Friday November 21, 2008 - Cedar Lake Withdrawal is similar to New York City Ballet Withdrawal. Same symptoms. Luckily whenever a fix is needed, Cedar Lake comes thru. Today I went down to one of my favorite dance venues, Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet's fantastic home on West 26th Street to watch - along with Evan, Avi and Tonya - a rehearsal of two works being prepared for their Winter season.
Choreographer Didy Veldman (photo, above) is creating Frame of View on the Cedar Lake dancers. Speaking to us briefly beforehand, Didy described her piece as a reflection on human nature in terms of how our public and private selves differ - how we behave in social situations as opposed to what we might do behind closed doors. Witty, ironic, full of movement and laced with of snippets of conversation, we recognize ourselves and our friends at every turn of events.
Free-standing doors describe the playing area. The dancers come and go; they hang from the door frames and the doors in fact become participants in the movement. Intense personal crises give way to party scenes and chance meetings as the doors open and close. Ana-Maria Lucaciu self-propels her table and chair across the diagonal as she suffers the after-effects of some romantic breakdown. Jason Kittelberger and Marina Mascarell have a violent domestic dispute - in slow motion - as Jubal Battisti quietly showers them with confetti: ah, the joys of married life. Ironically, they duke it out to the ultra-romantic strains of the Barcarolle from Offenbach's TALES OF HOFFMANN. Later, Jubal and Soojin Choi have their own interlude with Soojin hiding under Jubal's loose shirt.
Didy spoke of how specifically this work is being created on the individual characteristics of the Cedar Lake dancers and so we are able to focus on people who have intrigued us in past works, like Acacia Schachte (above). In a City full of fascinating dance personalities, Acacia always stands out.
Above, Oscar Ramos, Golan Yosef, Christopher Adams and Acacia. Oscar, Christopher and Matthew Rich each make their mark in the ensemble which calls for athleticism...and door-climbing. And there is a hilarious segment where the four girls dancing in unison each call out to Jason Kittelberger to save them from falling. He ends up with his hands full. Eclectic musical elements - Nina Simone, Bartok, Kronos Quartet, an Offenbach galop - add to the quirky delights of Frame of View which is as yet unfinished; a Dean Martin song is being worked up as the finale. This will be a piece to see multiple times because there's a lot to take in.
True to his word: Caleb promised to have a video of Didy's rehearsal ready for us today. And here it is.
Luca Veggetti's new work is Memory/Measure. Luca's imaginative staging of the Xenakis ORESTEIA at the Miller Theatre earlier this Autumn made me eager to see what he would come up with working with the Cedar Lake dancers. (Photo: Jon Bond and Acacia Schachte from the alternate cast).
Memory/Measure is a quartet which has a dream-like and oddly ancient feel despite being very contemporary its musical setting: industrial, clanging sounds alternate with spoken recitations; later a metallic violin is heard. Ana-Maria Lucaciu on pointe (long balances in grand plie in second) really shines in this work, as does Nickemil Concepcion - a big, strong guy who dances with a darkly lyrical spirit. Soojin Choi has already become an indispensable dancer with her delicacy and sense of mystery; and the piece gives us an opportunity to see the technical polish and clarity of Jubal Battisti's excellent dancing. Soojin's signature motif here, a stylized slow-motion sprinting effect, is later employed to striking effect by Jubal as he skirts the perimeter. It looks simple but calls for great control and concentration.
Over at The Winger, Bennyroyce Royon has interviewed Cedar Lake dancer Harumi Terayama. Harumi and her colleague Kristen Weiser gave a tremendous joint performance of Angelin Proljocaj's L'ANNONCIATION this past Spring.
Cedar Lake have become one of my favorite addictions. Now there's a six-week wait for the actual performances, though somehow I feel I'll be seeing them in some context before January 8th.
Rehearsal photos: Paul B Goode.
Thanks for the mention. :-)
Posted by: Bennyroyce Royon | October 29, 2009 at 11:01 AM