June 13, 2000

DANCE REVIEW

Start With Lyricism, Progress to Brilliance

To Keep It Short

Robin D'Amato

Contest Studios

The modern dance pioneer Doris Humphrey believed that all dances are too long. Robin D'Amato, who trained in Humphrey's technique, cited that observation in program notes for "Short Pieces 2," presented on Friday night. One imagines that Humphrey might have approved not only of the succinctness of the dances but also of the subtle organizing principles of Ms. D'Amato's 1999 "Dancing= Barefoot."

In the first of the two duets that make up "Dancing Barefoot," performed to songs by Patti Smith, Ms. D'Amato moved as if tethered within a circumscribed area. Suzanne Jaehne danced through the larger space around Ms. D'Amato but always looked as if she were connected by some imaginary strand. Contrasting circles and smaller spins were at the heart of the second duet. The differences in the dancers' height, build and attack added texture to the lyrical piece, though Ms. D'Amato needed a little of Ms. Jaehne's stronger focus.

Focus and the weight of gesture and stillness were key in "Ghazi," a solo choreographed by the guest artist Richard Daniels to Beethoven. The title refers to the Turkish word for hero, leader and survivor of war. As Ms. Daniels's warrior moves slowly from a pool to a path of light, designed by Clifton Taylor, one can see that he has survived long, wearying years of battle. His focused gaze and the time and space he gives to every moment suggest he will go on. That kind of focus is rare in dance today. Mr. Daniels suggests how important it is in this handsome, poignant solo.

The program also included Ms. Jaehne's "One for My Baby," Molissa Fenley's "Ocean Walk" and Ms. D'Amato's "Four Pieces of Eleven," performed by the choreographer and Christine Conkoin, Elizabeth DeMent and Stefanie Smith.
    JENNIFER DUNNING

March 7, 1999

DanceGalaxy: Taking Age in in Stride and Breaking Barriers

By JENNIFER DUNNING

NEW YORK -- Dance, like youth, may be wasted on the young. That is one of the premises of DanceGalaxy, a new ballet troupe founded by Judith Fugate and Medhi Bahiri, which makes its formal New York debut on Tuesday at the Joyce Theater.

The dancers, who range in age from their late 20s to their late 30s, are not old by any normal standards. In classical ballet, however, dancers start the approach to obsolescence at age 30. For modern dancers, the age is 40.

More attention is now being paid to finding jobs for dancers after they leave the stage. But what about the dancers who do not want to leave? The waste of precious resources can be troubling.

Ms. Fugate and Bahiri are part of a recent and growing trend, in modern dance for the most part, of providing showcases for the kind of burnished artistry that comes only with age.

Also opening on Tuesday, a block east at Dance Theater Workshop, is a program by two performer-choreographers over 40, James Cunningham and Jane Comfort, that includes a continuing improvisatory piece called "The Horse's Mouth" that documents the lives and work of the older dancers who have performed in it.

Like Cunningham and Ms. Comfort, Ms. Fugate and Bahiri, who are married, prefer to think of their work in terms of experience rather than age. What is important, the founders of DanceGalaxy say, is that all 14 dancers have absorbed immeasurable knowledge during careers with companies that include American Ballet Theater, the New York City Ballet, the Joffrey Ballet and the Paris Opera Ballet.

One dancer, Donald Williams, is still performing with the Dance Theater of Harlem. Ms. Fugate is a former principal dancer with City Ballet and Bahiri has performed with Maurice Bejart, the Boston Ballet and Ballet West.

Ms. Fugate, a former principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, talked of all that she had learned from George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins during her days with the company. Their perspectives color all her dancing, she said, whether in ballets by William Forsythe or by Michael Smuin, two of four choreographers whose work will be presented by DanceGalaxy in New York premieres at the Joyce. (The others are Ginger Thatcher and Dennis Wayne.)

That kind of education may be fast becoming a thing of the past, however, in the impoverished and hurried world of ballet today. "There is less and less time in the major companies to stress the kinds of personal things I learned from Balanchine and Robbins and also from watching my predecessors," Ms. Fugate said. "The dancers only learn the ballets and then get them out on the stage."

Ms. Fugate and Bahiri picked their 14 dancers -- among them Cornel Crabtree, Deborah Dawn, Christina Fagundes and Marie Christine Mouis -- for their versatility and vivid personalities as well as their technical skills. "What's missing for me, in ballet today, is (italics)heart,"(end italics) said Bahiri. "And dancers who have fun."

The dancers also have to be quick studies. Time is money, Bahiri, who is nicknamed "the slave driver," said, grumbling about dancers who put on their point shoes too slowly. ("Always the women," Ms. Fugate said with a sigh, teasingly.)

With age and experience there can also come an extra doggedness about getting the work done. Ms. Fugate and Bahiri acknowledged that raising money for the company, founded two years ago as an outgrowth of small touring ensembles they put together, was an unending uphill battle.

Money is hard to come by, though the two said that the choreographers and their dancers have been extraordinarily generous. All the money has come from private sources, though Ms. Fugate and Bahiri are hoping, they said, that success at their Joyce season and their increasing tour dates will help them raise more money from additional sources.

Ms. Fugate said that the repertory, which includes a ballet by Peter Martins and Adam Miller's "Dracula," has also been been chosen for its heart.

"These are pieces you have to put yourself into as a woman or a man as opposed to a dancer," she said. "Our dancers have lived lives. You carry so much of that on the stage with you, as opposed to living in the theater and thinking about ballet 24 hours a day."

Modern dancers have historically lived more in the world outside the studio. They required less stringent training than their ballet peers, at least until recent years when the two forms began to merge. But a wider vision of life does not entirely diminish the pain of having to let go.

"You develop the instrument so that you are an instrument," Cunningham said. "Unfortunately, your body just can't do what you did in your teens and 20s."

Modern dancers over 40 have more choices today than ballet dancers to do something other than simple guest performing. There are at least three modern-dance groups and one soloist -- Dancers Over 40, 40 Up, Paradigm and Richard Daniels -- that have become involved in producing dance by older performers in recent years.

The Dancers Over 40 and 40 Up companies feature mature dancers performing pieces tailored to their gifts by choreographers who are often also over 40. Paradigm, composed of Gus Solomons Jr., Carmen de Lavallade and Dudley Williams, will perform in late April and early May at Aaron Davis Hall and is commissioning work by choreographers of all ages, among them Geoffrey Holder to Nicholas Leichter.

And Richard Daniels, who performs his own dances and pieces by choreographers including Molissa Fenley, Christopher Gillis, Eleanor King and Zvi Gotheiner, focuses not just on the possibility of dancing past 40 but also on dancing as a performer with AIDS.

In classical dance, Ballet: The Daring Project, a company founded by Valentina Kozlova and Margo Sappington, makes use of older dancers and will perform in Manhattan in mid-May.

What do middle-aged dance artists have to offer their audiences that was unavailable to their younger performing selves? "A subtlety, nuance, texture," Cunningham said. "I think this brings up the whole question of whether dance is going to deal only with the ideal young body. I don't think it has to. But it's different from going to see ideal bodies."

Such dancers also have memories to offer. "When I first came to New York, it would have been fascinating for me to hear these stories people have," Ms. Comfort said. "When you're young, you're always in such a hurry. This is about process. What you are as an artist. Not the flavor of the month that you have to have. Just being a young hungry dancer, it might be fascinating."

The Horse's Mouth" was created by Cunningham and the choreographer Tina Croll as a group work for their dancer friends, most of whom were of their generation.

"We asked a few people, and it grew," Ms. Croll recalled. "People who have danced for years have so much to say, so many stories to tell. We wanted everyone's point of view."

The piece now incorporates young dancers and ballet performers in its mix of improvised movement and anecdotes. To the great joy of Cunningham and Ms. Croll, the young have freely interacted in the improvisations with their older colleagues in rehearsals.

Linda Tarnay, one of the older performers, described the sight as being like "dying and going to dancers' heaven."

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