Resilient

DEMO: Now
Terrace Theater
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
March 29, 2019

Tap-dance made the latest in Damian Woetzel’s “Demo” series memorable, and there was just one tapper: Caleb Teicher. He is a thin, young fellow with a bleached blob at the front of his haircut. At rest, Teicher seems high strung. Dancing, he surfs atop a spectrum of moods that includes the joy of free mobility, the relief of secure landings and the itch to explore further. Three low tap tables served him as surfaces. They had been placed in a row across the stage, with some space between them. Teicher jumped from one table to another like a Nijinsky faun. His tapping had rhythmic nuance. He jabbed the toes proudly, relished standing on pointed heels for balancing and seemed to treasures clapping the full underfoot onto the sounding surfaces. His solo “TurnAround” was accompanied by two pianists – Kurt Crowley and Joel Wenhardt who played a medley of compositions by J.S. Bach, Joe Garland, Louis Prima, George Gershwin and John Adams. I’d like to see Teicher tackle a single composition, for he seems to be not just a vivid dancer but also a thoughtful choreographer. 

There was much of this performance that my poor hearing made inaccessible – Damian Woetzel’s commentary, Sarah Kay’s poetic yarns to Caroline Shaw’s fiddling, etc. Among the participants, Dance Heginbotham’s danseur Victor Lozano had sensual intensity. Alas, the ballerina Patricia Delgado seemed to have become hard. Woetzel’s series of “Demo” performances will resume at Kennedy Center next season.    

copyright 2019 by George Jackson