Rire-Woodbury: Traces

Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company’s Traces includes a sharp, stylish duet by company artistic director Daniel Charon as a prelude and Ann Carlson’s evening-length “Elizabeth, the dance,” originally created for the company in 2017. My pet word is almost always “effective” when I critically appreciate and evaluate a production. But, regarding Carlson’s astounding “Elizabeth,” I find that the words sending me to the thesaurus are related to ‘“strength” -  strong choices, strong chemistry, and an overarching strong sense of deliberate purpose.

The focal point of the opening tableau in “Elizabeth, the dance” is a modular wall of dense foam blocks, each around two and a half feet square, that are stacked in rows of five or six. The company of six sits contemplating the blank, imposing structure. They proceed to launch individual full-body assaults on the wall, egged on by off-the-cuff verbal appraisal from their cohort. The wall gives way with a truly jarring crash and its constituent blocks are claimed, scattered, and repurposed by the dancers with intense motivation. This sequence presents a literal foundation, and also its figurative analogue. The theme is structure: obstruction, destruction, construction. These incredibly versatile blocks are later counterposed with light white balloons. Archetypal simplicity belies complexity of craft in “Elizabeth, the dance”; a textured collage of speech, movement, and sound proliferates within this elemental framework. 

Carlson drew directly from the lives and experiences of the dancers in the creation of this work, and the dancers embody it beautifully. Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company is thoughtfully peopled with distinctly virtuoso individuals who, together, have an incredible working chemistry. Their ensemble unison in silence was especially impressive. Some singular moments and images in “Elizabeth” stand out from the piece’s gestalt enactment of human endeavor: Melissa Younker is the first dancer to fully arrest the viewers’ attention, in a series of draping poses on a block pedestal with all the exaggerated static angularity and total living force of the classical statuary figures she invokes. A recording of Bashaun Williams telling a personal story is accompanied by William’s solo movement, which, though adept and sharp, left room to focus on the utterly compelling cadence and content of the narration. The dancers emerge and re-emerge from behind the wall in accumulating states of clown get-up, starkly breaking the aesthetic monochrome, and enact a furtive pants-tugging, crotch-rubbing, shiftily ambiguous probing of erogenous bits that hits the perfect note of discomfort and grotesquerie.

(From left to right) Bashaun Williams, Dominica Greene, Brian Nelson, and Melissa Younker of Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company in Ann Carlson’s “Elizabeth, the dance.” Photo by Stuart Ruckman.

Other moments of note deal more explicitly with the overarching theme of dance history and precedent and its patent impact on the lives of dancers. Clad in pointe shoes and tutu, Megan McCarthy executes bravura balletic movement, only to break against human impediments and collapse dramatically to the floor. The director stops the scene to redo the fall again and again, which McCarthy accomplishes not only with wit and intensity but also the blithe, performative deference demanded of a dancer receiving vague, disparaging rehearsal notes. In another vignette, newest company member Dominica Greene speaks directly to the problematic framing of historical legacy. Greene and two other dancers ascend and descend a block, draping their long black costumes in pan-Hellenistic toga fashion and striking the corresponding languid poses. They respond warily at first to unvoiced questions about unnamed forebear Isadora Duncan. The series culminates in Greene stating that this historical figure was a racist, that she prefers personally to look to the many women of color who innovated and originated modern dance, and, in an admission of confliction, acknowledges Duncan’s contribution to the field with the certainty that Greene would have been excluded from her work. In “Elizabeth,” the treatment of modern dance as subject never feels like an in-joke. Rather, it is explicit and integral, driving conflict and inquiry.

Watching “Elizabeth, the dance” reminded me both of reading Italo Calvino’s lectures on lightness and weight and of trying feverishly to stay awake through the hippo, crocodile, and ostrich ballet in Disney’s Fantasia. It made me consider the difference between intention and objective. We are often called on to appreciate and acknowledge the intention or internal process of a performance. But it is refreshing and exciting to be swept along with unremitting craft and purpose, with the sense that each artist is driven by a strong objective in every moment, and on a path of deliberate choices. The path here terminated in an on-stage popcorn party, so thoughtfully scaffolded and respectful of boundaries that I participated in it comfortably and gladly.

Ann Carlson has long-standing connections with the University of Utah and the founders of Ririe-Woodbury and has recently presented work for UtahPresents and the inaugural Dance West Fest. I fervently hope she will continue to create here in our community.

Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company’s Traces continues through September 28, with a family matinee and full-length evening performance, at the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center.

(From left to right) Dominica Greene, Brian Nelson, and Melissa Younker of Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company in Ann Carlson’s “Elizabeth, the dance.” Photo by Stuart Ruckman.

Nora Price is a Milwaukee native living and working in Salt Lake City. She can be seen performing with Durian Durian, an art band that combines post-punk music and contemporary dance.

UtahPresents: Ann Carlson's Doggie Hamlet

Go see Doggie Hamlet. It’s a rare event, and one that exemplifies what dance has to offer our species. Last night, I drove down Provo Canyon, from a conference I was attending in Midway, to the Salt Lake County Equestrian Park. Just to watch this dance. It reminded me: viewing dance – the rarified act of looking at other bodies and identifying with them – is an irreplaceable way of knowing. 

Those incredible mountains I’d just driven through lay there on their sides, bathing in the sun. The lawn was eerily verdant and flat. We sat on bleachers – like you do at a high school football game – staring at an arbitrary rectangle of grass. Dominica Greene, who you may know from Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, climbed over a fence and a haystack to traipse casually across the long, heroic diagonal. She was wearing what looked like a wedding dress made of snakes. We never saw her again, but she was followed by Imre Hunter-To, who might have been a teenaged ranch hand. He waved toward a faraway road, and moments later several dozen sheep came bounding toward us from the inaudible distance. Dogs, a shepherd or two, and more dancers followed. 

Doggie Hamlet, the brainchild of choreographer Ann Carlson, is hard to describe because the action unfolds at a glacial pace – and yet there‘s always more to look at than you can really take in. You make choices. I spent a lot of time looking at Eph Jensen’s son, the middle-aged caretaker of his father’s flock, who stood still at the far corner of the field, an imposing icon with his cowboy hat, bright white shirt, and cane. (The program notes tell us that the Jensens are the only sheep outfit in Utah that still trails their ewes home each fall via a dedicated right-of-way in Box Elder County.)

Geese and airplanes cross the sky. The six human performers (including Diane Cox, the “onstage” shepherd) comprise a weather-beaten family.

One of many tableaux: the dancers call out for the dogs with a helpless enthusiasm. Their cries and useless flailing-of-limbs make the dogs’ connection with Cox seem like the epitome of ancient human-animal competence. Another image: our heroes dress up in sheep-drag and perform a gruesome Vaudeville number for their uninterested ungulate co-stars. As the night unfolds, the sheep themselves react very slowly to the rising temperature of inexplicable human behavior. The dogs do what dogs do. They labor to make sense of the social predicament. 

Ryan Tacata dances an entrancing solo with real or fake sign language that puts me in mind of the work of Francisca Benitez. Maniacal human-patriarch Peter Schmitz (more King Lear than Hamlet) invites us to sing. The dancers – yes! – but there’s always something else to look at. It’s not anthropology or narrative that lets us understand these humans, it’s what they look like next to the other animals who also run, leap, and stare. Periodically, we even find ourselves to be indifferent to the human concerns on display. We become like the sheep and the empty blue sky. 

Doggie Hamlet asks a lot of the audience. When we are not being sheep, we must work. We must accommodate several different frames, up to and including the valley in which we live. We must look at animals and people in various states of pain and confusion. A logic emerges, far outside of what a story can tell us. We learn something by imagining ourselves as a part of that grimy – dare I say, primitive – pack of humans. We learn something else through our aestheticized empathy with the dog who gets stepped on by a ewe. Another insight comes from watching how the flock acts as one slow-moving mind, but still makes room for the odd leaping soloist. The sun sets on all of us. The mountains turn azure and pink and the grass is still unnaturally green. 

Doggie Hamlet continues Saturday, September 14, at 6 p.m. at the Salt Lake County Equestrian Park.

Samuel Hanson is the editor and executive director of loveDANCEmore. 

Dance West Fest: Topography

topography n. the physical or natural features of an object or entity and their structural relationships

The inaugural Dance West Fest combined workshops hosted individually in the past by Repertory Dance Theatre, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, and the University of Utah. The newly branded workshop culminated on Thursday night with Topography, an aptly titled program that featured a hybrid of dances in varying stages of completeness. The evening served as a preview, both of the upcoming local dance season as well as of work from outside the state, and provided an instructive side-by-side of pieces that would not share a program otherwise.

With no printed playbill, directors and choreographers personably introduced each dance and cast; the informality was a nice foil to an otherwise surprisingly polished presentation in the Rose Wagner black box, complete with lighting and (light) costumes. 

Doris Humphrey’s 1949 “Invention,” staged by Limón company alum and veteran repetiteur Nina Watt, opened the program with jubilation. RDT will perform this new acquisition in its coming season; here, it was danced with aplomb by seasoned company members Jaclyn Brown, Lauren Curley, and Tyler Orcutt. 

Difficult feats such as a series of tours en l’air, with bow-and-arrow arms, and suspended hinges to the ground appeared effortless, buoyed by the performers’ horizon-focused gaze. As Norman Lloyd’s piano score transitioned from effervescence to effort, so too, and seamlessly, did the relationships between dancers. Though “Invention” clocks in at just eleven well-paced minutes, “through form and music and shape and gesture, [Humphrey] creates a world." 

Lauren Curley and Tyler Orcutt of Repertory Dance Theatre in Doris Humphrey’s “Invention.” Photo by Tori Duhaime.

The fully-mined finality of an archival work was followed by an exploration of something brand new, as Ann Carlson introduced an onstage rehearsal featuring Ririe-Woodbury artistic director Daniel Charon. Carlson explained that, for her, the audience always completes a dance; this is evident in her 2017 work for Ririe-Woodbury, “Elizabeth, the dance,” which the company will re-stage this fall. 

Charon tap-danced to “Moses Supposes” from “Singin’ in the Rain” and Carlson admitted she knows nothing about tap as she mimicked his movements while calling out directions, her hands fluttering behind her like quaking aspen leaves. Her coaching interjections, which functioned both for Charon and for us, made the case that, even here, the audience remained her final ingredient. 

Molly Heller (left) and Arletta Anderson presenting the start of a new collaboration with Katie Faulkner. Photo by Tori Duhaime.

Bay Area choreographer Katie Faulkner presented a collaboration with Arletta Anderson and local artist Molly Heller. The three women live in different cities, and Faulkner introduced their piece, the beginning of an evening-length one (shown in front of an audience here for the first time), as an experiment in working across distance and time. 

Performed by Heller and Anderson, the duet focused on percussion (audible, prancing pony steps, body slaps, and half-intelligible, breathy muttering) to create an abstracted narrative verging on the humorous. Like a contemporary art rendering of two Stooges, Heller and Anderson’s foibles (literally) pushed off and built upon one another, the two garnering laughs as they raced in circles around the stage, one clearly imagining herself the triumphant winner. 

Rebecca Aneloski (foreground) performing in a piece created by Dante Brown during Dance West Fest. Photo by Tori Duhaime.

New York-based choreographer Dante Brown mined both poetry and personal life in his offering performed by four students of the workshop, which he introduced as a “text to movement experience.” For the most part, any clarity was derived from the poetry read aloud by Brown at the front of the stage. The dancers began by moving in a rather amorphous blob and Brown’s relationship to them, as well as his choice to wear feathered wings, was not abundantly clear, lending the selection the air of a classroom exploration (in fairness, it was created in just several hours over the course of the workshop). But a solo by Rebecca Aneloski colored the space between performers and text beautifully, providing both heft and purpose. 

Yin Yue, also based in New York, presented twice on the program; first, a duet performed with Grace Whitworth, who is rehearsal director for Yue’s YY Dance Company, and then, to close the program, an excerpt of a new commission for Ririe-Woodbury to premiere in April 2020. 

Yin Yue (left) and Grace Whitworth in Yue’s “The Time Followed.” Photo by Tori Duhaime.

Lights rose on “The Time Followed” (2019) on what appeared to be one figure - the soon-revealed duo of Yue and Whitworth continued the idea of a singular, eight-limbed body with responsive, intelligent, and close-quartered partnering. Each manipulated the other through challenging weight shares and elegant promenades, both remaining in simultaneous control throughout. The ending image had Yue and Whitworth facing each other, arms outstretched and hands slowly rising while moving closer together, like moths seeking the light.

The program-concluding excerpt of Yue’s Ririe-Woodbury commission gave an enticing glimpse of company newcomers Dominica Greene and Nicholas Jurica. Similarly task-oriented partnering once again emphasized movement itself as concept (if the chosen selection is any indication of the whole). The dancers of Ririe-Woodbury appeared freer to inject daring in their approach to Yue’s choreography, or perhaps their sense of abandon was a product of their bodies’ interpretation of a new language - either way, it was a rewarding expansion upon the previous, more carefully calculated, pas de deux. 

Dominica Greene and Brian Nelson (pictured in rehearsal attire) performing an excerpt of a new commission by Yin Yue for Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company. Photo by Tori Duhaime.

Amy Falls manages and edits all reviews found on loveDANCEmore.org. Please send press releases for upcoming shows, and inquiries about writing, to amy@lovedancemore.org.

Ririe-Woodbury: Bloom

Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company’s Bloom featured two new works, one by artistic director Daniel Charon and one by University of Utah professor Stephen Koester, as well as a piece by Tzveta Kassabova (2010) that Ririe-Woodbury first performed in 2016. The concert was well-formatted, with Charon’s dynamic and daring work splicing two more humanistic explorations of relationship and transition. I’m not convinced the title Bloom accurately described my experience, but how does one accurately name a diverse repertory program? If the title didn’t portray what was happening on stage, it did sum up the beautiful Salt Lake City spring that is happening outside.

Kassabova choreographed “The Opposite of Killing” as an exploration of emotions pertinent to losing a close friend, and the piece has been performed by multiple casts, including by students at the University of Florida, University of Maryland Baltimore County, and Middlebury College. Amy Falls did a thorough job of describing and unpacking the piece at its Utah premiere; I will add that I especially found meaning in its arc.

The beginning was an exploration of movement, absence of movement; sound, absence of sound. The dancers confidently found their places making parallel lines and right angles, clear in their mission and devoid of emotional ambiguity. As the piece unfolded, it slowed down, weighted with grief. Breeanne Saxton found herself upstage and alone, bathed in a warm spotlight, isolated, watching the movement carry on without her.

There were the more obvious moments of experiencing loss, such as soft embraces and collapsing bodies. Particularly resonant, however, was the constant shift of dancers’ costumes. As the choreography moved the dancers on and off stage, each subtly shifted what they were wearing; one who was wearing shorts came out in pants, one previously showing skin next appeared in a turtleneck. The costume changes never departed from a gray palette, but morphed enough to signal that each dancer was, in fact, changing; as if to say, “I may be similar on the outside, however, with loss, there is a shift.”

The end was the beginning, the dancers lying down in horizontal and vertical lines. What felt self-assured and expectant in the opening scene now felt unresolved and heavy. What we experienced in the middle shifted everything.

Charon’s Dance for a Liminal Space, divided into two parts, buffered either side of the intermission, and each part diverged from the other in their definitions of “liminal.” From the program notes, the first section related to a transitional or initial stage of process, while the second explored occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary. I found both parts showcased the five dancers beautifully (Brian Nelson, who joined the company in 2018, did not appear in the piece), as well as challenged notions of how to convey something both in transition and arriving from transition. That is to say, I liked it.

The first part began with the three women of the company (Megan McCarthy, Melissa Younker, and Breeanne Saxton) as clear, directional, and undulatory, their bodies bright and severe against the darkness of the stage. Then, just when I started to put my finger on the piece, text by Meredith Monk began. Phrases such as “he salted his empty plate first” and “she wears the same bow as her dog” refused to relate to what was happening on stage, and scrambled any definitive meaning. This absurdity paired with the robust physicality was oddly satisfying, and forced my mind to open and receive instead of to close and define. Undoubtedly, there will be those that find the disparity jarring, even frustrating; but when the closing image was settled and fixed, two groups having taken their places, statuesque and clear, I appreciated it even more.  

The second part of Dances for a Liminal Space was highlighted with bold and geometric lighting by Ririe-Woodbury technical director William Peterson and relentless music by Michael Gordon. Did I mention that the dancers looked fantastic? Because they did. Bloom is also the farewell concert for both Yebel Gallegos and Breeanne Saxton, two versatile dancers that will be greatly missed. They, along with the others, were in perfect form, and this section of Charon’s piece in particular showed off the company’s range and virtuosity. Bashaun Williams and Megan McCarthy travelled from one side of the stage to the other, flying, twisting, and turning, and when they leapt into the wings, I wished they would run back around and soar through the phrase again. The stakes were high in this section, the position had been chosen, and it was time for the dancers to confront the consequence with intensity and resolve.

The final piece was Koester’s “Departure - A Last Song, Perhaps a Final Dance Before a Rest.” As the program note detailed, Koester is retiring from his position at the University of Utah in the School of Dance, and perhaps from dance in general. I was his student at the U during graduate school, and thus feel a personal connection to his retirement; he has been a strong figure in the Utah dance community for decades. I have admired him as a choreographer, and found his pieces bold and impactful -- even the few that I did not enjoy would run through my mind for weeks after, as I tried to find a landing place for them (arguably the biggest compliment of all).

To that end, I found myself anticipating what his final work would be. Conceptually challenging? Movement-driven? Autobiographical? Trying not to be too melodramatic (although the piece’s title doesn’t temper this), it was as if we were all huddled around him, staring intently: “What are your parting words?!”

His parting words in “Departure” seemed to be, “Find community. Help one another. Be together.” The piece featured the entire company, clad in pedestrian clothes, with music by David Lang. There was form to it, but that form sprouted from relationships as each dancer seemingly took a turn at being supported, or at least seen, by the others. Sometimes the relationships poked, nagged, questioned, or insisted; there was little movement for movement’s sake, each vignette attaining an emotional resonance that could also immediately shift or drop.

The final image was a terse wave from Yebel Gallegos, as he and Brian Nelson retreated upstage, the lights fading.

Bloom concludes tonight, April 20, with a final performance at 7:30 p.m. at the Rose Wagner Center for the Performing Arts.

Erica Womack is a Salt Lake City-based choreographer. She coordinates loveDANCEmore’s Mudson series and contributes regularly to the blog.

Ririe-Woodbury: the live creature and ethereal things

Anyone who enjoys being hugged, or enjoys giving great hugs, knows that friendship is as much felt as spoken. In the newest production by Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, a collaboration with Flying Bobcat Theatrical Laboratory inspired by the Red Fred Project, this is made abundantly clear. Words intermingle with choreography and music to generate a rich environment that reminds us that movement can be as powerful as spoken language when it comes to conveying emotions and ideas.

Called the live creature and ethereal things, this performance is a flight through relationships, challenges, and discoveries told by the six dancers of Ririe-Woodbury who are joined on stage by actor Robert Scott Smith. The music by John Paul Hayward and costumes by Jared Gold add to the vibrancy of the production. As an interdisciplinary endeavor, a project that combines storytelling with music and dancing, live creature amplifies the synergies between narrative, character, and choreography.

In the first scene of the performance, a solo by dancer Melissa Rochelle Younker, the bird-like nods of her head and wing-like movement of her arms transform a person into an avian creature. When Smith walks on stage and opens a book that he is carrying, it transforms into a magical totem, lighting up the stage and sending more bird-like characters into the production. This idea that books can animate our environs finds an apt parallel in the ways the dancers become a flock of creatures or morph into mischievous playmates.

Throughout the production, the direction and dramaturgy of Smith and Alexandra Harbold, as well as choreography by Daniel Charon, sustain a perfect balance between fantasy and realism. Unison phrases of movement are used to convey a sense of solidarity and camaraderie among the bird-like dancers. Songs sung by Smith express the subtleties and nuances within relationships. Bashaun Williams stands out as a particularly compelling and charismatic part of the cast, as gifted an actor as he is a dancer.

Some elements in the production reveal that the target audience may be a lot younger than the adults who filled the seats on Friday night, such as the scenes that ask for audience participation and encourage us to repeat the simpler steps performed by the dancers. In some ways these moments connect to a theme of the show: our movements say a lot about our personalities and our attitudes, and perhaps by dancing together we can feel a sense of connection and belonging.

There are similar messages conveyed in the stories: “If you trust yourself, it will be okay in the end.” Or, “You can do anything you put your mind to.” Such statements of perseverance and hope reinforce the sense of dedication and joy communicated by the dancers. Their partnering sequences involve cartwheels and daredevil lifts, revealing how much trust and balance––physical and mental––goes into dancing. Their flocking conveys feelings of bonding and interdependence.

Other moments are hilarious, such as part of the book called “Running on the Wind,” by Dallas Graham and Meghan Waldron: “Sure I’m small, but so are poison dart frogs.” An added delight is listening to parts of this story in Spanish while projections on the screen share excerpts in English.

The final image of the dancers onstage as colorful pages from books flutter down from the sky evokes a feeling of wonder and magic: just as we can learn about people and places from the pages we read, we can also discover new relationships and ideas by engaging with one another.

Several times throughout the performance Smith asks the audience, “If you could tell the world a story, what story would you tell?” Like the performance itself, this question opens up possibilities to reframe and to animate aspects of our lives and our imaginations. And this may be an especially important message for younger audiences who come to see the production. The shenanigans of the dancers span from humorous to poignant, and like the authors who share their stories through the Red Fred Project, they are heartfelt, personal, and inspiring.

the live creature and ethereal things continues today, Saturday, February 2, at 1 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. at the Janet Quinney Lawson Capitol Theatre.

Kate Mattingly is an assistant professor of dance at the University of Utah. She has a doctoral degree in performance studies from UC Berkeley, and has had writing published in The New York Times, The Village Voice, Dance Research Journal, Dance magazine, and Pointe magazine, among others.