Dance Magazine articles from June 2004

Dance Magazine archives from June 2004

Curtain up.
June 1, 2004... Anything can happen in adolescence," wrote Agnes de Mille about that tremulous age in which we are almost unbearably sensitive. We have a sense that every decision we make will affect our lives forever--and we might be right. We're almost...

Preludes and nocturnes: dancers dream about dance: dreams are often stages for our obsessions. For dancers, this can take on a more literal meaning. In the February issue, we invited you to write and tell us your dance dreams. Here are some responses.(Letter to the Editor)
June 1, 2004... SLEEPING BEAUTY In 1970 I was attending the University of California at Irvine for my master's in dance. One of the main subjects was choreography, and I felt blocked. After reading an article in the Los Angeles Times about fostering...

A sleeker swan.(Dance Matters; Christopher Wheeldon retools Swan Lake for Pennsylvania Ballet )(Interview)
June 1, 2004... WHEN Pennsylvania Ballet artistic director Roy Kaiser asked Christopher Wheeldon to choreograph a new million-dollar production of Swan Lake for the company's fortieth anniversary, Wheeldon didn't blink. In his opinion, every serious ballet...

Marked for export.(Dance Matters; dances by Robert Garland and other choreographers slated for London)(Interview)
June 1, 2004... THIS IS no time for an inferiority complex. Americans operating under the delusion that in ballet, everything important flows westward across the Atlantic should readjust their thinking. Last season, London's Royal Ballet incorporated Mark...

Ballet San Jose Silicon Valley has received a $1 million gift from Fry's Electronics of San Jose.(Money Matters)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... Ballet San Jose Silicon Valley has received a $1 million gift from Fry's Electronics of San Jose, the largest single gift in the company's history

The Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation (CRPF) has awarded a $10,000 Quality of Life Grant to the Dance in Education Fund.(Money Matters)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... The Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation (CRPF) has awarded a $10,000 Quality of Life Grant to the Dance in Education Fund, which will expand its program of dance classes for people with both physical and developmental disabilities

Dance/USA has received a $1 million grant from The James Irvine Foundation for continued support for California dance artists.(Money Matters)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... Dance/USA has received a $1 million grant from The James Irvine Foundation for continued support for California dance artists. "Dance: Creation to Performace" will award grants totaling $225,000 annually for three consecutive years

Karole Armitage and the universal grammar.(Dance Matters)(Interview)
June 1, 2004... CHOREOGRAPHER Karole Armitage has a beautiful loft overlooking lower Manhattan, but she doesn't enjoy the view that often. Between January and May, she unveiled six new projects ranging from an opera in Naples to a New York season at The Joyce....

The Jerome Robbins Foundation has announced a leadership grant of $150,000 to The George Balanchine Foundation.(Money Matters)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... The Jerome Robbins Foundation has announced a leadership grant of $150,000 to The George Balanchine Foundation for the updating and expansion of Choreography by George Balanchine: A Catalogue of Works and for the creation of an online...

A milestone.(Dance Matters; Orlando Ballet celebrates thirtieth anniversary)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... A MILESTONE Florida's Orlando Ballet celebrated its thirtieth anniversary in March with a gala al Orlando's Carr Performing Arts Center. For this occasion, Fernando Bujones, who has directed Orlando Ballet since April 2000, returned to the...

Visions of dollar signs.(Dance Matters; Dance/NYC on economic impact of dance on New York)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... DANCE DOESN'T usually call to mind images of spreadsheets, pie charts, and dollar signs (unless you need a new accountant), but Dance/NYC, a branch of Dance/USA, claims it's time the dance community began paying more attention to its own...

Musical chairs in France.(Dance Matters; dance companies in flux over dwindling unemployment benefits and tenured choreographers )
June 1, 2004... IN 1997, a group of forty young dancers and choreographers addressed a letter to France's culture minister requesting a new examination of the country's dance agenda. Among their demands was the re-evaluation of the tenure of the nineteen...

Step by step.(New York Notebook; performance art piece by Stephan Koplowitz )(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... [NY] In a project that Stephan Koplowitz calls a mega street performance art piece, he is sending fifty dancers up and down the grand staircases of New York City from June 15 to June 29. "It's an idea that's been brewing for years," says...

Too much TV.(New York Notebook; performance by Koosil-ja Hwang at the Nest in Brooklyn)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... [NY] A pile of video monitors accompanies the riveting Koosil-ja Hwang in her new piece, deadmandancing Excess, at the Nest. The basement of a commercial building in the DUMBO section of Brooklyn, the Nest has been rent-free for artists,...

Margot everlasting.(New York Notebook; exhibit honoring Margot Fonteyn at New York Public Library )(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... [NY] It was in 1949 that a charming ballerina stole America's heart--as well as subsequent cover stories in Time and Newsweek--dancing Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty at the old Metropolitan Opera House with the Sadler's Wells Ballet (now The...

It takes a diva.(New York Notebook; Dalia Carella performs In Search of A Goddess )(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... [NY] With a time-tripping vision of Ruth St. Denis in mind, producer-writer Fran Kirmser turned to Dalia Carella. Critics had crowned Carella the latter-day Miss Ruth, noting her skilled, glamorous interpretations of "ethnic" dancing. The...

Advice for dancers.
June 1, 2004... SHOULD I FOLLOW MY HEART AND TRY TO BECOME A PROFESSIONAL DANCER? OR SHOULD I GIVE UP AND PERHAPS FEEL REGRET AFTERWARD? I ASK BECAUSE I'M ALMOST 18 AND I'VE HAD ONLY ONE YEAR OF TRAINING. MY TEACHERS SAY I HAVE POTENTIAL. THEY'VE ALSO ADVISED...

Pilates: ripe for reforming?(Mind your Body)
June 1, 2004... PILATES HAS become the workout of choice among many dancers for all the obvious reasons. It helps build alignment and flexibility, lengthens and tones muscles, and helps dancers find their center. But as Pilates continues to gain...

You are (exactly) what you eat.(Health and Fitness)
June 1, 2004... EVER BEEN TOLD to lose weight of you'll lose your job? I recently got a teary call from a dancer who felt under that pressure. When I talked to the company's artistic director, he was crestfallen, explaining that all he had said was that the...

Force of one: this is Alexandra Ansanelli's season to shine. The gifted New York City ballet principal talks about her passion for dance and her determined journey to center stage.(Interview)(Cover Story)
June 1, 2004... On a spring afternoon in a ballet studio high above New York's Lincoln Center, Alexandra Ansanelli and Nilas Martins are struggling. It's their first rehearsal in the "The Man I Love" pas de deux from Balanchine's Who Cares?, and Ansanelli, who...

Contact improvisation comes of age.(Interview)
June 1, 2004... How is Contact Improvisation like the Internet? Lots of ways, it turns out. Both the dance form and the electronic network came into being in the early 1970s. Both revolutionized the way we communicate. Both have spread dramatically,...

Out of the wings: School of American Ballet graduates remember their first moments in the sun.
June 1, 2004... In the spring of 1916 in St. Petersburg, the young Georgi Balanchivadze performed the pas de trois from Paquita with Alexandra Danilova and Lydia Ivanova at the Maryinsky Theater in his school's annual end-of-year performance. Almost fifty...

Some like it hot: Salsa is spicy, sexy, and making waves in dance.
June 1, 2004... Ask any salsero and they will tell you salsa is more than a dance. It is life, the motion of intense rhythm, being in the beat and on top of things. Today's salsa is unquestionably shaping tomorrow's social dances. The passion for salsa is...

Touring or training, less is more.(New Products--Traveling Light)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... BACK TO BASICS STRIP DOWN to Capezio Overs and Unders when the weather gets hot. Lightweight, stretchy, and formfitting, they make perfect classroom practice gear. Get the crew-neck T-shirt, leotard, women's tank top, or women's hipster...

Grace Under Pressure: Passing Dance Through Time.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
June 1, 2004... GRACE UNDER PRESSURE: PASSING DANCE THROUGH TIME By Barbara Newman. New York: Limelight, 2004. 480 pages. Paper. $22.50. Newman's three-decades plus absorption in the international dance world has yielded a volume of interviews with a...

Dancing with Cuba: a Memoir of the Revolution.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
June 1, 2004... DANCING WITH CUBA: A MEMOIR OF THE REVOLUTION By Alma Guillermoprieto. New York: Pantheon Books. 2004. 304 pages. Cloth. $25. When Merce Cunningham suggests to Alma Guillermoprieto that she take a teaching job in Cuba, she knows that...

The Days We Danced: the Story of My Theatrical Family from Florenz Ziegfeld to Arthur Murray and Beyond.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
June 1, 2004... THE DAYS WE DANCED: THE STORY OF MY THEATRICAL FAMILY FROM FLORENZ ZIEGFELD TO ARTHUR MURRAY AND BEYOND By Doris Eaton Travis; with Joseph and Charles Eaton as told to J.R. Morris. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press. 2003. 279 pages....

Henning Kronstam: Portrait of a Danish Dancer.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
June 1, 2004... HENNING KRONSTAM: PORTRAIT OF A DANISH DANCER By Alexandra Tomalonis. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida. 2002. 608 pages. Cloth. $39.95 When Kronstam died in 1995, his reputation as one of Denmark's foremost danseurs nobles,...

Writing in Motion: Body--Language--Technology.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
June 1, 2004... WRITING IN MOTION: BODY--LANGUAGE--TECHNOLOGY By Kenneth King Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press. 2003. 256 pages. Paper. $24.95 Veteran American postmodernist King epitomizes the thinking person's dancer choreographer; and every...

Diary of a college residency: choreographer Henning Rubsam shares his experiences.(Education Matters)
June 1, 2004... Day 1 Dance department director Greg Halloran introduces me to thirty students sprawled on the dance studio floor, some in ballet clothing, others in baggy pants. I see some familiar faces and eager expressions. This is my second visit to the...

Making a better argument: Howard Gardner talks about the arts in schools.(Education Matters)
June 1, 2004... Howard Gardner may have surprised some dance educators when he addressed the National Dance Association membership in January. The Harvard scholar recommended against using a particular argument for the inclusion of arts in public school...

Eva Encinias-Sandoval: teacher's wisdom.(This Month)(Interview)
June 1, 2004... Many dancers now study flamenco, drawn by its percussive power and the subtle combination of delicacy and dramatic farce. Writer Jennifer Noyer interviews master teacher Eva Encinias-Sandoval, who created the flamenco emphasis in the University...

Crossover kid: hip-hop dancemaker John Byrne moved from Taylor 2 to MTV.(Biography)
June 1, 2004... When Britney Spears got ready to shoot her new music video. "Every Time." she didn't turn to hip-hop mavens Wade Robson or Brian Friedman. Instead, she entrusted the steps to a relative newcomer, John Byrne. This sentimental song needed a...

Going Bollywood: can kathak dancers stop the show in Bombay Dreams?(On Broadway)
June 1, 2004... It's happened with some regularity: I'll be chatting with an Indian of Pakistani taxi driver when traffic suddenly stalls as we approach the theater district. He tells me he doesn't understand the holdup; I tell him it's Wednesday...

Nederlands Dans Theater.(Dance Review)
June 1, 2004... NEDERLANDS DANS THEATER BROOKLYN ACADEMY OF MUSIC BROOKLYN, NY MARCH 9-14, 2004 What was in the water in Stuttgart? This quaint German city nurtured three of the most sought-after ballet makers of the 1990s: William Forsythe, John...

New York City Ballet.(Dance Review)
June 1, 2004... NEW YORK CITY BALLET NEW YORK STATE THEATER, LINCOLN CENTER NEW YORK, NY NOV 25, 2003-FEB 29, 2004 From its opening night winter gala onwards, through the customary Nutcracker, to the closing two week bombardment of The Sleeping...

Susan Rethorst.(oh oh oh)(Don't Go Without Your Echo)(Dance Review)
June 1, 2004... SUSAN RETHORST DANCE THEATER WORKSHOP NEW YORK, NY FEBRUARY 18, 19, 27, & 28, 2004 When a continuous sound stops, your ears perk up. It's a well-known auditory phenomenon and one that Susan Rethorst plays with in her new piece oh oh...

Houston Ballet.(Tales of Texas)(Dance Review)
June 1, 2004... HOUSTON BALLET WORTHAM THEATER CENTER HOUSTON, TX MARCH 11-21, 2004 The premiere of Houston Ballet's Tales of Texas, choreographed by the company's new artistic director, Stanton Welch, was a paean to the courage, endurance, and vision...

Spectrum Dance Theater.(Fado, Hip-Hop & The Blues)(Dance Review)
June 1, 2004... SPECTRUM DANCE THEATER SEATTLE, WA FEB. 19-22, 2004 Donald Byrd presented three very different works in his first full season with Spectrum Dance Theater. Virtually all of the dancers are new (Allison Keppel and Paula J. Peters, the...

Remembering May O'Donnell.(Transitions)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
June 1, 2004... When I was a young dancer, new to New York, I loved taking class with May O'Donnell on the slippery wood floor of her narrow studio on lower Fifth Avenue. My classmates included Cora Cahan, Jane Kosminsky, Norman Walker, Ben Vereen, Dudley...

Transitions.(deaths)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
June 1, 2004... Susan Borree, former dancer with Jerome Robbins' Ballets: USA, New York City Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, and mother of New York City Ballet principal dancer Yvonne Borree, passed away on December 26, 2003. Doreen Bird, dance educator...

Sherri LeBlanc and Leslie Young, both soloists with San Francisco Ballet, retired at the end of the 2004 season.(Retirement)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... Sherri LeBlanc and Leslie Young, both soloists with San Francisco Ballet, retired at the end of the 2004 season. Young, a nineteen-year veteran with SFB, plans to take time off and continue her studies of Benesh notation. LeBlanc will continue...

Alexandra Koltun and Alex Lapshin, principal dancers with Ballet San Jose, welcomed Anthony John Koltun.(Births)(Brief Article)(Biography)
June 1, 2004... Alexandra Koltun and Alex Lapshin, principal dancers with Ballet San Jose, welcomed Anthony John Koltun into the world on March 15.

American Ballet Theatre.(Moving Around)(Rachel Moore appointed)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... American Ballet Theatre keeps it all in the family. Rachel Moore, dancer with ABT from 1984 to 1988, has been appointed Executive Director of the company effective mid-April 2004. Moore served as director of the Center for Dance Education at...

Sarah Lamb.(Moving Around)(Royal Ballet)(Brief Article)
June 1, 2004... Bright young star Sarah Lamb has signed to dance as first soloist with The Royal Ballet in London beginning in August. Lamb, who was promoted to principal in 2003, has spent the last five years in Boston Ballet and was trained at Boston Ballet...

Dance finder: schools, studios, colleges, universities, companies, teachers, dancers, choreographers, somatic practices, movement arts, dance medicine, yoga.(Directory)
June 1, 2004... Contents United States International Somatic Practices, Movement Arts, Dance Medicine, and Yoga United States ALABAMA ALABAMA BALLET Wes Chapman, Artistic Director Alice Cox, Director of External Affairs 2726 1st Avenue...

United we dance.
June 1, 2004... The country's most talented high school dance students gathered together with distinguished faculty last March for four days of classes, workshops, auditions, and competitions at the 7th biannual National High School Dance Festival. The...

Attitudes.(dansicals)
June 1, 2004... WHAT'S wrong with the word "dansical"? Too obvious, perhaps? Words, words, words. The naming of things is a task found essential even by Adam in the Garden of Eden. As my friend and sometime mentor Edwin Denby once remarked to me, one of the...