ByGD
I’ve missed the big arts organizations’ live performances in world-class spaces during the pandemic. But I’ve discovered a lot of small, innovative projects that I would have missed in normal years. Many of them might not even have happened during business as usual. One of them is “We’re All in This Together: An (almost) Post-COVID Ballet.” It’s a six-minute ballet video filmed at Vashon Center for the Arts. And it’s really beautiful.
ByGD
When I heard that Pacific Northwest Ballet principals Noelani Pantastico and James Yoichi Moore were starting their own off-season dance company, I knew it was going to be something special. Program One of the Seattle Dance Collective, performed at the Vashon Center for the Arts, was every bit as impressive as I expected. I ran out of space to talk about the specific dances in my initial post on the event and in my post on the first half. Here are my impressions of the pieces performed after the intermission: “Anamnesis,” “Frugivory,” and “Mopey.”
Choreography: Bruno Roque
Music: Nils Frahm
Text: Noelani Pantastico
Lighting Design: Alex Harding and Bruno Roque
Cast I Saw: Noelani Pantastico
Probably the least balletic piece on the program, “Anamnesis” uses spoken word and recorded text as much as music. Pantastico rides a bike on stage, and even the actual dancing is often jagged and disjointed in a way that well illustrates the emotions described, but in no way resembles ballet. Unfortunately, I don’t have any photos of this unique performance.
The program and website don’t describe this as a world premiere, or really describe the origin of the piece at all. But the text (written by Pantastico) is an intensely personal revelation of aspects of her own childhood, and is tied so closely to the music that it must have been created as a vehicle for her.
What the program does say is that “Anamnesis” touches upon the concept of how defining moments in our formative years leave a permanently ephemeral imprint that echoes throughout one’s existence. The word “anamnesis” means the remembering of things from a supposed previous existence (often used with reference to Platonic philosophy) or a patient’s account of a medical history. (I had to look it up.) That is evident in the dance. The stories relate to pivotal moments in Pantastico’s childhood. They relate to times where she “leveled up;” the chaotic movements representing moments when she felt out of control give way to a more controlled, balletic style as she finds new coping mechanisms and sources of strength.
Intellectually, it’s a fascinating piece that I could go on and on about. But with so much going on, it seemed like there was less room for actually dancing, which is ultimately what I most like to see.
Choreography: Bruno Roque
Music: Dead Combo
Costume Design: Noelani Pantastico
Lighting Design: Reed Nakayama
Cast I Saw: Liane Aung, Angelica Generosa, Jim Kent, Elizabeth Murphy, Miles Pertl, Dylan Wald
Like a good rug, “Frugivory” really ties the program together. It’s by the same choreographer as “Anamnesis” and uses some of the same tropes – unusual props, doing things on stage besides dancing. In common with “Mopey” it is set to popular music; like “Shogun” the music is Portuguese.
But the dance stands on its own, particularly for its wry humor. “Frugivory” is described as
a light, unphilosophical take on the idea that the object of our desire can drive us, or blind us; that we are often “prisoners” of our needs and longings
SDC Website
and for once I think the artists’ description is apt. The metaphor is clear when three women offer three men apples; the joke comes when one of the men insists on eating the whole apple before joining the woman in a dance. She even comments on it. In fact, they talk throughout the entire piece, as if eating apples and performing ballet were both common first-date activities. The whole thing is delightfully weird and actually funny.
Choreography: Marco Goecke
Music: CPE Bach, The Cramps
Staging: James Moore
Lighting Design: David Moodey
Cast I Saw: James Moore
We all know that “Mopey” is the real reason I made the trek to Vashon Island to check out a new dance company. James Moore is well-known for this solo at PNB, but he alternated with Ezra Thomson for SDC’s inaugural performances. I think that this was the first ballet I ever saw James Moore in, and I’ve been a Moore fan-girl ever since. So I was happy to see him reprise his signature role when I attended on Sunday. But I have to admit, I’ve seen some Instagram videos that make me really curious to see Ezra Thomson’s take on the piece.
I saw “Mopey” before I started blogging, so there is no record of my impressions, and memory is an unreliable thing. But I know that “Mopey” blew my mind. It literally changed my understanding of what dance could be, because I had never seen anything like it on stage before.
In the years since, I have seen things like it. Ballet that celebrates male dancers is a lot more common than ten years ago. I’ve seen ballet performed in contemporary street clothes in numerous ballets since James Moore bounded on stage in a black hoodie; body slaps have gone from shocking to Contemporary Eric cliché; I’ve still never seen another ballet use music by The Cramps, but I’ve heard plenty of other popular recordings used. Just like the second time that I saw the band Momentum, I was reminded that the same art can’t blow your mind twice.
But I will never get tired of watching the muscles in a dancer’s back drag limbs into contortions most people can never achieve. I will never get tired of the shift between CPE Bach’s sweet violins and the ugly awkwardness of “Surfin’ Bird” and its more fitting affinity to the violent motions of the dance. I will never get tired of the adolescent chaos, confusion and emotional crisis of “Mopey’s” alternating cockiness and self-loathing. A thirty-minute Solstafir set once justified a trip to Iceland. “Mopey” more than justifies a ferry-ride to Vashon.
{I attended Program 1 courtesy of SDC and Vashon Center for the Arts. The tickets were theirs; the opinions are mine.}
ByGD
When I heard that Pacific Northwest Ballet principals Noelani Pantastico and James Yoichi Moore were starting their own off-season dance company, I knew it was going to be something special. I gladly took the ferry to Vashon to see Program One of the Seattle Dance Collective performed at the Vashon Center for the Arts. As you know, I was so impressed with both the facility and the overall program, I ran out of space to talk about the specific dances. So here are some of my impressions of the first three pieces: “The Grey Area,” “Shogun,” and “Sur Le Fil.”
(an excerpt)
Choreography: David Dawson
Music: Niels Lanz
Staging: Rebecca Gladstone
Costume Design: Yumiko Takeshima
Lighting Design: Bert Dalhuysen
Cast I Saw: Elizabeth Murphy/Miles Pertl
PNB fans will already be familiar with the choreography of David Dawson (when I saw “Empire Noir” at PNB, it struck me as very metal.) “The Grey Area” suffered from being a good ballet surrounded by remarkable ones. While there isn’t any intriguing backstory or bizarre staging involved, this stripped down, architectural pas de deux was exactly the sort of contemporary ballet that you would want to build a company repertory around.
Devoid of bells and whistles, with a minimal violin soundtrack and neutral, almost nonexistent costumes, there was nothing to focus on here but the lines and angles of competent dancers. This was the only piece on the program with pointe work. It was a perfect introduction, establishing the company’s technical chops before challenging viewers with the more adventurous choreography to follow.
Choreography: Ivonice Satie
Music: Milton Nascimiento, Fernando Bryant
Staging: Liris do Lago
Lighting Design: Ivonice Satie
Cast I Saw: James Moore, Ezra Thomson
Moore has a personal connection to Shogun because he grew up watching Ivonice Satie’s ballet about passing down Japanese cultural heritage to the next generation in San Francisco. But this was one of the pieces I was most excited to see because of a different personal connection. Satie dedicated the piece to her grandfather who taught her the traditional Japanese arts of laido and Shinto-ryu. My husband is one of only three Americans certified to teach that style of sword work.
So of course we were looking for evidence of Shinto Ryu, and though the dancers wore hakama, the choreography was not nearly so literal. “Shogun” explores the relationship between master and disciple, which was much more obvious than martial tradition in the choreography, with one dancer often mimicking the other. On the other hand, we are only familiar with the sword arm of the Shinto Ryu curriculum. Another branch of the school practices kenbu (martial dance) which includes the use of fans. Maybe Satie was literal after all?
(By a Hair’s Breadth)
Choreography: Penny Saunders
Music: Mike Wall, Moon Dog, Yann Tiersen
Staging: Jacqueline Burnett
Lighting Design: Ben Johnson
Cast I Saw: Liane Aung, Angelica Generosa, Jim Kent, Elle Macy, Elizabeth Murphy, Miles Pertl, Ezra Thomson, Dylan Wald
Between the suspenders and the fedoras, it was inevitable that “Sur Le Fil” would remind me of Twyla Tharp’s “Waiting at the Station.” But costuming is really all those two dances have in common. In contrast to Tharp’s jazzy soundtrack, “Sur Le Fil” starts out with a poem recorded in French and moves through field recordings of a child talking, radio news broadcasts, muted drums, and the Amelie soundtrack.
The fedora hats are more than just costuming. They become props to the dance, earning so much attention from both dancer and audience that they start to feel meaningful. Unlike “Waiting at the Station,” I never discovered the metaphor in “Sur Le Fil,” but eventually the hats became a more abstract focal point. Like a mantra.
My first impression was of “Waiting at the Station,” but in the end, “Sur Le Fil” was more like “Little Mortal Jump.” It inexplicably made me want to cry.
{I attended Program 1 courtesy of SDC and Vashon Center for the Arts. The tickets were theirs; the opinions are mine.}
ByGD
It’s not very often you get a chance to witness the birth of a new arts institution. But when I heard that Pacific Northwest Ballet principals Noelani Pantastico and James Yoichi Moore were starting their own off-season dance company, I knew it was going to be something special. Even though I usually keep my arts adventures close to home (living in Fremont, I there is more good art than I can consume within 3 miles of my house) I gladly took the ferry to Vashon to see Program One of the Seattle Dance Collective.
As founding artistic directors Pantastico and Moore are quick to make clear, Seattle Dance Collective (SDC) is a side hustle. They are both in a place to be thinking about their post-PNB careers, but neither of them is ready to move on yet. Instead, SDC is intended as a summer season company.
With only ten dancers, the company repertory will necessarily comprise smaller, contemporary pieces that don’t use the principal/soloist/corps structure of classical ballet. But with eight of the ten dancers recruited from PNB (two work with Whim W’him) you can still expect it to be ballet. The small size of the organization and the facility also necessitates recorded music rather than the live orchestra of PNB. SDC makes up for this by using non-orchestral music and introducing a lot of verbal narrative to the dances.
Although “Seattle” is in the name, SDC has found a home at the Vashon Center for the Arts. I confess that although I’ve lived in Seattle since 1992, the first time I ever went to Vashon Island was three years ago to pick up my daughter from her middle school orchestra retreat. So in my mind, Vashon was already associated with the arts.
The Vashon Center for the Arts opened in the summer of 2016, a $20 million arts facility in a community of 10,000 people. This was my first visit to the Center, which is a small but lovely arts venue. There’s a gallery in the lobby (and judging by all the red stickers, performance venues are a great place for artists to sell their work) with really interesting work on display. The stage is just the right size for a small dance company like SDC, and the auditorium is comfortable and intimate. Even when I get the really good tickets at McCaw Hall, I am never as close to the stage as a person sitting in the middle of VCA.
The hassle of the ferry means that it’s tempting to “make a day of it” when you see something at the Vashon Center for the Arts. But there are worse things than spending the day on Vashon. The cost of the ferry means that tickets at VCA are not as affordable as they seem at first glance, but the space is worth the added cost for shows you really want to see. For me, that will definitely include future programs of Seattle Dance Collective.
Program One officially comprised six short contemporary ballets, but the performance began with an unannounced piece. Pantastico crawled out from behind the still-closed curtain to perform In a Minute by choreographer Penny Saunders. Unlike the dancer in the video below, she her costume and facial expressions evoked a creepy doll.
The 90-second dance was simultaneously unnerving and a delightful Easter Egg that clued us in to not expect much in the way of traditional presentation from SDC.
Even if I try to keep my comments short (and you know how good I am at that) I have too much to say about what I saw at Program One to fit it all into this post. So I plan on writing about the dances themselves separately. But for the record, here is what was on Program One.
(an excerpt)
Choreography: David Dawson
Music: Niels Lanz
Staging: Rebecca Gladstone
Costume Design: Yumiko Takeshima
Lighting Design: Bert Dalhuysen
Cast I Saw: Elizabeth Murphy/Miles Pertl
Choreography: Ivonice Satie
Music: Milton Nascimiento, Fernando Bryant
Staging: Liris do Lago
Lighting Design: Ivonice Satie
Cast I Saw: James Moore, Ezra Thomson
(By a Hair’s Breadth)
Choreography: Penny Saunders
Music: Mike Wall, Moon Dog, Yann Tiersen
Staging: Jacqueline Burnett
Lighting Design: Ben Johnson
Cast I Saw: Liane Aung, Angelica Generosa, Jim Kent, Elle Macy, Elizabeth Murphy, Miles Pertl, Ezra Thomson, Dylan Wald
Choreography: Bruno Roque
Music: Nils Frahm
Text: Noelani Pantastico
Lighting Design: Alex Harding and Bruno Roque
Cast I Saw: Noelani Pantastico
Choreography: Bruno Roque
Music: Dead Combo
Costume Design: Noelani Pantastico
Lighting Design: Reed Nakayama
Cast I Saw: Liane Aung, Angelica Generosa, Jim Kent, Elizabeth Murphy, Miles Pertl, Dylan Wald
Choreography: Marco Goecke
Music: CPE Bach, The Cramps
Staging: James Moore
Lighting Design: David Moodey
Cast I Saw: James Moore
Seattle Dance Collective has not announced specific plans for the future yet. It’s uncertain when Program Two will take place, or how many programs they hope to perform each summer. It’s possible that we’ll have to wait until next year for a follow up. But you can be certain that I will be there.
{I attended Program 1 courtesy of SDC and Vashon Center for the Arts. The tickets were theirs; the opinions are mine.}