“Close the Door Slowly”
Liss Fain Dance
Z Space
San Francisco, CA
May 5, 2019
Clarity of vision is one of the characteristics of Liss Fain who has been making dance in the Bay Area since 1990. While for the time being she seems to have forgone proscenium performances in favor of installations, often combined with wandering poets and narrators, in this new show language is buried in stacks of books, which however, are barely consulted. “Close the Door Slowly”
"Renaissance" "The Best of Smuin"
Smuin Contemporary Ballet
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
April 26, 2019
Last year Smuin Contemporary Ballet (formerly known as Smuin Ballet) changed its name to the current one; this year they celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of Michael Smuin’s finally having his own troupe. Remarkably right from the start, Smuin could count on a sizable, faithful audience who appreciated his showmanship and the breadth of his musical tastes. He died quite
“The Little Mermaid”
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
April 19, 2019
Stunning performances, particularly by Yuan Yuan Tan who we cannot possibly hope to again approach the mastery she brought to the title role of John Neumeier’s “The Little Mermaid,” left many of us speechless with admiration. If anything Tan brought an even more spellbinding intensity to her character’s physical frailty and fierce spirit. You couldn’t take her eyes off her in
“Art Songs” “Pole Star”
Alonzo King Lines Ballet
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
April 12 and 17, 2019
Misreading of curtain time made me miss the major part of Alonzo King’s reworking of his 2016 “Art Songs” which opened the company’s spring season. I thought it necessary to return since a partial perspective of a work never makes sense. Also, the new “Pole Star”, with original music, performed live by composer Van-Anh Vanessa Vo,
“5 Soldiers: The Body is the Frontline”
Rosie Kay Dance Company
San Francisco Performances
Taube Atrium Theater
San Francisco, CA
April 11, 2019
A West Coast American premiere of a work created in Britain is not an everyday event. One produced “In Association with the British Army” definitely would have to be considered esoteric. Kudos for San Francisco Performances for having taking the risk to program something as unusual. The Rosie Kay Dance Company’s “5 Soldiers: The Body is
“Your Flesh Shall Be a Great Poem” “Bound To” “…two united in a single soul. . .”
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
March 27, 2019
Many ballet companies seem to feel that story ballets bring in much needed, faithful audiences. It would, however, be difficult to imagine that anyone watching SFB’s most recent triple bill would not want to return to see more ballet. After the reprise from last year’s Unbound Festival of Trey McIntyre’
"Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes" "Die Toteninsel"
Bjork Ballet"
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
March 29, 2019
The last of this season’s triple bills includes the premiere of Liam Scarlett’s “Die Toteninsel”; Justin Beck’s 2015 “Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes”, new last year for SFB; and Artur Pita’s “Bjork Ballet”, a delirious costume phantasmagoria with a bit of a dark underbelly. Well performed, this last program leads up to the final two that
“Simple Symphony” “Another Time” “Like an Ox on the Roof” “Concerto Grosso”
Mark Foehringer Dance Project/SF
Cowell Theater, Fort Mason Center for Arts and Culture
San Francisco, CA
March 23, 2019
Though partially raised in Brazil, and having performed with Brazil’s Cisno Nero Company for a decade, Mark Foehringer has been a respected local educator and choreographer for close to a quarter of a century. Some years ago, he choreographed “Diadorim”, a sprawling full-evening length work, based on
"Sleeping Beauty"
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
March 9, 2019
Why do we keep going back to see “Sleeping Beauty” when we can almost hear the music’s next section before it hits the air? Of course, this is Tchaikovsky's greatest ballet score, here sensitively conducted once again by Martin West. Yet we may have seen the ballet many times, sometimes live, sometimes on screen. Some of us even make a point of seeing different
"World's On Fire"
ODC Dance
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
March7, 2019
Every arts institution, particularly one over forty years old, has to face the future. Most of them do it rather later than sooner. ODC Dance, still under the leadership of its founding members Brenda Way, KT Nelson and Kimi Okada, is planning more openly than any other I can think of. Currently, Oakland-born Kate Weare now heads her thriving Kate Weare Dance in New
"Xenos"
Akram Khan Company
Zellerbach Hall, Cal Performances
Berkeley, CA
March 2, 2019
When last Saturday night the stage went dark at the end of Akram Khan’s “Xenos,” nobody moved in the near-capacity audience of the 2,600-seat Zellerbach Hall. The silence was deafening. Finally, a small, dirt-covered figure walked downstage, and the hall exploded. “Xenos” supposedly, is Khan’s last solo performance. With his first-rate collaborators he created a haunting meditation on what it means to be human
"Divining"
little seismic dance company
ODC Theater, San Francisco
February 16, 2019
The first time I saw Katie Faulkner’s choreography was when, as a member of AXIS Dance Company 2003-2007, she set “Decorum” on three dancers, a wheelchair and a sofa. It was one of those “where did she come from?" moments. For her own little seismic dance company, she has since made and performed dance films, solos on herself and for small groups. She also created the onsite