Generation-to-generation, Santa Monica’s Westside Ballet prevails and thrives 2
May
28
2025
spencer collins, photo: sarah madison The art of classical ballet is born out body-to-body, and there’s no going around that. Personal involvement has always been at the heart of the pedagogy practiced at one of Southern California’s finest training academies, that of the Westside Ballet of Santa Monica. The company’s co-founders, Yvonne Mounsey (New York ...
‘The space between us all’: Mark Morris’s ‘PEPPERLAND’ in fetching revival 1
When this Fab Four configuration of Mark Morris dancers made a 90-degree turn to march directly toward the audience in the culminating moments of ‘Pepperland,’ the much-heralded choreographer Mark Morris’s brilliant dance-and-music homage to the Beatles’ culture-bending “Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” album of 1967, I laughed. It was so funny. But my heartstrings ...
The one and only Billy Shears! Mark Morris’s ‘Pepperland’ at The Wallis
photo: robert torres When I first saw Mark Morris’s bullseye-hitting “Pepperland” oh so many years ago at Segerstrom Center in Orange County, I was so ebullient through the entire thing that after the show, I clambered backstage to congratulate Mr. Morris in person. I don’t typically do that. I’m a dance critic. I felt I ...
A visit to the dentist for Charles Moulton, choreographer & artist
He who made this grand opera of minimal nuttiness mixed with finesse, “Ballet Passing” (above), the choreographer/visual artist/film man Charles Moulton, staged his master work on a grand scale in 2017. But it was just a passing phase! Because by March 2025, the former Merce Cunningham Dance Company dancer and choreographer of mind/body whimsical works, ...
Our Brazilian dance-friends, GRUPO CORPO, hit the Music Center stage
May
9
2025
It was a thrilling sight as a string of dancers in yellow unitards filtered onto the stage of the Ahmanson Theater, in a veritable chorus line. The work, “21,” by veteran choreographer Rodrigo Pederneiras, created in 1992 has become the international calling card of the wonderfully athletic Brazilian dance company, GRUPO CORPO. In a fitting ...
Get off that couch! Come celebrate Grupo Corpo at ‘Dance at the Music Center’
Most of us can relate. Last Saturday night, April 5, as the clock ticked toward curtain time for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, I was wavering. A cloud of despair over the state of our nation weighed me down. The couch looked good. A glass of rose wine beckoned. Hell, I had half a bottle! ...
Andrea Miller’s ‘YEAR’ for A.I.M meets ‘The White Lotus’
We’re not suggesting that choreographer Andrea Miller‘s “YEAR” (2024) for A.I.M by Kyle Abraham, is literally “The White Lotus” in dance. No way! But somehow, Miller’s ingenious, mesmerizing, tribal, thirty-minute ballet goes for the jugular in a way that syncs with the neurotic energy with which the HBO series wrapped up its Thailand adventure. The ...
This week! Ailey Company in two rich, vital programs at The Music Center
Apr
1
2025
sacred songs, matthew rushingphoto: paul kolnik We’re spoiled rotten! Springtime at the Los Angeles Music Center brings an annual visit of our resident dance company, no less than Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. “Gorgeous,” “stellar” and body-beautiful” does not begin to describe the dancers of this historically important dance company, a beacon of Black excellence ...
Wheeldon’s wonderful world of Shakespeare: ‘The Winter’s Tale’ for ABT at Segerstrom
Mar
24
2025
Springtime in Southern California brings big, full-evening ballets to Segerstrom Center for the Performing Arts in Costa Mesa. We last experienced Christopher Wheeldon’s work with American Ballet Theatre in his Like Water for Chocolate in 2023. Now again, the British choreographer draws inspiration from yet another literary source: a Shakespearean comedy: The Winter’s Tale in ...
Death of a dancer: the great Christian Holder (1949-2025)
Mar
16
2025
ed. note: With permission of the author, artsmeme is very proud to republish William Whitener‘s marvelous obituary of a F.O.A.M. (Friend of Arts Meme), Christian Holder, who passed away, too soon! too soon!, at his home in London recently. How we loved this Renaissance man of the dance. Whitener’s homage, which Dance Magazine originally published ...