ever been involved in one of these three-sided relationships knows that each party will have his or her own take on the situation: how it started, how it is kept going and how it might end. Taylor, using a multi-faceted score by Peter Elyakim Taussig (photo above) entitled Five Enigmas, sets his new work so that we see the story told from each point of view: from the woman’s and from each of the two men. Each of the men – Sean Mahoney in blue and Robert Kleinendorst in green – see the other man as the interloper while the woman – Amy Young wearing a bright red dress – seems to think the men are actually attracted to one another and she is the unwitting third party. This third vignette brings a humorous vein to a basically serious and thoughtful work.

Amy Young (above in Tom Caravaglia’s photo) gave a wonderfully expressive and beautifully danced performance as the woman while the two men duked it out in stylized fist fights. When Sean and Robert were later depicted as happy and relaxed gay lovers, Amy gave a decisive portrayal of a woman scorned. To all of this a chorus of dancers led by James Samson made visual comments on the action. The work is complex and each of the three stories is set to music with a different feeling: pulsating rhythms for the man in blue, chant-like spitituality for the man in green, and minor-key jazzy for the woman’s narrative. I’m glad that I’ll get a chance to see this new work again next week; now that I know the premise and structure I will be able to savor the details. On first viewing the last minutes of the work, after the three tales have been told, seemed a bit long but maybe that will sort out in future encounters.

I rate CLOVEN KINGDOM (created in 1976) very high among my favorite Taylor works, not least for its fusion score. So I had no problem seeing it two nights in a row (with a third viewing set for next week). This evening the four men in the cast gave a teriffic performance: Michael Trusnovec, Robert Kleinendorst, Francisco Graciano and Michael Novak. The four women in mirrored headwear were also superb: Amy Young and Laura Halzack – in an interrupted duet that picks up where it left off – along with Aileen Roehl who, in diagonals of spirted jumps, pursues the enigmatic Eran Bugge who is clad in lime green and balancing a silvery globe on her head. Annamaria Mazzini, Michelle Fleet, Parisa Khobdeh and Jamie Rae Walker weave beautifully in and out of this mysterious ballroom where things are not always as they seem.

February 26, 2011
Millepied/Balanchine/Robbins @ NYCB

Wednesday February 23, 2011 – A really nice evening at New York City Ballet tonight with two beautiful Balanchine masterworks as the centerpiece, opening with a recent work by Benjamin Millipied and ending with a Jerome Robbins classic that still feels quite contemporary even though it’s a quarter-century old. Top photo: Sterling Hyltin & Tyler Angle in Benjamin Millepied’s PLAINSPOKEN, photographed by Paul Kolnik.

PLAINSPOKEN: Hyltin, Taylor, Reichlen, Somogyi, T. Angle, Marcovici, Ramasar, J. Peck

VALSE-FANTAISIE: T. Peck, De Luz

SQUARE DANCE: M. Fairchild, *Huxley

GLASS PIECES: Laracey, Hankes, Lowery, Whelan, Finlay, Thew, Tworzyanski, Hall

The curtain rose on the Millepied and I felt certain I was going to like it much better than I did the last time I saw it. The music is very good (especially the ‘Sterling Hyltin’ section), and the eight dancers looked great. But as the work progressed I found my interest fading, despite the high level of dancing and the individual personalities of some of the Company’s best and brightest stars. The audience applauded dutifully at the end but failed to muster a call for the dancers before the curtain. My feeling is that we won’t see PLAINSPOKEN again; as well-danced as it is, there is nothing in the ballet that really grabs the viewer either musically, emotionally or technically.

Thereafter the performance soared steadily upward with superb dancing from Tiler Peck and Joaquin de Luz in VALSE-FANTAISIE. Backed by a lovely quartet of ballerinas – Amanda Hankes, Ashley Laracey, Gretchen Smith and Lydia Wellington – Tiler gave a stellar performance where her musicality, technical wizardry, personal beauty and her elegant joy in dancing Balanchine’s steps combined in perfect measure to delight the audience. Joaquin tossed off the virtuoso passages with his accustomed brilliance. Watching Tiler and Joaquin is one of the great pleasures of ballet-going these days and they were at their finest tonight.

In SQUARE DANCE, Megan Fairchild has one of her most appealing roles. Whether wafting into balances or embroidering the stage with her fancy footwork, she gave a wonderful performance. Her partner was Anthony Huxley, debuting in his role with impressively precise technique. His quiet lyricism in the expressive slow solo kept the audience engaged, and he and Megan swept thru the allegro passages with easy charm. The audience responded enthusiastically to their dancing, calling them out three times before the curtain: a well-deserved success. The ensemble of twelve was comprised of excellent dancers from the NYCB corps and they all deserve mention: the ladies – Likolani Brown, Alina Dronova, Lauren King, Meagan Mann, Kristen Segin, Mary Elizabeth Sell – and the gentlemen: Devin Alberda, Cameron Dieck, Ralph Ippolito, Austin Laurent, Troy Schumacher and Giovanni Villalobos. They added so much to the pleasure of watching this beautiful Balanchine creation.

Wendy Whelan and Craig Hall danced the adagio of the concluding GLASS PIECES with cool intensity; the audience scarcely breathed as these two gorgeous dancers cast their spell, abetted by the mystery of the Philip Glass score. An excellent sextet of demi-solistes – Ashley Laracey with Chase Finlay, Amanda Hankes with Joshua Thew, and Savannah Lowery with Christian Tworzyanski – made a vivid impression in the first movement, and of course the finale of this ballet is a treat for corps watchers.

It was nice to see the house packed to the rafters tonight. Perhaps the sold-out SWAN LAKES this season have generated a desire among newcomers to the ballet to see more of the Company’s rep and more of this great troupe of dancers. I hope the management are planning a couple weeks of SWAN LAKE in the Autumn: strike while the iron is hot! In addition to generating good box office and buzz, there are some potential Swan Queens and Siegfrieds in the Company who I’d like to see have an opportunity.

February 23, 2011
Pointe & Pirouettes @ MMAC: Wendy Whelan

Monday February 21, 2011 – New York City Ballet’s principal ballerina Wendy Whelan gave an afternoon class at Manhattan Movement and Arts Center as part of their day-long Pointe and Pirouettes event. I asked Matt Murphy, dance photographer de luxe, to meet me there and he was happy to since he is as big a fan of Ms. Whelan as I am.

Wendy’s classroom was filled to capacity with dancers from many levels. Rather than ‘talking down’ to some of the youngest dancers, Wendy set the pace and complexity of the exercises and combinations quite high, giving the girls a taste of what they’ll need to be prepared to do as they dance into the future. Wendy gave gentle and helpful corrections, mixed in with more specific remarks about body placement and keys to projecting the movement into the performing space.

One thing she spoke of which I think is sometimes not given enough attention in class is using the eyes while you are dancing. Not only must you watch where you are going, but you need to look to your hand in an extended port de bras or to your foot in develope to say to the audience: “Look how beautiful this movement is!” Sure enough, I’ve seen her do this so many times when watching her from my high/side perch at NYC Ballet performances: she’ll look right up along her arm and hand and right into my eyes. This kind of contact draws the viewer into the dance and makes it personal. How wonderful to find among the photos Matt sent me this very image, above. (Of course all the professional ballerinas know this ‘eye-language’, but there’s something extra captivating about peering thru your opera glasses into Wendy’s gaze.)

I loved her barre excercise based on envelope, a move I hardly ever think about – and how beautifully she executes it. This in fact was one thing about the class that I found most intriguing: how difficult it is to look at anyone else when Wendy Whelan is in the room. But despite the allure of watching her demonstrate, she deflects attention to the students; she treats them all as colleagues and fellow travelers on the path that turns work into art.

Despite the studio being filled to bursting, I couldn’t help but wish that even more students could have had the benefit of taking Wendy’s class.

There were a few dancers in the room that I recognized from other visits to MMAC…

…including the young ballerina Amy Gilson (above) who caught my eye and Matthew’s lens.

One of the most distinctive and delightful people in the New York City dance world, Deborah Wingert – an outstanding teacher and priestess of Terpsichore in her own right – took Wendy’s class. Kokyat and I are especially enamoured of Ms. Wingert and her lovely spirit.

As the class flew by, I felt an urge to clamber up onto the piano and set the clock back by a half-hour or so just to keep Wendy and the dancers there a bit longer.

I’ve saved the best for last. I am not sure how Matthew managed in this crowded and bustling studio setting to capture this portrait of Wendy but I am so glad that he did, and I’ll let him keep the secret of this capture all to himself. It’s one of my favorite images ever of this fascinating dancer.

My thanks to Wendy, Francois Perron, Matt Murphy, MMAC‘s Erin Fogarty and the publicist Michelle Brandon Tabnick – and all the dancers – for a beautiful late-Winter day full of dance.

All photos by Matthew Murphy.

February 21, 2011
David Grenke’s VESPERS/Rehearsal

Sunday February 20, 2011 – Kokyat and I went out to Brooklyn where Shannon MacDowell, a young dancer we have met thru her work with Amy Marshall Dance Company and isadoraNow was rehearsing a duet by David Grenke, VESPERS, with her partner Brian Runstrom in preparation for the upcoming performances at the Cedar Lake theater by Dancers Responding to AIDS.

David Grenke, a former principal dancer with Paul Taylor Dance Company, created VESPERS in 1992. Set to the Tom Waits song ‘Tom Traubert’s Blues‘, the duet portrays a man attempting to raise his beloved from the dead.

You can hear the music here; If you aren’t familiar with the voice of Tom Waits – described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding “like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car” – it might take some getting used to. In the context of David Grenke’s dancework, the singing is strangely haunting.

As soon as Shannon and her partner Brian Runstrom began the rehearsal today I recalled seeing a film of this work up at the Pillow at the time Grenke was creating it. They were showing various dance clips on a screen in the Pillow’s visitors center and I remember some women were watching it; one said: “This is so sexist, I hate it!” and another asked: “Why is he abusing this poor woman?” I said aloud, “She’s dead. He’s not abusing her, he’s trying to wake her up!”

It was a powerful experience to re-encounter the duet today, danced to the raspy invocations of Waltzing Matilda. Shannon and Brian had been learning the duet from a filmed version and this was their first time actually being in the studio with David. The dancers have the basic moves and structure down, the choreographer was detailing their work and bringing it into focus.

The piece is intensely physical and full of body contact. “Don’t let it get sexual!” David admonished: “That’s not what it’s about.” Shannon and Brian responded keenly to all that David asked of them. Sometimes the choreographer would step in, taking the place of one of the dancers to show how he wanted something to be done. But he also let Shannon and Brian bring their own personalities into play.

Shannon MacDowell and choreographer David Grenke

Brian Runstrom, Shannon MacDowell

The light in the studio was quite evocative; Kokyat shot the duet in the available light and though we were there for less than an hour, the atmosphere of VESPERS radiated strongly as David and the dancers kept their focus on the process. Looking forward to seeing their finished work at the Cedar Lake performances.

All photos: Kokyat.

February 21, 2011
Pointe & Pirouettes @ MMAC: Francois Perron

Monday February 21, 2011 – A day-long ballet fete at Manhattan Movement and Arts Center which featured classes taught by Francois Perron and Wendy Whelan as well as toe-shoe fittings provided free of charge by various manufacturers of the satiny slippers.

I arrived to watch Francois’ class at 10:30 AM. I had never met him before; he’s a tall and very charming gentleman and I really enjoyed listening to him give the exercises and combinations with his delicious accent from the Parisian boulevards. Francois had a studio full of students and he called them to order and plunged into the plies without preamble.

The best description of Francois Perron’s class is, it’s a lyrical experience. His style brings out the musicality and grace of the dancers. He said one thing that struck me as so essential: “Elegance is the key.” Beyond that were some more specific suggestions: “Glue your bellybutton to your spine” (if I could master that one I would look 20 pounds thinner!) and “You won’t gain any strength from (over-bending) your wrists.” He pointed out the importance of always closing tendus in a complete 5th, especially tendus to the back, and the necessity of keeping the feet fully pointed no matter how fast you are moving.

There were several notable dancers in the class; Kyle Hiyoshi (above), currently at SAB, stood out for clarity and smoothness of technique and a really nice presentation. There were others I’d love to single out but I don’t know their names: here are some of the girls I kept my eye on. Shoot me a comment if you recognize them:

There were others, too often too far out of the range of my small camera. I also felt a bit like an eavesdropper shooting them at their work, but I guess it is something they need to get accustomed to as dancers.

In many of my pictures the dancers flashing by me appeared on my little screen only as a blur of movement.

The class progressed to what seemed to me to be some pretty demanding center work. The students swept across the floor in pairs after which Francois gave them additional tips. If I was a young ballet dancer here in New York City, I’d want to take class from Francois every week. There’s an old-world feeling in his method that should not be lost.

Following Francois’ class I ran over to Thai Basil for a delicious solo lunch, then made a quick trek to Lincoln Center to check the NYCB lobby casting sheet for changes in their final week and there ran into Wendy Whelan – wearing the most fetching coat – who was en route to MMAC to teach. Half an hour later, I was in her studio along with Matt Murphy who took time from his busy schedule to come and photograph one of our mutually favorite ballerinas giving class. That story will be found here, along with Matt’s photos.

February 21, 2011
Sara Mearns in CORTEGE HONGROIS

Paul Kolnik’s photograph of New York City Ballet principal dancer Sara Mearns in Balanchine’s CORTEGE HONGROIS. Read about the performance here.

Click on the image to enlarge.

January 30, 2011
Scheller’s CORTEGE/Revival of OUTLIER

Saturday January 29, 2011 – Ana Sophia Scheller’s debut in the prima ballerina role of Balanchine’s CORTEGE HONGROIS was a big attraction for me this afternoon at New York City Ballet. Kokyat photographed the Argentine ballerina last November when she appeared with Avi Scher & Dancers.

CORTÈGE HONGROIS: *Scheller, Askegard, Laracey, *Hankes, Lowery, Suozzi
intermission
OUTLIER: Bouder, Kowroski, T. Peck, Hyltin, Whelan, Ramasar, R. Fairchild, *Alberda, De Luz, *Tworzyanski, Hall [Solo violin: Nikkanen]

The two ballets are so well-contrasted in every regard, making for a really satisfying visit to the ballet this afternoon. Andrews Sill was on the podium and gave the Glazunov a lush romantic treatment; along with the excellent violinist Kurt Nikkanen, the orchestra made the OUTLIER score so darkly radiant.

Ana Sophia Scheller’s Raymonda is a gorgeous princess, regal but not haughty. With her classic poise, technique and beauty, the ballerina gave her dancing a special sense of allure and mystery. One especially lovely moment came near the end of the adagio when she swirled through a series of pirouettes which seemed almost to be in slow-motion: really dreamy. I’ve always loved watching Scheller and would give anything to see her as Kitri, Gamzatti, Juliet, Giselle, Aurora or Swanhilda. Her originally-announced partner, Jonathan Stafford, was replaced by Charles Askegard whose fluent partnering I think we tend to take for granted, but we shouldn’t.

Savannah Lowery and Sean Suozzi were a grand gypsy couple. They rightly conveyed an underlying sexual tension during the slow opening of the czardas, then burst into joyous swirling dance when the tempo quickens. (Sean’s upcoming debut as the Prodigal Son is circled in red on my calendar: February 8th). The solo variations were danced tonight by Ashley Laracey and Amanda Hankes, much to my delight, and the pas de quatre danced by Mlles. Adams, Brown, Dronova and King was extremely fine. The big corps look superb in the green-white-gold costuming and the whole ballet is such a pleasure to watch…and to hear.

I really liked Wayne McGregor’s OUTLIER at its premiere last May and thoroughly enjoyed seeing it again this afternoon. It’s vastly dfferent from anything else in the repertoire; there are some production photos here. In the above Paul Kolnik photo, Tiler Peck in the ballet’s opening moments.

The ballet begins in silence: a vivid circle of red illuminates the stage floor as the orchestra starts to sound the very quiet opening phrases of the Thomas Ades score. Then Tiler Peck and Craig Hall begin to move slowly, almost warily at first. The work proceeds, highlighted by a series of duets: Maria Kowroski and Robert Fairchild, Robert with Amar Ramasar, Wendy Whelan with Craig Hall (to an especially gorgeous theme in the score). Debuting Devin Alberda has a duet with Sterling Hyltin, both dancers so light and luminous in their movement. An ensemble passage is danced to an intriguing tom-tom rhythm with strings and woodwinds. Meanwhile, the lighting is really striking throughout the ballet – it’s good to see it from ‘above’. Ashley Bouder looks great with her hair in bangs and with her stellar dancing taking on an restless element. Christian Tworzyanski and Joaquin de Luz are wonderful to watch although – along with Wendy Whelan – I wish they had more to do. In fact OUTLIER is one of those rare works that I wish was longer! I’ll catch it two or three more times this Winter because who knows when we might see it again.

January 28, 2011
Parsons Dance @ The Joyce

Thursday January 27, 2011 – Great dancing from Parsons Dance at The Joyce tonight, performing five works by David Parsons and a new piece by Monica Bill Barnes. Kokyat and I recently got to watch the Company rehearsing and thus became familiar with some of the newer faces in the troupe. An enthusiastic audience saluted the dancers with applause and cheers at the end of a well-paced programme. The Company are at The Joyce thru February 6th; read about specially discounted tickets here. Top image: Abby Silva Gavezzoli, Eric Bourne and Sarah Braverman photographed by Paula Lobo.

The evening began with BACHIANA, a work which I saw at its first public showing (even before its official premiere) at Jacob’s Pillow on August 29, 1992. I knew even then it would become a Parsons classic and it looks great nowadays with it’s vivid dark red costuming and excellent lighting. This piece is a great programme-opener for it immediately serves notice both of the choreographer’s freedom-of- movement style and the joy therein of the Parsons dancers. One fanciful motif is the men head-standing for quite a long time. For all its fast-paced, celebratory dancing, an outstanding highlight of the piece is the adagio duet danced by Abby Silva Gavezzoli and Miguel Quinones in which they slowly make their way across the stage together in expressive partnering combinations to the strains of the Bach Air on a G-String. Photo of Eric Bourne, Steve Vaughn and Miguel Quinones in BACHIANA by B. Docktor.

Miguel Quinones, in my humble opinion one of Gotham’s most extraordinary male dancers, speaks about the new duet PORTINARI – which David Parsons has created for Miguel and the blonde beauty Sarah Braverman – here. The dancers are pictured above in a Paula Lobo photo. Kokyat’s images from a rehearsal of this duet may be found here.

The duet was inspired by the life and work of the Brazilian painter Candido Portinari, best known for his panels War and Peace at the United Nations headquarters here in New York. Portinari died in 1962 from lead poisoning induced by his constant use of lead-based paints.

For this duet, David Parsons turns to the very familiar music of Samuel Barber: the Adagio for Strings. As with his use of the Bach Air in BACHIANA, David’s choreography makes us listen to the music afresh. Miguel ‘creates’ Sarah – his Madonna and muse – with his brush. Their duet is quietly ecstatic and builds to a fantastic pose with Sarah standing on Miguel’s shoulders; from there she takes a breath-taking plunge into his arms. But the story isn’t over: the painter then descends into sickness and death, with the woman consoling him. As he expires in her arms the light fades and the dancers are drawn into shadow. The audience watched the two dancers in awed silence; Sarah and Miguel give a perfect and memorable interpretation of this duet.

In David Parsons’ 2003 work SLOW DANCE, three couples dance in a somewhat confined space to music of Kenji Bunch. This work is quite different from anything else in the Parsons repertoire…

…the dancers looked fine and reveled in some high lifts that decorate the piece. Photo: B. Doktor.

Parsons Dance rarely perform choreography by anyone other than David Parsons but this season they have added Monica Bill Barnes’ LOVE, OH LOVE to their repertoire. Despite being perfectly danced and ‘acted’ by the Parsons troupe, the work’s mildly amusing qualities are offset for me by the use of pop love-anthems that – while appropriate for the theme – are too loud and go on too long. I couldn’t wait for it to end. I know it’s meant to be ironic, but the musical overkill is too much. Irony and brevity must go go hand-in-hand to be really effective. Nevertheless: excellent work by the dancers.

In a tour de force, Miguel Quinones (Gene Schiavone photo, above) performed the imaginative and wildly popular solo CAUGHT in which a flashing strobe light makes the dancer appear to be literally dancing on air. Miguel, who danced in every single piece tonight and was still full of energy in the final NASCIMENTO, moved miraculously thru the over-100 jumps which constitute the choreography of CAUGHT, leaving his beautiful torso bathed in sweat as he finally ‘landed’. At the end, the crowd screamed wildly for the dancer: a demonstration of awe and affection which Miguel received with modest grace.

NASCIMENTO begins and ends with Abby Silva Gavezzoli (Elena Olivio portrait above) alone onstage. Abby’s sexy and lush dancing sets the pace of this colorful work in which the Parsons dancers revel in their choreographer’s signature style: witty, spacious, affectionate and vital. The music of Milton Nascimento, the appealing Santo Loquasto costumes and the excellent lighting by Howell Binkley (all evening) conspire to make this an exciting closing number.

Now in his third decade of presenting dance, David Parsons remains at the top of his game. His newest works, PORTINARI and RUN TO YOU, seem destined to take their places among the Parsons classics that always make his New York seasons so enjoyable. And his current roster of dancers are as exciting and dynamic as any to be seen in our dancing City.

January 27, 2011
Another SWAN @ NYC Ballet

Due to the extraordinary demand for tickets, New York City Ballet have announced an additional performance of the Peter Martins SWAN LAKE for Friday February 11th. Sara Mearns is scheduled to dance Odette/Odile that evening. Photo of Sara by Damon Winter.

It’s amusing to hear people attribute the great interest in these SWAN performances to the recent film BLACK SWAN. But the last previous revival of Martins’ SWAN LAKE was also a sellout, and that was long before the movie was made.

January 27, 2011
Lydia Johnson Dance: Class @ Peridance

Friday January 28, 2011 – Went dashing thru the snow (now slush, actually) to the East Side to watch a class at Peridance offered by a choreographer whose work I especially like: Lydia Johnson. Lisa Iannacito McBride of Lydia’s company (above, a studio photo by Kokyat) called the large group of about thirty students to order promptly at 11:30 AM and started to teach them a passage from Lydia’s work entitled DUSK, set to music of Henrych Gorecki.

I’ve seen Lisa dance many times but she’s also a really fine teacher; looking chic in a deep-purple satiny leotard, Lisa began the phrase and the students immediately picked up the basics. Laura DiOrio and Jessica Sand of Lydia’s company were on hand to help the dancers with tips on how they each execute the phrase. From watching the three girls, I saw how they are each able to achieve their unique shading of a danced expression while always remaining in the context of the basic qualities of movement.

These classes where a phrase is taught are always so interesting to me because as a frustrated shoulda-been dancer, I’m continually amazed by how quickly the dancers in the studio can translate the instructor’s movement into their own bodies. Once Lisa went beyond the initial steps and gestures, I was throughly lost but the young dancers picked it up and ran with it. Within minutes they were working the passage and then the group broke into smaller units and took turns spiffing it up.

Lydia sometimes addressed the dancers, speaking of the imagery that she had in mind when creating a given movement, but she steered clear of saying what the dance was supposed to ‘mean’; her remarks were more in terms of finding the freedom of each dancers’ individual expression than in trying to impose an interpretive boundary. I think this is why her own dancers always look so good: they filter the steps and gestures thru their own bodies and spirits, making individual statements while always maintaining the atmosphere that the music creates.

As the session progressed, the group was broken down still further into four units and each performed the phrase as a canon, starting in different corners of the room. By the end of the class, they were starting to look like a Company.

Lydia’s dancers Eric Vlach and Or Sagi were dancing, and so were two dancers I was familiar with: Justin Lynch and Danielle Schulz. There were other familiar faces but I can’t put names to them. The time sped by and all too soon the studio was emptying as another group of dancers stood waiting for the space. Many of the participants in Lydia’s class were headed to other classes or rehearsals, or to the jobs they hold down to pay the bills since dance jobs are not all that plentiful these days. Still, I find the idea of this life of dancing – of physical work to an artistic end – so fascinating.

Even if I’d known that one could make a life in dance and even if I’d pursued it, by now I would be retired. But who knows? I might have gone from dancing to having my own dance company. There are certainly plenty of dancers in New York City who would look great performing, and who deserve the opportunity to do it.

January 27, 2011