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Volume 1, Number 2 October 6 , 2003 An online supplement to DanceView magazine
Letter from New York 6
October 2003 William Forsythe
has been here all week with the Ballett Frankfurt, for performances at
the Brooklyn Academy of Music and talks around town. The program at BAM
was a surprise, at least for me: all-dancing, from curtain to curtain;
no harangues in a fractured polyglot tongue; scores from Thom Willems,
Forsythe’s longtime composer, that were completely appropriate to
the stage action; and choreography that seemed to have themes and a focus
that even a lumpkin like me, who gave up trying to penetrate the works
of Jacques Derrida and Theodor Adorno 20 years ago, could grasp. It may
be that the concentration on dancing to put over the theatrical ideas
made it possible to see what those ideas are and to appreciate the relationship
between the individual phrases that the dancers contribute to the work
and the larger editorial shaping and control that Forsythe exerts in the
studio and through his customarily brilliant lighting designs. These were
works that didn’t look as if they had to prove anything, or compete
for something, or impose themselves in order to be recognized. They were
dances in the presence of skillfully-designed particles of sound, performed
by brilliant movers, and it was pleasant to be in their company for an
evening. A: Carlotta Sagna's inside-out dance-theater A By
Meital Waibsnaider Part
rehearsal-on-display, part modern-dance performance and part late-night
confessional, Carlotta Sagna's A explored performers' psyches while humorously
toying with audience expectations. In a jumble of a show that touched
on many aspects of performing and living, small kernels of truth shone
throughout.
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The American Forsythe Ballett
Frankfurt By
Nancy Dalva Native
son William Forsythe returned to New York City this week, to warm acclaim.
The four performances at the Brooklyn Academy of Music were the last here
for the Frankfurt Ballet, which will disband next summer after a final
American tour. Having fallen out with the city burghers, the maverick
Forsythe, who has for some twenty years directed his troupe under Frankfurt's
sponsorship, will then move on. (Though perhaps not far. At press time,
he had any number of balls in the air, including regrouping under a new
banner in Frankfurt itself.) Like that other prodigal, Mark Morris, who
made rude remarks about Belgian royalty and Bejart and was booted out
of Brussels, Forsythe has only gained in American affection from his recent
political difficulties abroad. With interesting synchronicity, the program
he brought here, four works new to New York, was distinctively American
looking, while usually what one sees of Forsythe here looks European. What's
on This Week? October
6-12 (opened September 23) October
9 October
9, 13, 16, 23, February 18 and 21 October
11-12 October
6-18 (opened October 1) October
10 – 17 Dale Brauner |
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