Dormeshia and friends swing out at The Joyce

Dormeshia
(photo: Eduardo Patino)

And Still You Must Swing
by Dormeshia
at The Joyce Theater
December 3-8

No hype. Dormeshia has been crowned Queen of Tap and, while some might find the notion of regal hierarchy in the arts a bit distasteful, there's no denying the evidence of one's eyes and ears. Mastery is mastery. Moreover, the refined ability of this artist to make and switch up minute mental/physical calculations with every passing microsecond qualifies her for superstardom. Go see And Still You Must Swing, one of Aaron Mattocks' great tap presentations at The Joyce this season. All hail the Queen.

Dormeshia's show, which premiered in Summer 2016 at Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, teams her with veteran dancers and frequent running buddies, Derick K. Grant and Jason Samuels Smith, of whom we can never ever see enough. The tap firepower is strong with this endearing trio, as we've come to expect. But look who's also in the house: Camille A. Brown, top-notch performer and in-demand choreographer of contemporary and Broadway dance. Her unmatched embodiment of Black culture and legacy adds a distinct, dedicated underpinning of wokeness/awareness to this seamlessly entertaining show.

From left to right:
Derick K. Grant, Dormeshia, Camille A. Brown and Jason Samuels Smith
(photo: Christopher Duggan)

Jason Samuels Smith
(photo: Christopher Duggan)

And Still You Must Swing, a 75-minute suite of dances and musical interludes, has a tight, intermission-less structure with generous fun but no time for fluff. Choreographed and "improvographed" solos, duos, trios and quartets each aim, jump and achieve high spots you think can't possibly be topped, all supported by a vivacious jazz band as sumptuously warm as it is driven--musical director and pianist Carmen Staaf, drummer Winard Harper, bassist Noah Garabedian and percussionist Gabriel Roxbury. And the linkage between the lush, expressive fluidity of swing in dance and swing in music--and the roots of all this in Black experience and sensibility--comes across clearly without being forced. If you can't imagine why a djembe, the iconic West African drum, deserves to get a highlighted moment in the middle of a tap show, no one will get up and tell you. But just wait for Brown's solos; she channels the innovations of enslaved African taking back the power of intense vibration and rhythm, preserving and expressing this freedom through the body. Drums, you see, were forbidden to a stolen people but never truly silenced.

Brown adds outrageous gutsiness and quirk to Dormeshia's lineup. The charming bros--often bookending sleek, slithery Dormeshia--add hoofericious heft while dazzling us with the possibly limitless variety of ways heels, toes and sides of feet can ring changes on the meeting of metal and wood. Legs and feet fly like the digits of a 75 wpm typist.

Breathless, you eventually stop thinking How'd they do that? and surrender to your own connection to the music.

Good. They got ya.

Original music: Allison Miller and Dormeshia
Lighting design: Sue Samuels/Divine Rhythm Prod./Event Systems & Design Inc.
Costume design: Javier Pedroza

And Still You Must Swing continues through Sunday, December 8 (Wednesday, 7:30; Thursday and Friday, 8pm; Saturday and Sunday 2pm and 8pm). If any tickets remain--and that's chancy--grab them here. In the event of sold-out shows, there will be a ticket line for hopefuls starting one hour before curtain time.

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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Ayodele Casel and Arturo O'Farrill team up at The Joyce

Tap dancer Ayodele Casel
(photo: Michael Higgins)

Ayodele Casel + Arturo O'Farrill
The Joyce Theater
September 24-29

As I take my seat at the Joyce, a couple of audience members to my left peruse their programs, making note of the fact that tap artist Ayodele Casel has cast herself among her ensemble in all nine dances on the bill. It doesn't faze me. I know Casel. That one--given the Yoruba name for "joy has arrived"--has energy to burn.

This season's particular display of joy, though, surely comes from the victory of sharing her prestigious first full-length program at The Joyce with six-time Grammy-winning Afro-Latin jazz musician Arturo O'Farrill. The woman who once created a solo tap show called While I Have the Floor (Spoleto Festival, 2017) took another floor this time to foreground cultural pride (she is Black and Puerto Rican). Both Casel and O'Farrill are in top form here--as introduced by Scalular, the sharp-edged, scintillating world premiere ensemble piece that opens the night. Their respective arts clearly grow from the same seed. The deep, intuitive communication and affection between these master artists could be easily read throughout the theater.

If you need any reason to be convinced that tap belongs in a bond with Afro-Latin jazz, buy a ticket to this show. As offered by O'Farrill and Casel, the combined music endlessly cascades like a crystalline stream over a long stretch of rocks, sparkling, glinting in sunlight. It gives life. Casel, in particular, finds innumerable delicate, exquisite facets to bring forth in sound--nothing expected or stale or slapdash; her discipline is steely--and she's joined by a diverse, talented young ensemble that includes Naomi Funaki, Dre Torres, Luke Hickey and Andre Imanishi. If I wished for anything at all, it might be a second program with juicy challenges for spirited artists like Hickey or Imanishi, in particular. Both look game for anything, grounded in good training and inspiration.

But I do love this program with its easy-going interlude where Casel tells of going from being a Ginger Rogers fan girl to her revelation at Fazil's--legendary, dearly-departed dance studio--when the entry-level tap she'd mastered fell embarrassingly short of the hoofer's mark. And with its feminist shout-out to Girl Power everywhere and, especially, to the once-overlooked women of color in tap's history, like Jeni LeGon. And O'Farrill and Casel's embrace of everything from Bach (Chromatic Fantasy in D Minor) to Charles Mingus, Dave Brubeck and Wayne Shorter.

A grand new leap forward in Casel's career, this show is a must-see if you can manage to get a ticket. I suggest you don't delay.

Arturo O'Farrill (pianist/composer)
Keisel Jiménez (percussion)
Zack O'Farrill (drums)
Ivan Renta (saxophone)
Bam Bam Rodriguez (bass)
Kali Rodriguez-Peña (trumpet)

Carolina Gonzalez Mama (vocals)

A Broadway Foundation Leaders-in-Training (2019-2020):

Sasha Arteaga
Samaria Dalling
Karime De La Cruz
Mckayla Faye
Jasmine Mendoza
Vanessa Pavia Fuentes
Amani Varney

Betsy Chester (lighting)
Daniel Erdberg (sound)

Ayodele Casel + Arturo O'Farrill continues through Sunday, September 29 with 8pm performances through Saturday and a 2pm Sunday matinee. For information and (hurry!!) tickets, click here.

The Joyce Theater
175 8th Avenue (corner of 19th Street), Manhattan
(map/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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Days of Black Future Past: Black Rock Coalition at The Met

Above: Sandra St. Victor
Below: Shelley Nicole
Black Rock Coalition: The History of Our Future
Metropolitan Museum of Art
photos: Paula Lobo

"Black music has been the taproot of every significant movement in rock music. Sadly, the vast majority of Black artists in rock have been erased from the historical narrative or relegated to footnotes."

--Darrell M. McNeill

When you imagine venues to host one of the badbadbadass-iest rock concerts of all times, do you think of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art?

Mmmhmmm.

Well, think again, because you missed Black Rock Coalition: The History of Our Future, a MetLiveArts show designed to demonstrate that Black people not only did rock first but they did it best, do it now and have no intention of stopping. Under Darrell M. McNeill's creative and musical direction, the famed Black Rock Coalition Orchestra and featured guests rocked that house last night with a steady roll. All walls and pedestals should be checked for damage.

Named for BRC Orchestra's 1991 album, the two-hour show started off with the pumping Sly Stone hit "Dance to the Music." That funk functioned here like it did when it was new back in 1967--a sure-fire commercial success for David Geffen's CBS Records and, in 2019, an icebreaker like no other. Though the predominantly white Met Museum audience needed the initial permission to dance to the music, as the evening sped along, folks required little prompting to get up on their feet.

The stage of the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium was packed, side to side and front to back, with instruments and artists including a revolving cast of standout featured performers--among them, Nona Hendryx, Toshi Reagon, Stew, Carl Hancock Rux, Living Colour's Vernon Reid and Corey Glover and, led by a commanding Sandra St. Victor, The Family Stand reunited. Yoruba chants and drumming, spoken word, jazz vocals, traditional work songs, gospel tunes, rock and roll and straight-up rock presented a stream of Black genius, all telling a story of determination, improvisation, spiritual depth and lust for life in the face of a long, long stretch of rough times under white supremacy. Times are still rough; the music persists and continues to do its work.

"So what is rock and roll?" Hancock Rux asked, "We begin with juke joints, and women loving women...." He went on to say it's rooted in "trying to find our way home."

Each performance--like vocalist Everett Bradley's unquestionable authority on both "Dance to the Music" and Louis Jordan's "Choo Choo Ch'Boogie"--felt like a sturdy home and one connected, at the foundation, to every other home. Places of rest and reflection, generous nourishment, everyday miracles and jubilation. Hendryx, above all others, took all my heart with witchy renditions of the jazz classic "Afro Blue" and, later, an unexpectedly expanded and capacious "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot." She enters a song at unusual angles, spies just the right, clear path, then guides you through as intensity builds. Reagon quietly took up and met the challenges of Curtis Mayfield's bleak "When Seasons Change" with agility of voice and soul. Stew, with David Barnes on harmonica, updated Bo Diddley's "I'm A Man," making a statement on toxic masculinity from the White House to the church house, from FOX News to NPR. And it was just pure fun to watch Glover rock out again to "Cult of Personality," the show's closer.

An historic one-night only event. So, if you didn't catch it, bummer! But if you love rock, you can still check out Play It Loud: The Instruments of Rock & Roll, at the Met through October 1. Plan your Met visit here.

*****

Featured Artists:

Nona Hendryx
Fantastic Negrito
Vernon Reid, Corey Glover (Living Colour)
Toshi Reagon
Stew (The Negro Problem)
The Family Stand
"Captain" Kirk Douglas (The Roots, Hundred Watt Heart)
Carl Hancock Rux
Ronny Drayton

Black Rock Coalition Orchestra:

Darrell M. McNeill (bass)
LaFrae Sci (drums)
Howie Robbins (keyboards)
Elenna Canlas (keyboards)
Marcus Machado (guitar)
Marvin Sewell (guitar)
Gordon "Nappy G" Clay (percussion)
V. Jeffrey Smith (saxophone, flute)
Don Byron (clarinet, saxophone)
Bruce Harris (trumpet)
JS Williams (trombone)
Sophia Ramos (vocals)
Shelley Nicole (vocals)
Bruce Mack (vocals)
Everett Bradley (vocals, percussion)
Kelsey Warren (vocals)
David Barnes (harmonica)
Mikal Amin (vocals)

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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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Reggie Lucas, 65

Reggie Lucas, Versatile Guitarist and Producer, Dies at 65
by Jon Caramanica, The New York Times, May 20, 2018

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We gon' dance now: Hank Smith's "Story of Tap" turns 20

Hank Smith, host of The Story of Tap,
remembered the late Sammy Davis, Jr.
patting his shins, before rising from his chair,
and telling them, "We gon' dance now."
(photo: Charles Dennis)

I felt myself smiling nearly all the way through dancer Hank Smith's program last night at Dixon Place--The Story of Tap: 20th Anniversary. Launched back in 1998 at the original Dixon Place with Marion Coles and James "Buster" Brown as Smith's first guests, the evening works a bit like a tv talk show...but better. Way better.

The better part is that it's all about tap and has the elfin Smith--dancer and so much more--as genial host. Better in that this edition had kickass tap stars Jason Samuels Smith and Derick Grant as guests along with Ayako Shirasaki, a jazz pianist whose playing is simply delicious. Better, too, because you're not home on your couch in front of a screen. You're just a few feet from the action, helplessly smiling.

The Story of Tap offers Smith a venue for humorously chatting up colleagues and idols about how they started and built their careers; who taught and mentored them; the grand inspirations--like Gregory Hines and Jimmy Slyde--they most miss; places where their skills were tested and honed; values that drive them to this day; issues that continue to intrigue them. Conversation, illustrated by archival photos and video clips, alternates with tap improvisations--astoundingly intricate or blistering solos with each dancer setting the bar higher and higher; playful face-offs; and, of course, the traditional shim sham ensemble with friends from the audience bringing it all to a close. Shirasaki was also granted her own solo at the keys during which every last one of us fell in love and awe.

I can't urge you to go to The Story of Tap: 20th Anniversary. That story has been told. But I hope Smith plans to bring tap's wonderful stories back to Dixon Place next year and the year after that and then some.

CLOSED. For information on upcoming Dixon Place events, click here.

Dixon Place
161A Chrystie Street (between Rivington and Delancey), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Charles Neville, 79

New Orleans legend Charles Neville, saxophonist for the Neville Brothers, dies at 79
Keith Spera, The New Orleans Advocate, April 26, 2018

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Nathan Davis, 81

Nathan Davis, Jazz Saxophonist and Educator, Is Dead at 81
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, April 17, 2018

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Cecil Taylor, 89

Cecil Taylor, Pianist Who Defied Jazz Orthodoxy, Is Dead at 89
by Ben Ratliff, The New York Times, April 6, 2018

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Buell Neidlinger, 82

Buell Neidlinger, Acclaimed Genre-Crossing Bassist, Dies at 82
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, March 25, 2018

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Leon (Ndugu) Chancler, 65

Leon (Ndugu) Chancler, Versatile Drummer, Is Dead at 65
by Jon Pareles, The New York Times, February 7, 2018

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Happiness: Kumagai and Watanabe at Asia Society

Left: Kazunori (Kazu) Kumagai
(photo: Maiko Miyagawa)
Right: Kaoru Watanabe
(photo: Yuki Kokubo)

Bessie-winning tap dancer Kazunori Kumagai (2006) is likely better known to my InfiniteBody readership than is composer-musician Kaoru Watanabe, but these two major artists merged forces last night at Asia Society's First Friday, presented with Japan Foundation. Kumagai (aka Kazu) brought two friends he has partnered with in recent years--Sabrina Clery, an engaging, heartful vocalist, and renowned veteran bassist, Alex Blake. Watanabe, percussionist and flutist, was accompanied by colleagues whose work similarly spans cultures and genres--violinist Mazz Swift and percussionist Satoshi Takeishi.

We were treated to an exemplary performance by Kumagai who, over time, demonstrated finer and finer control of his sounds and speed of delivery. Assured technique, yes, but he also learned, from Black funkmeister mentors, to keep heart and soul in place. And sass, too, like those slices of shoe against wood, so like skate blades marking ice. His inward concentration--pitched forward, drilling the floor, eyes on his work--this time reminded me less of Gregory Hines, with whom he has been compared, than Savion Glover. He appears less interested in looking pretty than sounding awesome, getting results, holding his own with rhythmic powerhouses like Blake (in their dynamic Blue Moses duet) and Watanabe (in the stormy and ecstatic Amazing Grace finale, performed with all hands on deck).

This gig with Watanabe marked Kumagai's (and, likely, tap's) Asia Society debut. A huge audience received it all warmly, and I hope that means we can expect future Watanabe/Kumagai collaborations and return visits.

Asia Society's First Friday is celebrated from 6pm to 9pm on the first Friday of the month with free museum admission, exhibition tours, refreshments, late night shopping at AsiaStore and more. The next will be held on March 2. Asia Society also hosts LGBT Connections Night at Leo Bar each night on third Fridays. For more information on all of these events, click here.

Currently on view at Asia Society:

In Focus: An Assembly of Gods

Through March 25, 2018

An in-depth look at a large Chinese pantheon painting

from the early nineteenth century

Masterpieces from the Asia Society Museum Collection

Through March 25, 2018

A selection of the finest artworks

from the renowned Asia Society Museum Collection

For more information, click here.

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Hugh Masekela, 78

Hugh Masekela, South African jazz trumpeter, dies
BBC News, January 23, 2018

Hugh Masekela, Trumpeter and Anti-Apartheid Activist, Dies at 78
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, January 23, 2018


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The Joyce's American Dance Platform welcomes Caleb Teicher and BODYTRAFFIC

Dancer-choreographer Caleb Teicher
and below with dancer Nathan Bugh
(photos: Scott Shaw)

The powers-that-be are only offering you one more chance to catch New York's fantastic Caleb Teicher & Company along with BODYTRAFFIC, a dance ensemble from Los Angeles, at The Joyce Theater this season during American Dance Platform, curated by Christine Tschida. The entertaining ten-year-old LA troupe focuses on contemporary repertory from a variety of choreographers such as Kyle Abraham, Sidra Bell and Andrea Miller. On the ADP program, the dancers radiated charisma in works by Richard Siegal (The New 45, from 2015) and Matthew Neenan (the previewed A Million Voices) and demonstrated sturdy technique and fierce energy in Hofesh Shechter's dismal Dust (2015). They look thoroughly capable, ready and eager for any challenge a dancemaker might bring.

BODYTRAFFIC in Hofesh Shechter's Dust
(photo courtesy of American Dance Platform)

Nothing, though, charms quite as magically, quite as indelibly as the sight of two men--superb Caleb Teicher and Nathan Bugh--dancing romantic partnership like it has always and everywhere been just another part of life's scenery. And dancing it to the most delicious vocals by Ella Fitzgerald (Meet Ella, 2016), letting the smooth, graceful follow-through and crunchy nuttiness of their movement style ironically and ingeniously intertwine. This generous fantasia, originally shown at Gibney Dance in 2016, sparkles on the Joyce stage where the two bodies manage to write flourished signatures across unbounded space. I often thought of The Nicholas Brothers while watching Teicher, in particular, with his flash and fearlessness, his expansive angularity and impeccable jazz timing and flow. In Bugh, he has an all-in, springy and sassy partner in swing and humor and dance-scatting, both of them working musicality and surprise for all they're worth. Like some of my favorite dance artists, their deep knowledge of the music and their joy make me want to get up and dance, too. Really, what more can one ask?

On the program, too, a trio from Variations (2015), an intricate showpiece set to Glenn Gould's 1955 recording of The Goldberg Variations danced by Teicher, Brittany DeStefano and--watch, especially, for a mindboggling solo by this one--Gabe Winns Ortiz.

Caleb Teicher & Company and BODYTRAFFIC continues with a final performance on Sunday, January 14 at 7:30pm. For information and tickets, click here.

For schedule information and tickets for other shared programs on the American Dance Platform series, on now through Sunday, January 14, click here.

The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Avenue (at 19th Street), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Kevin Mahogany, 59

Kevin Mahogany, Masterly Jazz Singer, Is Dead at 59
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, December 19, 2017

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Sunny Murray, 81

Sunny Murray, Influential Free-Jazz Drummer, Is Dead at 81
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, December 14, 2017

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Happy Holidays! Trisha Brown repertory at The Joyce

Trisha Brown Dance Company in
Brown's Groove and CountermoveBelow: Geometry of Quiet
(photos: Stephanie Berger)

Imagine The Joyce Theater, or some other lucky venue, making Trisha Brown Dance Company an annual holiday-time tradition! Works like what the Joyce has aqcuired for this season--L’Amour au Théâtre, 2009; Geometry of Quiet, 2002; Groove and Countermove, 2002--possess both the late choreographer's postmodern-pioneer cred and her luscious, eye-pleasing appeal in a time when we all could use some reassurance and soothing. I can easily foresee a future in which Ailey and the usual Nutcrackers share the bounty of the holiday season with TBDC, now under the leadership of Carolyn Lucas and Diane Madden.

This is work, too, that might aspire to heal the desperate rawness we feel now across the spectrum of gender. The dances persist in showing egalitarian interactions between and among bodies. L’Amour au Théâtre, set to excerpts from Rameau's opera, Hippolyte et Aricie, is particularly good with this as gender never determines who will grasp, lift and support whom. Brown seems to advise, "Just do the next thing that needs doing." Bodies quietly, efficiently align themselves to be as ready and humbly useful as possible, no one more powerful than another in an unpredictable landscape they create and re-create by their moving. No one flies tremendously high, literally or figuratively. One's virtuosity--if we choose to call it that--lies in the ability to go all quicksilver fluid and responsive in that space between heaven and gravity.

A duet of two women opens Geometry of Quiet, a quartet set to music by Salvatore Sciarrino, taking a different route to the same locale. The music--played live by flutist Sato Moughalian stationed at stage left--breathes, but it can also bark. Leah Ives and Amanda Kmett'Pendry, gleaming in white, each stretch out, front and back, from one firmly-grounded standing leg, a picturesque image. But they end up clasping each other like jigsaw pieces with only as much individuality to be able to fit and lock together perfectly. No surprise that Groove and Countermove's dancers, in their Crayola array of costumes, seem like drawing implements in the hand of a smart, happy child. Brown's choreography invites us to focus, breathe, be flexible, be surprised, take pleasure in the unending doing and discovering.

Trisha Brown Dance Company runs through Sunday, December 17. Tonight's program includes a "curtain chat" moderated by Wendy Perron, dance writer, educator and former Trisha Brown dancer. For schedule information and tickets, click here.

The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Avenue (at 19th Street), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Jon Hendricks, 96

Jon Hendricks, 96, Who Brought a New Dimension to Jazz Singing, Dies
by Peter Keepnews, The New York Times, November 22, 2017

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Muhal Richard Abrams, 87

Muhal Richard Abrams, 87, Individualistic Pianist and Composer, Is Dead
by Howard Mandel, The New York Times, November 1, 2017

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Grady Tate, 85

Grady Tate, Jazz Drummer Turned Vocalist, Dies at 85
by Richard Sandomir, The New York Times, October 12, 2017

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John Abercrombie, 72

John Abercrombie, Lyrical Jazz Guitarist, Dies at 72
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, August 23, 2017

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