Creating A Personal Archive Is On My To-Do List

The New York Times a few years ago published an article about the death of the black dance historian Joe Nash whose Harlem apartment was filled with dance memorabilia. The article struck a chord with me. It reminded me that I should get my papers and artifacts together for submission to an archive.

It also reminded me that my late friend, the poet and playwright Assotto Saint, encouraged me and others to start organizing our materials while we were still able to. Unfortunately, I haven't done it yet but it's at the top of my to-do list.

In 1990, I interviewed Mr. Nash via telephone for an article in the New York Amsterdam News about the dance pioneer Pearl Primus. He had been a dancer in her company in the late nineteen-forties. I remember him thanking me for keeping her memory alive. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that my article was included in his vast archive.

Letting Dancegoers Interpret The Dance For Themselves

In April of 1989, avant-garde dancemaker and former architect Gus Solomans, Jr. collaborated with a team of Columbia University students in the creation of a dance work called Site Line, performed by members of the Solomans Company/Dance at the Danspace Project of St. Mark's Church in Manhattan's East Village. In a telephone interview, Solomans described the work as a dance with "a wall that would divide the dancing space in half. The audience on each side of the wall [will] see essentially a different dance. They'll be able to see the dancers on the other side. The wall is partly transparent, partly translucent, and partly opaque." Solomans said that he wants the audience to interpret what they see for themselves,"to make choices, to participate as viewers, not just sit there and [let the choreography] wash over them and be entertained. I try to make the visual atmosphere rich enough to get some stimulation."

In another dance work, performed at Danspace in January of 1990, Solomans's company presented a piece for five men whose title was  represented by a symbol described by Solomans as "an unpronounceable graphic gesture." Both the dancers and the musicians provided vocal sounds. And as with Site Line, the audience was expected to interpret for themselves what the vocal sounds and movement signified.


This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News. It was edited from two articles that were published in 1989 and 1990.

Creating Choreography Via Architecture

Avant-garde dancemaker Gus Solomans, Jr.'s segment will be half of a shared evening of dance at the Danspace Project of St. Mark's Church in [Manhattan's] East Village (April 14, 15,16 [1989]). In a collaborative work with a team of Columbia University [architectural] students, the Solomans Company/Dance will present Site Line, described by Solomans (a former architect), in a telephone interview, as a dance with "a wall that would divide the dancing space in half. The audience on each side of the wall [will] see essentially a different dance. They'll be able to see the dancers on the other side. The wall is partly transparent, partly translucent, and partly opaque." Solomans says that he wants the audience to interpret what they see for themselves, "to make choices, to participate as viewers, not just sit there and [let the choreography] wash over them and be entertained. I try to make the visual atmosphere rich enough for everyone to get some stimulation."

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (April 15, 1989) as part of a Spring 1989 Dance Roundup article.

Dance Theatre Of Harlem At New York's City Center

As part of Dance Theatre of Harlem's 20th anniversary celebration, an all-Nijinska program has been scheduled for four evenings during the company's two-week engagement at City Center (June 21-July 2 [1989]).

These evenings will offer dancegoers the unique opportunity of seeing three Bronislava Nijinska ballets performed collectively; a first for an American company.

Although DTH has previously staged Les Biches, Les Noces and Rondo Capriccioso will be company premieres.

"When we did Les Biches five, six years ago," recalled artistic director/co-founder Arthur Mitchell, "Irina Nijinska"--the daughter of one of the greatest choreographers in Serge Diaghilev's Ballet Russes company--"said 'You know, I think it would be wonderful for the company to do Les Noces' and I said 'It's a nice idea.' This year her mother, who is the sister of [the late dancer/choreographer ] Nijinsky, is celebrating her, some say 98th; some say, 99th; some say, 100th birthday. I thought it would be a wonderful tribute [to her] to do that whole evening."

In addition, continued Mitchell, these works reveal "the diversity and the strength of the company" as well as providing balance to the repertoire by giving the audience "something historic and then something new."

One of the ballets--Rondo Capriccioso--has not been performed since its 1952 premiere. This season will mark its American debut.

Fortunately for DTH, Rosella Hightower, who originally danced the part of the Bird of Paradise, and, said Mitchell, "is one of the five great American Indian ballerinas," was able to reconstruct from memory the ballet, "a small piece for four people" that, further stated Mitchell, "even Nijinska's daughter didn't know [about]." Interestingly, she is the only ballerina to ever dance the role. (This time around, Stephanie Dabney, a DTH principal dancer, will be the new Bird of Paradise.)

Other ballets include Mitchell's John Henry, set to music by Milton Rosenstock, Dance Theatre's musical director and Balanchine's Allegro Brilliante, built on music by Tchaikovsky.

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (June 24, 1989).

Dance Theatre Of Harlem's Financial Woes

The Dance Theatre of Harlem announced January 31 [1990] that it has canceled its May concerts in New York because of a $1.7 million budget deficit. It is the first such cancellation in the company's 20-year history.

"We have had financial crises before," said Arthur Mitchell, DTH's artistic director and co-founder, "but never to this extent."

The current crisis, involving the layoff of the 55 dancers as well as technicians and a few administrative personnel, is linked to a series of domestic and foreign cancellations of performance dates. "Many of the sponsors that we are dealing with," explained Mitchell, in a telephone interview from Pasadena, California, where the troupe performed January 29-February 4 [1990], "are not private, commercial bookers. They are usually funded organizations themselves. They just weren't able to raise the money that they thought they would raise."

When the Dance Theatre of Harlem finishes up its tour--which will conclude in Washington, D.C. in March--the dancers will go on hiatus. At that point, they and other company personnel will be eligible for unemployment benefits. "If they can get other work," said Mitchell, "they are free to do that. They can teach, they can go to school, they can work in other areas. That's part of what Dance Theatre is about--preparing themselves for post-dance careers. But right now, the most important thing is that they should be dancing because that's what they are."

Despite DTH's financial situation, there are still long-range plans in the works, such as the building of office and dormitory space in the area surrounding the company's headquarters on 152nd Street, a project Mitchell calls "an Olympic Village of the allied arts here in Harlem." (The money, partly provided by the city, can only be earmarked for the capital expansion program.) And Mitchell still has his eye on the 1991 New York season. "Our fiscal year starts October 1. I hope that by that time, the monies will be available for us to continue. But you just don't stop planning."

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (February 17, 1990).

Dancing To The Music Of Charlie Mingus

In a book called The Jazz Story (Prentice Hall, 1964), the author, Dave Dexter, Jr., had this to say about the music of  [jazz bassist] Charles Mingus: "[He] composes and plays music that is often understandable to no one but himself."

Such music, you would think, would be difficult if not impossible to choreograph to. But Loris Anthony Beckles of the one-year-old Blue Mercury Dancing Company has managed to do just that. The 12-member multi-ethnic group performed these, and other works, at the Theatre of the Riverside Church on April 22, 24, and 26 [1987]. The program was in tribute to what would have been Mingus's 65th birthday (he died in 1979).

The longest of these pieces, "Eclipse," ran about 30 minutes. It featured a series of solos by the dancers using a lot of abstract movements and patterns beginning with the dancers parading around the stage backwards with their arms folded across their eyes. All of this movement is accompanied by polyrhythmic drumbeats. In this piece, the dancers put on a great display of energy and agility.

Like all of the Beckles choreography performed at TRC, there is the absence of a storyline: the audience must be willing to bring its imagination to the theatre. Beckles prefers this. "I'm not interested in telling a story," says the 33-year-old native of Guyana. Dance, he continues, can be enjoyed for the beauty of the movement and its celebration of the human form.

One of the most strikingly beautiful dances created by Beckles is "SheKing," inspired by Coretta Scott King, who represents "an elegant black woman in bereavement." The six women, in black gowns that seemed to float in the air with every movement, were placed in my mind in some ancient civilization, perhaps Egypt. Leonora Stapleton, who has a solo here, exhibited a queenly presence.

The only piece that had a more clearcut storyline is Michael Vernon's somewhat erotic but memorable "Changing Opinion," with haunting music by Philip Glass. Two males (Beckles and Tyrone Aiken) and a female (Stapleton) are cast. It is the tale of a romantic triangle in which one of the males emerges victorious. Much of the action takes place on a wooden bench with the female situated symbolically at the center. The men, especially Aiken, gave a strong performance. Stapleton, on the other hand, came off rather nonchalant.

Ray Tadio's "The Moon in Libra" and "Dear Giovanni" I found uninteresting, except for the solo jazz piano scores that accompany each dance.

Although these young dancers were a bit awkward at times, they nevertheless deserve high marks for having the guts and stamina to take on the demanding task of dancing to Mingus's cerebral music.

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (May 23, 1987).

A Young Brooklyn Choreographer Has His Say

"I'm dancing," says Brendan Upson, a Brooklyn-based dancer/choreographer, "because I have something to say."

Recently [in 1987], in the "New Territory" performance series at BACA/Downtown in Brooklyn, he got the opportunity to have his "say." Two of the three pieces that night had definite social messages.

The first of the dances, "Stay Here and Keep Watch With Me," a male solo (Upson), is about a man's spiritual awakening. At one point, as he sits down in a metal folding chair, he mocks religion by lip syncing the soprano chanter on the soundtrack. But after life's adversities have beaten him down, he sees that the last laugh is on him. It is a very compelling piece, energetically performed.

The second work, an improvisation called "Energy Spot," showcased a group of teens from the El Puente Community Center in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. The press release describes "Energy Spot" as depicting "how an individual is blocked from attaining her true potential because of the fears which bind her." However, I came away with the impression that these 11 bodies represented atoms interacting with one another. The El Puente dancers have great potential, although I would like to see the females shed a few pounds; the added weight breaks the flow of movement. I didn't particularly like this work. The dancers crisscrossed the performance space numerous times, making no clear statement. It became so tedious that I was glad when it ended.

Upson was wise to save the best for last. "Delirium Tremens," a satirical piece for four people, good-naturedly explores alcoholism. Upson, displaying a comedic talent, was cast as the alcoholic husband and father. As the lights went up, his head was resting on a portable TV dinner tray, shot glass nearby. His family vainly attempted to rouse him from a drunken stupor. Eventually his dependence on alcohol causes him to wind up in a detox unit. While there he encounters the dreaded "pink elephants," a sign that he is having the D.T.s [convulsions and hallucinations]. The other three dancers, who played his family members, were also the pink elephants, dressed humorously in pink and gray costumes, sunglasses, and elephant trunks. Leslie Arlette Boyce gave a standout performance as Upson's no-nonsense wife.

The piece is appropriately accompanied by New Orleans honky-tonk style music. Although the piece at times can be stereotypical in its portrayal of alcoholic behavior, Upson should be commended for dealing with such a serious subject, the comic touches notwithstanding. Fortunately, Upson knows how far to go. Those comic touches do not turn into slapstick. I was not, sad to say, clear on whether the Upson character licked his problem.


This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (February 20, 1988).

Pearl Primus, An Authority On African Dance

One of the greats in the black dance field who should be celebrated during Black History Month is Pearl Primus--dancer, choreographer, anthropologist , educator (she is professor of Ethnic Studies at Amherst College in Massachusetts). In the 1940s and '50s, Primus created such a stir with her African-based  dance works among critics and public alike that Walter Terry, the dance critic, now deceased, proclaimed her "the world's foremost authority on African dance."

That designation, resulting from her years of travel throughout the American South, the Caribbean, and Africa to study and document black dance, is anchored to her "search for roots" and her need to reveal "the dignity, beauty, and strength" of black people.


The 70-year-old Trinidadian-born artist-scholar's quest gave rise last summer to a photo-biographical exhibition at the Caribbean Cultural Center, "A Search for Roots: The Life and Work of Dr. Pearl Primus." The exhibition, part of the center's Third Annual Tribute to African Diaspora Women, consisted of many enlarged black and white performance photos from such dances as "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" (based on the Langston Hughes poem) and "Haitian Play Dance" as well as facsimiles of printed concert programs.


Pearl Primus, declared Dan Dawson, who curated the show, is a "living national treasure."

This article was submitted to the New York-based New American newspaper on January 30, 1990,but was not published.

Note: Pearl Primus died in 1994 at the age of 74.

Bringing Jubilation To The Dance Stage

The style of dancing that has brought critical and public acclaim to Jubilation! Dance Company is labeled "kiative movement" by Kevin Jeff, the company's chief choreographer, and has been described in previous press kits as "a unique blend of modern, ethnic, jazz, and classical ballet technique in traditional African dance."

To many of Jubilation!'s fans all of this choreographic nomenclature is of little importance. The bottom line for them is the energy, skill, and joy exhibited by the dancers, both singularly and as an ensemble. All of which has broadened Jubilation!'s appeal not only in this country but abroad. (They recently returned from an extensive tour of 15 American cities and several cities in Canada, Italy, and Switzerland.)

Kevin Jeff founded Jubilation! in 1979 when he was 19 on the advice of his mentor Mr. Lee Lynn Thompson, who taught at the Bernice Johnson Dance Studio in Jamaica, Queens. The name of the company came from a suggestion by a female friend. "At the time, I was choreographing Jubilation! as a dance show," recalled Jeff, who has appeared in the Broadway musicals The Wiz and Comin' Uptown, "not as a dance company. She liked what she saw and said to me, 'I feel jubilant!' I just kept it. It felt good, it felt right."

Since then, Jeff has come a long way. He has done choreography for two Washington, D.C. musicals, Blackbirds and Street Dreams, and choreographed the dance sequence in filmmaker Spike Lee's 1986 comedy-drama, She's Gotta Have It. Jeff's involvement with this film has inspired him to want to do other commercially-oriented work.

This condensed article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (September 24, 1988).

Dancing About Black Males

The two-year-old DeNoble Men's Dance Company, under the direction of its founder, choreographer/dancer Robert Logan Mayo, who danced with the Alfred Gallman and Donald Byrd companies, will present an evening-long concert of  duets and trios called "Men on Dance" on August 13, 14, and 15 [1992] at the Downtown Dance Studios, 69 West 14th Street, near 6th Avenue. This will be DeNoble's first dance concert since March of this year [1992] when they performed a benefit performance for the Upper Room AIDS Ministry of Harlem at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center, where Mayo was a student.

With only a cast of three male dancers, DeNoble will explore themes that range from euthanasia to issues that face black men in general and black gay men in particular.

According to Mayo, who has been dancing for 12 years, DeNoble's repertory consists of seven dance works. By September it will expand to 10. Six of those pieces, three of them premieres, will be on the upcoming program. They include "A Different Testament," a trio choreographed by Mayo, and "Dove," a duo, also choreographed by Mayo, set to music from the gospel musical, The Gospel at Colonus.

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (August 15, 1992).

Jubilation! At The Apollo Theatre

Sad to say, but when dancers Aaron Dugger and Glenn Ford Good died, much of the magic and energy of Jubilation! Dance Company  went with them. Despite the enthusiasm of the Apollo Theatre audience at the June 1 [1991] benefit performance for Jubilation!'s Center of Enrichment, that overriding thought could not be dispelled.

Part of the problem was that with the exception of Robin Gray, all of the current members are new and, unlike their predecessors, who unfailingly gave me a spine-tingling, vicarious experience, left me totally without satisfaction.

And that's a shame because for me Jubilation! has always meant an evening of soul-stirring, sensational dance.

Another problem was with the program. I had trouble following it because the sequence of the dances did not always coincide with the printed program. Fortunately a couple of the works from the repertoire, "Nia Keii" and "Dedication," served as "landmarks."

The most beautiful of the night's offerings was Martial Roumain's assertive, thought-provoking "Essence (A Portrait of Four Women)," set to the music of Nina Simone, Roberta Flack, and others. Although the dancers, each wearing a dress of a different color (red, black, green, white), failed to bring dramatic intensity to their character (Robin Gray should have been cast here), the ideas and emotions expressed through the use of movement were recognizable.

During the intermission, a heavy-set, bespectacled West Indian lady approached me in the lobby when she saw me making notes and exclaimed, "That last dance ["Essence"] was so beautiful." Indeed it alone was worth the price of the ticket. The four women embodied the agony, despair, nurturance, and triumph experienced by black women throughout American history.

Jubilation!'s signature piece, "Dedication," which traces the African odyssey from the Motherland to present-day America in three sections, lacked its usual sparkle. In the first section, "Oluwa, Many Rains Ago," sung by [the South African performer] Letta Mbulu, I kept visualizing Aaron Dugger as the Child of a New World, a role he originated and partnered with Kevin Jeff (who was cast as the Ancestral Elder, a role he reprised at the Apollo). Willie Edward Hinton's performance was overshadowed by Dugger's indelible mark on the role.

Anthony Marshall's long, tedious "In His Name," dedicated to Dugger and soloed by Jeff in a G-string-like costume, had Jeff rolling and flinging himself all over the stage, making at times grunting sounds, like a person possessed by demons. I wasn't sure what point was being made. Was Jeff being tormented by the loss of his close friend?

At the end of the program, Jeff, Jubilation!'s artistic director and founder, addressed the audience. He brought the news that this might be the company's last performance. He attributed the possibility of Jubilation!'s demise to financial difficulties. Some of the trouble, I think, might be due to the fact that Jubilation! has lost much of the spirit and joy it once had in abundance.

Note: According to Denice Jeff, Jubilation!'s public relations coordinator, the company plans to return to the Apollo sometime in the fall [of 1991].

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (June 22, 1991).

Assessing The Dance World

In assessing the current New York dance scene, the four dance experts I interviewed saw very little, if any, trendsetting going on in modern dance or ballet.

The leaning in modern dance toward what Celia Ipiotis, the host of Channel 31's Eye on Dance, described as the blending of "elements from the world of theatre, music, and visual arts" is, said dance historian Joe Nash, "nothing new. Everything now is merely a continuation of what was started in the sixties." Although there is this cyclical aspect to modern dance, Village Voice critic Deborah Jowitt pointed out that "whenever those things come out, they usually come back in a slightly different form."

Back in the sixties, recalled Jowitt, there was "a dance revolution" that took place. It was at this point, said Nash, "when modern dance entered a whole new phase." What the early pioneers such as Martha Graham and Katherine Dunham "established [was] a style, a technique, an approach to modern dance that was related to [a period] when people were trying to communicate about issues, about the human spirit." But, further explained Nash, who teaches dance history at the Alvin Ailey school, the choreographers who emerged from the Judson Movement in the sixties--named after the church performance space on the West Side of Manhattan--wanted to "establish their own principles of movement that ran counter to what was considered traditional. It gained in popularity as more people entered the field. Critics began to try to analyze and describe what they were seeing. They still don't know what they're seeing, but they describe it anyway."

In ballet, particularly with "the major companies," said New York Daily News critic Charles Jurrist, "it is really hard to spot trends." Jowitt attributed this to "the classical language staying the same." She detected, although, "a kind of aggression entering ballet. You can see a lot of aggressive, violent dance today in ballet and contemporary dance."

Said Jurrist, "The New York City Ballet has clearly still not decided where it's going after the death of [its founder and choreographer George] Balanchine. At ABT [American Ballet Theatre], they've mostly been involved in cleaning up the company which needed a lot of cleaning up--disciplining the corps de ballet and sort of weeding out the repertory, making it a more stylistically coherent company." Jurrist added that he "really couldn't say that I would spot a trend in either one of those two companies--as yet."

On the other hand, historian Nash saw the influence of modern dance, particularly the African American contribution to it, on contemporary ballet. "At the root of American dance is the black movement styles. What the African American brought to a whole field of dance was just total involvement of the body in dance. You now see twisting and contorting the body as you would do in jazz or ethnic dance. This is the contemporary trend. Contemporary ballets are really based upon the New Movement as opposed to classical tradition handed down from the 17th century--'Swan Lake', 'Giselle.' The choreographer takes those traditional five-position movements of the legs and arms and updates them and places them in a contemporary mold. More and more companies are using contemporary approaches to ballet production and that will continue."

Although Celia Ipiotis said that today the definition of dance is "fluid," the Daily News's Charles Jurrist thought that a lot of what passes for dance--such as "carrying a transistor radio onto the stage and turning it on"--should be labeled as performance art, which he himself admitted is a catchall phrase, much like the term "post-modern." In his mind, dance has "movement as its primary mode of expression. Otherwise, it's another form of theatre."  Opined Joe Nash, "You will always have people engaged in multimedia because when you're lost for something to say through movement, you can always revert to words or [photo] slides."

This article was originally published in the West Side Spirit (December 19, 1988).

Ruth Williams's Harlem Dance School

Since 1947, when Ruth Williams and choreographer Henry LeTang opened the Ruth Williams Dance Studio in Harlem, she has trained three generations of students, many of them the grandparents and parents of the current crop.

And for as many years, Ms. Williams has staged an annual dance recital to showcase the talent and skill of these youngsters whose ages range from four to 21 plus, and who come from all over the tri-state area.

This year [1989]--for the 16th time--the recital will take place in Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall June 17 at 7:30 p.m. The 310 recitalists will perform all dance styles taught at the school's Theresa Towers [formerly the Theresa Hotel] location (2090 7th Avenue)--tap, ballet, jazz, ethnic (African), and pointe--in works choreographed by Ms. Williams and her faculty. Such works include an all-female teen tap number set to the immortal Fats Waller-Andy Razaf tune, "Ain't Misbehavin'."

All but seven of the recitalists are female. "It's hard to hold on to boys," said the pleasant-voiced Ms. Williams, a small silver-haired woman, "once they get into athletics." But she hopes to "reach out" to them "over the summer months and in the fall. We'll still continue with the girls," she added, "if that's what it comes down to. But I would like to have some more male dancers. It always adds a little more excitement to the works, adding the strength and the agility of the male dancer."

Ms. Williams, a child development specialist, with degrees from Hunter College and Columbia University, formed the Ruth Williams Dance Foundation eight years ago which has as one of its goals a scholarship program for children.  Recently the foundation was awarded a grant from the New York City Youth Board. "We're looking forward," said Ms. Williams, "to having a very successful tutorial as well as dance incentive program beginning in the fall of '89 through  June of '90." The program is aimed at "low achievers; children that are having trouble sitting still in the classroom, that sort of thing." (The program is only for those who live within the boundaries of Community Board 10 and School District 5.)

But in the meantime, Ms. Williams, the faculty, and most especially the kids, are giving their all toward achieving a boffo show.

This article was originally published in the New York Amsterdam News (June 17, 1989).

Dancing In Japan

Tyrone Aiken, the 26-year-old associate artistic director of the Blue Mercury Dancing Company, performed  a male solo called "Returns," at the Nikolais/Louis ChoreoSpace  on November 11, 12, and 13 [1988]. The work is choreographed by Loris Anthony Beckles, Blue Mercury's artistic director, to the music of  jazz musician Lester Bowie.

Aiken  recently returned from a six-week tour of Japan with Michiyo, "a small modern company." While there they were able "to tune into [the Japanese] people: what they're doing , what they thought about Americans, and dancers, and how inspiring they are [to outsiders]. They work so hard at what they do, whatever it is. They're just really very appreciative of artists or knowledge," said Aiken.

On a previous trip to Japan, Aiken, along with other members of Michiyo, spent time teaching and performing. On that trip, he recalled, there was "This one girl, one of my students there, [who] was so kind as to bow and tell me I was a god for teaching and thinking."

Said Aiken: "I don't know how soon, but I will go back. It's a really good experience."

This item, from a dance column I wrote, was published in the New York Amsterdam News (ca. February 4, 1989).

Ailey Dancers Are Body-Poets

Among the various sections and inserts in the November 6 [1988] Sunday New York Times was--to my absolute surprise and delight--a 20-page advertising supplement celebrating Alvin Ailey's 30 years of dance making.

Surrounding the text were color performance photos and quotes from Ailey himself. In the back of the book was a schedule of the 1988-89 season at City Center [in Manhattan]. This slick -looking fundraising vehicle is worth saving because in a nutshell it gives potential subscribers the history and philosophy of the Ailey organization.

However, I was a bit dismayed with the presence of full-page cigarette and whiskey ads. For a [dance] company that glorifies dancers as "body-poets," these ads are out of place. Why didn't dance-related ads appear in their place?

This item, from a dance column I wrote, was published in the New York Amsterdam News (ca. February 4, 1989).