Dorrance Dance: The Joyce does it again!

Josette Wiggan-Freund
plays Clara's Mother and Sugar Rum Cherry
in The Nutcracker Suite.
(photo: Matthew Murphy)

Dorrance Dance
The Joyce Theater
December 17-January 5

The Joyce closes out the 20-Teens with another tap triumph--this time, a three-week run by Dorrance Dance, the superb troupe headed by 2015 MacArthur Fellow Michelle Dorrance. Dorrance has been showing three separate programs, each crowned--I can find no better word for it--by the world premiere of The Nutcracker Suite, set to the Duke Ellington/Billy Strayhorn arrangement of Tchaikovsky and designed like you've never seen it before.

The actual title--as rendered in the program notes, if not on the Joyce's website--is as follows:

WE PRESENT TO YOU: THE NUTCRACKER SUITE OR, A RHYTHMATURGICAL EVOCATION OF THE SUPER-LEVIATHONIC ENCHANTMENTS OF DUKE AND BILLY'S SUPREME ADAPTATION OF TCHAIKOVSKY'S MASTERPIECE THAT TELLS A TALE OF A MISUNDERSTOOD GIRL WHO KILLS A KING AND MEETS A QUEEN AND DON'T FORGET OOOO-GONG-CHI-GONG-SH'-GON-MAKE-IT-DADDY AND THAT IT AIN'T SO BAD AFTER ALL

Okay?

But we'll certainly call it The Nutcracker Suite for short.

In the program I saw (B), it followed the cool and spacious Elastic Time, also a world premiere, by the company's Associate Artistic Director, Nicholas Van Young, who is also a drummer, with sections of improvisation by the dancers and wonderful live music. Elastic Time and The Nutcracker Suite are like night and day. The first: abstract, rhythmically complex and transparent so that you marvel at the spare, dynamic architecture of its design and zoom in on its dancers' clean technical abilities, with Warren Craft bringing spunk and playfulness to an exciting tap suite that feels, nevertheless, to avoid the element of swing. The second: all swing all the time, winkingly queer, drenched in and bursting with color (lighting by Kathy Kaufmann, costumes by Andrew Jordan, scenic design by Christopher Marc--all of whom, like Dorrance, should clear a shelf for awards).

Dorrance's jazzy charm offensive starts right off centering a jitterbug couple and proceeds to woo us with a pocket-watch-hypnosis chorus line and a trio of Sugar Rum Blossoms (Elizabeth Burke, Carson Murphy and Maddie Murphy, led by Sugar Rum Cherry Josette Wiggan-Freund) who evoke Harlem showgirls. With its mayhem (seriously brawling rats) and bustling merriment (Russian trepak dance with some b-girl moves from Ephrat "Bounce" Asherie), this Nutcracker is non-stop, over-the-top entertainment giving good value for the price of your ticket.

Dorrance has the skillz. See this show, and you'll see why she could (and should, if desired) follow Camille A. Brown to Broadway. You will love The Nutcracker Suite, and you'll want to see it again and again. May this show become an annual tradition. Make it so, you geniuses at Dorrance Dance and The Joyce. Make it so.

Dorrance Dance continues through Sunday, January 5. For program and schedule information and ticketing, click here.

The Joyce Theater

175 Eighth Avenue at West 19th Street, Manhattan

(directions)

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DISCLAIMER: In addition to my work on InfiniteBody, I serve as Senior Curatorial Director of Gibney. The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, strategies or opinions of Gibney.

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Good medicine from Reagon and Dorrance at Lincoln Center

Toshi Reagon (standing) and some members of BIGLovely
at Lincoln Center Out of Doors at Damrosch Park
(c)2015, Eva Yaa Asantewaa

All of your friends were at The Blues Project last night at Lincoln Center Out of Doors, right?

I know that's right.

And they all tweeted and posted to Facebook and text messaged and Instagrammed. And maybe you were there, too. Most likely, you were. Maybe crowding that space between the seats and the stage, for the first part of the show, and dancing your ass off. So you already know what a celebration that was.

And that's how it goes these days. You don't need me to tell you. You probably don't need any critic.

And why would you need us anyway, since we're talking Toshi Reagon and Michelle Dorrance? And Derick K. Grant and The Empress Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards? And Juliette Jones? And Allison Miller? If the collaboration between musician Reagon (with her band BIGLovely) and tap dance wiz Dorrance (with her Dorrance Dance troupe) hasn't become a sure bet by now, I don't know what has.

Opening the show with her crew, Reagon first called the audience to attention. Basically, she said everything boils down to the environment. Mess that up, and it doesn't matter who you are or where you are: We're all royally screwed. Don't vote for anyone who doesn't get that, who doesn't have environmental concerns top of mind.

"Taking care of the planet will unite all of us past our differences," she said before launching into a clap-along environmental anthem with folk and gospel gleaming through, silver and gold. "No tears will fall, no battle will call/You will miss the world you know...." The set moved on to propulsive, open-throated rock, irresistibly sinuous reggae, and much more--all the confident, stylistic interweaving for which Reagon is noted.

She got folks, young and old, up on their feet. "Don't you need to jump up and down? This is the medicine you need for the hard week we've been through," she said, as we thought about Sandra Bland, about Lafayette. "It's been a horrible week."

For medicine, she and her band brought "sunshine, still shining in the pouring rain," an optimism practiced in music without borders. In the second part of the evening, Dorrance teamed up with, and matched, Reagon and BIGLovely with her own cool blend of old and new across styles, races and genders.

The Blues Project--a suite of ensemble and solo pieces created by Dorrance, Reagon, Grant and Sumbry-Edwards--might be one of the most efficient ways to introduce your newbie friends to concert dance of any kind or to teach them, through subliminal means, what tap's all about. For sure, this is smooth, stress-free education at its finest, right in the middle of pure, nonstop entertainment by dancers giving their best. You see and hear the roots of tap in the African-Irish encounter; the virtues of both polished choreography and expressive improvisation; the comfort of the familiar paired with the kick of new angles and accents and timing; the pleasures of both refined, minimal details and expansive, rip-roaring energy. No filler, and not a bit of cornball to muck it up.

If you are one of the two or three people who did not make it to Damrosch Park last evening, make sure that you find your next chance to see the Reagon-Dorrance collaboration in action. Take your medicine.

Lincoln Center Out of Doors continues through August 9. For all the details and a schedule of events--from Joe Bataan's boogaloo to Afro-punk and Judy Collins--click here.

Michelle Dorrance to be honored at the 2013 Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival

Michelle Dorrance (left) with Brenda Bufalino at Writing on Tap forum in 2012 (photo by Eva Yaa Asantewaa) 

New York's Michelle Dorrance--a Bessie Award winner, acclaimed for her fresh, innovative approach to tap dance choreography and performance--is the winner of the 2013 Jacob's Pillow Dance Award. The award--to be presented by Jacob's Pillow Executive and Artistic Director Ella Baff at the festival's opening gala on Saturday, June 15--comes with a $25,000 prize with no strings attached. She is the first tap artist to receive this award.

Baff comments, “With this year’s Award, we recognize a hugely talented young artist who is experimenting with new ideas and moving the art of tap forward.  We are also honoring the great American art form of tap, which has created some of the best dance and music-making ever.”

Dorrance will perform at the Gala with singer Aaron Marcellus. Her ensemble, Dorrance Dance, will perform at this summer’s festival, July 24-28, in the Doris Duke Theatre, accompanied by award-winning singer, musician and composer Toshi Reagon and band. Past recipients of the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award include Crystal Pite, Merce Cunningham and Bill T. Jones.

Read more about the Jacob's Pillow Dance Award here.

For complete information about the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, click here.