Live performance lives! at Vail Dance Festival

Dance · Reviews
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Melissa Toogood with other Festival Artists in Michelle Dorrance’s “New to the Session” at the Vail Dance Festival. Photo by Christopher Duggan As New York City’s dance venues gear up to re-open next month, in early August a heady mix of the city’s finest dancers brought the thrill of live dance to the Vail Dance Festival. ...

Dance Detective: Who chor’ed ‘An Occasional Man’ in ‘The Girl Rush’ (1955)?

Dance · Film
courtesy of doc macro From Bob Boross:From the film “The Girl Rush” starring Rosalind Russell, Fernando Lamas, Gloria DeHaven, and Eddie Albert. Matt Mattox is a leading dancer in the film’s four dances. The choreographer is Robert Alton, although Matt told me that he choreographed the film. After examining the dances, it looks as if ...

Curtain up for ‘Bayadère’ rehearsal at Palais Garnier

Dance
Front-row seats in a live, costumed performance would be better. But, for second best, watch this video’ed répétition, (rehearsal) of an Act Three duet from La Bayadère danced by these two full-bodied, gorgeously trained grands étoiles of Paris Opera Ballet: Amandine Albisson, as Nikiya, partnered by the hunky-but-sleek dreamboat, Hugo Marchand, as Solor. The rehearsal ...

Afternoon of a Tramp

Dance · Film
The nymph dance in the dream sequence of the 30-minute short film Sunnyside (Charles Chaplin, 1919) has been recognized as a tribute to the ballet. Charlie met Nijinsky in December 1916.Charlie met Anna Pavlova in 1922.

Antiseptic dance antics for our era: Steve Koplowitz at The Wooden Floor

Architecture & Design · Dance · Film
The cool kids who attend dance class at The Wooden Floor, the renowned and respected Orange County-based program that enhances youth development through dance, are not among the bummed-out performers sidelined by COVID-19. Heck no! They traded in the dance studio’s wooden floor for an asphalt parking lot! Under the command of a veritable P.T. ...

Meet director Roselynde LeBlanc of ‘Can You Bring It,’ Bill T. Jones doc

Dance · Film
‘Can You Bring It’, courtesy Kino-Lorber films This most compelling image is from a dance work dating from 1989, Bill T. Jones’s “D-Man in the Water,” which was a tour de force group work Jones fashioned in response to the AIDs epidemic. So why does that matter now? We have a new pandemic to worry ...

Un sueño de baile de Cuba

Dance
Sensual and smooth. Seamless, seductive and sexy. Sublime! Sliding to the silken ‘son Cubano,’ the Cuban sound. Sleek and sensational! Dancing in a Havana dream — un sueño. The man is Victor Zapata, the lady unidentified. Tremendous dancers. In solidarity with the struggle of the Cuban people, our neighbors, our friends.

Inspiring & relevant: ‘José Limón: A Life Beyond Words’ at 49th Dance Film Festival 1

Dance · Film
photo by Barbara Morgan It was time very well spent, in my living room, viewing one of the many attractive offerings of the Dance Film Festival, ihat kicks off July 16 (in person, bring a mask) at the Walter Reade Theater in Lincoln Center. But, wait, world citizens, the Festival features streaming fodder as well. ...

‘Color me modern!’ cries clever new dance book on Intl Women’s Day

Dance
(already colored!) yoshiko chuma, jennifer muellerphoto courtesy ‘modern women,’ etc. Facebook page Today is International Women’s Day, the most sacrosanct date in March, which is Women’s History Month. But … just for a moment, ladies: Think GIRL! Each of us started as one — packing roller skates, Oreo cookies, and crayolas. So, get into a ...

COVID making you ‘coo-coo’? Watch Bob Baker’s marionettes

Dance · Theater
Feeling a little …. um …. wobbly? Who isn’t? The Bob Baker Marionette Theater Bead Men are here to give you some ‘At Home Happiness’ with their rendition of spacey track “Coo Coo U” by The Manhattan Transfer. Okay, Bead Men, do your thing! Selected lyrics for sing-a-long below. Coo coo uI think you’re coo ...