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Saturday August 28, 2010 – Choreographer Emery LeCrone invited us to her rehearsal at MMAC today for the upcoming performances of her ballet FIVE SONGS FOR PIANO by Miro Magloire’s New Chamber Ballet which take place at City Center Studio on September 18th and 19th. Above: the dancers, Alexandra Blacker at the right. Click on the above image to enlarge.

The ballet was originally created for the Columbia Ballet Collaborative and is set to music of Felix Mendelssohn. Pianist Melody Fader was on hand to play the score ‘live’ for today’s rehearsal; Melody and Emery above. The ballet is set for five women, the dancers being Victoria North, Madeleine Deavenport, Elizabeth Brown, Lauren Toole and a new face at New Chamber Ballet: Alexandra Blacker.

FIVE SONGS FOR PIANO is truly lyrical, taking wing on the music of Mendelssohn which Emery has visualized with clarity of movement and rich emotional undercurrents. One key element of today’s rehearsal was the meshing of steps with the right tempo for each movement to show the dancers to best advantage. Adjustments were readily made and Emery also asked Melody for to linger momentarily in a couple of transitional passages to underscore the nuances of a dancer’s upper body or port de bras. In a final run-thru, everything seemed to be jelling quite nicely.

Here are some of Kokyat’s images from the rehearsal:

Victoria North

Victoria and Emery

Elizabeth Brown

Maddie Deavenport

Lauren Toole

Victoria North, Alexandra Blacker

Victoria North

Melody, Emery and Miro

For New Chamber Ballet’s upcoming performances, in addition to Emery’s Mendelssohn ballet, there will be a revival of Miro Magloire’s Adue
(http://www.newchamberballet.com/rep/adue.html); then Miro’s Haydn
ballet (which premiered this past Spring but will be completely re-worked and re-titled), and a new ballet set by Miro to his own music. Melody Fader will be the pianist. Ticket information here.

All photos: Kokyat.

Troy Schumacher of the New York City Ballet spent part of his summer creating a new piece entitled SATELLITE. Above: Marika Anderson. View videos from the ballet here.

I asked Troy to tell me a little about his ballet. He replied:

“This was a work commissioned by the Satellite Gallery in
conjunction with the Dogwood Center for the Performing Arts in Fremont,
Michigan. I put a group of dancers together including myself, Ashley Laracey, Justin
Peck, Marika Anderson, Lauren King, and Daniel Applebaum. In the first
half of the programme, excerpts from Agon and Barber Violin Concerto as well as the complete Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux were danced.

The music for Satellite was
created by Nick Jaina (piano), Nathan Langston (violin), and Amanda
Lawrence (viola). This was a collaborative process
between the four of us. It started with Bernard Tschumi’s Manhattan Transcripts and an epic poem and a ‘mood arc’ by Kevin Draper. The
musicians and I took those three inspirations and created an initial
structure for the piece that developed as the project continued. What I
found particularly interesting was that each musician also collaborated
to compose their own parts in this piece, which seems to be quite rare. The musicians played live and it was wonderful. And Andrew Scordato of NYCB designed the costumes.”

Ashley Laracey and Justin Peck

Lauren King

Daniel Applebaum

Photos by Lora Robertson, used with her kind permission.

Monday August 23, 2010 – A rainy, cool day: perfect for watching dancers in the studio. Choreographer John-Mark Owen is preparing for an appearance at the DanceNOW Festival on September 9th and today he working with dancer Julie Voshell on his duet Unam Ceylum, set to music of Heinrich Biber.

This was Julie’s first rehearsal of this piece and they’d been working on it for a half-hour when I arrived. Julie and John-Mark are great friends so it was a very easy-going, laugh-filled atmosphere. They watched a performance video of the piece and talked their way thru it, then began trying some phrases and marking various passages. In this way, Julie learned the basic structure and key elements of the piece in less than an hour.

It’s really interesting to see how dancers assimilate verbal cues and translate them into their own language of movement. John-Mark has scheduled plenty of rehearsal time but I think they’ll have the duet at performance level very soon; they can spend the remaining sessions polishing the fine points.

Unam Ceylum is one movement of John-Mark’s memorable and deeply personal TRIPTYCH: three duets danced by the same couple which trace the development and dissolving of a relationship. The music is achingly beautiful and the work has an intrinsic spiritual quality.

The studio was rather dark for taking pictures today; I was wishing Kokyat was there with his two cameras. The photos here were shot with my little Lumix.

 

Friday August 20, 2010 – TAKE Dance offered a two-week summer intensive this year and eighteen young dancers participated, taking daily class from either Take or Jill Echo and then working on pieces from the TAKE Dance repertoire with members of the Company.

Click on the images to enhance.

This afternoon there was a well-attended showcase performance; the participating dancers danced an excerpt from a new piece by Take, somewhat comic in tone, reminding me at times of Snow White’s dwarf-pals, or of the goons in PRODIGAL SON. The students stomped, wobbled and swayed…

…and sometimes they took to the floor…

…only to be “revived” by their colleagues.

Emily Chapo, Sylvana Tapia

The dancers then split into two groups to perform an excerpt from Take’s recent success, FLIGHT.

The segment being performed today uses music of Philip Glass and I especially like one stretch of the work where the music’s going very fast and the dancers are moving very slowly. Take is one of the few choreographers  who could pull this off convincingly.

Here are a few more of Kokyat’s images from the afternoon:

Sophie Bromberg

Jasmine Saunders, Iwalani Martin

Grace Sanford, Corinna Phillips, Alex Rodabaugh

Grace Sanford

Susan Ponomarenko, Natalie Walters, Sylvana Tapia

Kelsey Berry, Lauren Calzolaio, Sophie Bromberg

Kelsey Berry, Emily Chapo, Andrea Dispenziere

Ensemble in FLIGHT

A big round of applause for all the Intensive participants.

TAKE Dance will appear at the DanceNOW Festival on September 11th, and they will collaborate with the composers of PULSE for performances at Judson Memorial Church on October 14th and 15th; further details of this collaboration will follow.

Photos by Kokyat.

Saturday August 21, 2010 – Kokyat and I went over to Governors Island today. The very brief boat ride (it leaves from South Ferry, right next to the Staten Island ferry pier) barely takes five minutes. You step off into a crowd of bicyclists, strollered infants and somewhat dazed tourists all of whom have come over from the bigger island of Manhattan. Although there are many buildings (including a hospital and 3 churches), private homes and apartment units on Governors Island, no one lives there.

The Dutch lost New Amsterdam to the British who re-named it New York and then lost control of it during the Revolutionary War. It remained an army post, served as a prison for captured Confederate soldiers during the Civil War, and in 1966 became a Coast Guard station until 1995 when the Coast Guard closed the facility and all personnel were evacuated and re-assigned.

Buildings from various periods (some dating back to the 17th century) cover the northern end of the  island and for the most part all stand empty save for a few used by the Parks Department, a small Children’s Museum and a gift shop. It seems a colossal waste of living space but the deed transferring ownership from the Coast Guard to the City prohibits permanent housing or the establishment of casinos on Governors Island.

So it is rather like wandering around a ghost town; we peered into windows of the most recent structures (utilitarian apartment buildings) to see electric stoves and baseboard heating. A beautiful street lined with yellow houses (above) stand empty.

Kokyat and I thought we’d love to live in this little cottage.

St. Cornelius Chapel was our favorite place on the island. In the darkly shadowed interior the pews have been ripped out and the baptismal font sealed closed. Yet one could almost imagine the sound of a choir singing or a bride arriving in the vestibule for a military wedding.

There is a carillon…I wonder when it last sounded?

Lovely stained glass…

 

The angel Gabriel looks pensive.

There seems to be an accommodation for the Jewish population but no sign of a mosque, which I suppose is just as well given that 127% of New Yorkers are opposed to a mosque (and to everything else) at this point.

Flowers thrive on Governors Island…

…and there is a beautiful, stately row of London plane trees.

From time to time one comes upon plaques marking various aspects of the island’s history.

There are also some rather nice pieces of sculpture: above, Matador’s Cape by David Curt Morris…

…Quixotic Aquatic Erotica by Robert Michael Smith…

…and Commando by Mary Ellen Scherl which we especially liked.

Another view of Commando.

The hospital…

…and the Governor’s house…

…with its descriptive plaque.

A few modern touches crop up here and there…

..and there are places to buy food and beverages (alcohol is prohibited: they search your bags before boarding the ferry to be sure you aren’t packing a six-pack),

We did like these red benches which appear throughout the park.

The oldest aspects of the island were the most pleasing, and much of the time I was imagining the people who might have been quartered in the barracks, lived in the yellow houses and sang hymns in the old church.

After a nice outdoor lunch in a breezy spot by the water, we returned to Manhattan.

Saturday July 31, 2010 – Kokyat and I went to MoMA for the Matisse exhibit entitled Radical Invention 1913 – 1917. Above photo, Matisse in 1913. The exhibit runs thru October 11th.

The exhibition may be viewed with time-specific tickets but since Kokyat’s a MoMA member we simply breezed in. One can photograph in most galleries of the museum but not in special exhibits – but no matter: most of these Matisse works can be found in books and on-line. Of course it is wonderful to see them up close, full-scale and beautifully displayed.

LA DANSE (1909), probably Matisse’s best-known work, is part of MoMA‘s permanent collection..

…as is his LARGE SEATED NUDE (1925-1929).

I was delighted to find Fernand Leger’s BIG JULIE (1945). Leger was a friend of the Murphys and developed a special rapport with their son Patrick when the youth was fighting his losing battle against tuberculosis.

Among other works that caught my eye today were Ellsworth Kelly’s 1959 RUNNING WHITE (above)…

…Roger de la Fresnaye’s colour-rich CONQUEST OF THE AIR (1913)…

…and I SEE AGAIN IN MEMORY MY DEAR UDNIE by Francis Picabia (1914).

Wilhelm Lembruck’s STANDING YOUTH dates from 1913 (above and immediately below).

While I was snapping away with my little Lumix, Kokyat was creating beautiful images with his Leica. I hope he will post some of them on Red Dot.

And…he did.

Photographer Caitlin Kakigi has kindly allowed me to use some of her photographs from the Vail International Dance Festival where – it seems – several dancers I love are all in the same place at the same time. Above, New York City Ballet’s Tiler Peck prepares Robbins’ OTHER DANCES with Joaquin de Luz.

Idols: two of the greatest dancers I ever saw onstage: Peter Boal, now the director of Pacific Northwest Ballet, and Damian Woetzel who heads the Vail International Dance Festival. Both men are former principals of New York City Ballet.

In class, Pacific Northwest’s principal ballerina Carla Korbes, with NYCB’s Robert Fairchild far right. 

West Coast meets East Coast: Carla and Robbie.

Sarah Ricard Orza, PNB soloist in class.

Seth Orza of PNB was recently promoted to principal.

Ariana Lallone and Carla Korbes of PNB rehearsing SERENADE. This picture is just gorgeous!

Carla Korbes and Olivier Wevers of PNB rehearsing SERENADE.

Sokvannara Sar is also at Vail, dancing in a piece by Larry Keigwin.

More of Caitlin Kakigi’s Vail images here; I can’t wait to see her photos of the Paul Taylor Dance Company!

New York City Ballet’s Robert Fairchild and Joaquin de Luz rompin’ and stompin’ in the streets of Vail, Colorado as the Vail International Dance Festival opens. Caitlin Kakigi’s photos from Facebook.

Choreographer Larry Keigwin kicks it…

…along with the Festival’s director, Damian Woetzel. 

Tiler Peck of NYCB leads a group of local kids.

Convergence: some of my favorite dancers will all be at Vail at the same time when the NYCBers, Pacific Northwest Ballet and Paul Taylor Dance Company perform on successive nights. Amy, Aileen and Francisco, meet Tiler and Rob…and Carla, Sarah, Seth and William. I hope everyone has their cameras with them.

BeijingDance give the Festival an Asian touch.

Sean Stewart of ABT is performing with John-Mark Owen’s troupe at Jacob’s Pillow on July 30th. Kokyat photographed Sean at John-Mark’s rehearsal a week before the performance. Click on the above image to enlarge.

More photos from this rehearsal here.

Sydney Skybetter’s THE PERSONAL is a set of four solos danced to lieder of Schubert and Schumann using recordings of the late, lamented tenor Fritz Wunderlich. Rather than having them danced in succession, Sydney has interpolated the solos between ensemble works. Similar in style, each solo derives its unique character from the beauty and expressiveness of the individual dancer. The first solo is danced by Sydney himself (above and below).

Kristen Arnold (above)

Kristen

Kokyat’s different take on Kristen’s solo.

The newest solo of THE PERSONAL was created for Gary Schaufeld.

Gary dancing as the light began to stream into the studio.

Gary’s solo utilizes more space than the other solos in THE PERSONAL where the dancers basically remain on their mark throughout their dance.

Bergen Wheeler’s solo will be the closing work on Skybetter’s programme at Jacob’s Pillow.

At the rehearsal we attended, the reflected evening sun cast a direct beam on Bergen as she moved thru her solo. Kokyat produced a series of illuminated portraits of the dancer:

Bergen Wheeler in THE PERSONAL.

Throughout the rehearsal I was so moved and impressed by Skybetter’s dancers – even though by now I should be accustomed to what they can do – and by the poetic quality of Sky’s choreography.

skybetter & associates will be at the DanceNOW festival on September 8th.

All photos by Kokyat.