How thrilled and impressed are we that the spanking new Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, dead in in the center of Beverly Hills, will present as its inaugural performance modern dance?
Very thrilled and impressed indeed.
Why should this be so unusual? There are several reasons. Classical ballet has tended to trump modern dance on the dance-prestige hierarchy … and certainly on the gala circuit. Little brother jazz-dance, little sister ethnic and global dance, non-Western dance, all great art forms, relegated to the bottom.
And amongst our many wonderful American modern-dance troupes, the Mother of them all, the great Martha Graham Dance Company, with its roots to 1926, still sharing Graham’s rigorous and rich span of dance invention — political, mythical, literary, feminist, psychological, folkloric themes — well, that’s a minor miracle.
Launching The Wallis will be a special inaugural presentation.
Prelude and Revolt opens the program and uses dance and media to chart the era of Graham’s revolutionary discoveries – including her early years in Los Angeles.
Right on!
The evening will include Graham’s signature solo, Lamentation, as well as her stunning masterwork, Chronicle.
Seeing Chronicle is a life experience. Go.
Martha Graham Dance Company | Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts | November 8, 9 | info/tickets
Like this? Read more:
- The Great Graham
- Love for Martha Graham from Robin Williams & choreographer Vince Paterson in “The Birdcage.”
- Michael Jackson visited the Graham studio