DANCE

What connects us

heart to heart?

Margaret Jenkins on creating Other Suns in China: “As always these adventures into others’ realities, priorities, necessities, reveal so much about one’s own needs, what one thinks one has to have to continue, to survive, to feel replenished, enlivened, engaged, at attention… “What world have we entered of like limbs — but not — like minds but not, with histories that don’t compare? “Perhaps the work will answer this. ”

Margaret Jenkins

Co-commissioned by the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center.

Contains adult themes and nudity. Not recommended for children under 18.

Funded in part by the National Dance Project of the New England Foundation for the Arts, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and additional funding from the Ford Foundation, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Community Connections Fund of the MetLife Foundation.

Co-commissioned by the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center.

SEE PAGE 34 FOR DETAILS. September 24 – 25 . 8PM

EMIO GRECO|PC

[purgatorio] POPOPERA

conceived and choreographed by Emio Greco directed by Pieter C. Scholten original music by Michael Gordon In choreographer Emio Greco’s collaboration with composer Michael Gordon (Bang on a Can), seven brilliant dancers oscillate along the seam between music and movement. Omnipresent during the performance are shiny black guitars which, when married with the dancers’ bodies, transform them into fragile flesh-and-blood soundboards. Based on the structure of Dante’s Divine Comedy, POPOPERA is a richly potent netherworld of transition, transformation and purification where dancers perform to the point of utter exhaustion and ecstasy. KAY THEATRE $37 ($30 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

October 8 – 9 . 8PM

DANIEL BURKHOLDER/THE PLAYGROUND

My Ocean is Never Blue, revisited

with Arachne Aerial Arts Coyaba Dance Theatre Devi Dance Theater Drawing on the traditions of African and Indian dance and music, incorporating aerial feats and wrapped within a contemporary dance vocabulary, Ocean draws us to the edge of the river and asks us to reflect on what we see there. Four of our region’s most inventive dance companies collaborate to present this multi-faceted exploration of water and our relationship to it. DANCE THEATRE $37 ($30 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

October 22 – 23 . 8PM UM DEPARTMENT OF DANCE

MFA THESIS CONCERT

April Gruber and Vannia Ibarguen MFA candidates April Gruber and Vannia Ibarguen present two evenings of contemporary movement and new ideas. DANCE THEATRE $20 ($16 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

October 29 – 30 . 8PM

MARGARET JENKINS DANCE COMPANY

Other Suns

with the Guangdong Modern Dance Company of Guangzhou, China original music by composers Bun-Ching Lam and Paul Dresher Known for her innovative collaborative processes, choreographer Margaret Jenkins has infused Other Suns with the creative energies of the Guangdong dancers and her company members. Together, they explore how their physical languages affect each other, creating a unique hybrid language for everyone. Refined, precise and dynamic, with what dance critic Allen Ulrich calls a “current of sensuality that simmers on the surface, ” Other Suns represents the next chapter in Jenkins’s ongoing exploration of place, communication and identity. Jenkins writes: “We strive to stay ready for the surprises, to be able to surrender to what a new place, culture and people can offer us and how we might strengthen the dialogue among each other and by extension our countries. ” KAY THEATRE $37 ($30 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

MARGARET JENKINS DANCE COMPANY, OTHER SUNS PHOTO BY BONNIE KAMIN

SEE PAGE 34 FOR DETAILS. November 12 – 13 . 8PM

STEP AFRIKA!

In celebration of over 15 years of performing and teaching around the world, Step Afrika! brings its high-energy performance of stepping, an art form born at African American fraternities and based in African traditions, to the Center’s stage. As the first professional company dedicated to stepping, Step Afrika!’s intricate kicks, stomps and rhythms mixed with spoken word pound the floor and fill the air. Throughout their history, Step Afrika! has also raised awareness of stepping’s connections to other cultural traditions. From Appalachia to South Africa, from gumboot to Zulu, they seek to build connections between people and to highlight the similarities in dance forms, lives and communities. Step Afrika!’s motto is “if we can dance together, then we can work together. ” This special anniversary program features some of the company’s most celebrated works along with an amazing choral collaboration. KAY THEATRE $37 ($30 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

December 4 – 5 . 8PM UM DEPARTMENT OF DANCE

MARYLAND DANCE ENSEMBLE

Undergraduate and graduate student works selected by audition and performed by the repertory ensemble. KAY THEATRE $25 ($20 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

January 30 . 3PM and 8PM

27TH ANNUAL CHOREOGRAPHER’S SHOWCASE

Numerous up-and-coming dance artists make their homes in Maryland, Virginia and DC. The Clarice Smith Center and the Maryland-National Capital Park & Planning Commission collaborate once again to spotlight diverse and fresh talents from the region’s dance community in this adjudicated mixed program. DANCE THEATRE $25 ($20 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

February 5 – 6 . 8PM

DOUG VARONE & DANCERS

Alchemy and other repertory

Doug Varone & Dancers return to the Center with charismatic, lyrical and lush movement. Varone’s newest work, Alchemy, takes inspiration from Daniel Variations, the Steve Reich score that juxtaposes text from the biblical book of Daniel and the words of Daniel Pearl, the American Jewish reporter kidnapped and murdered by Islamist extremists in Pakistan in 2002. Reich’s music pays homage to all victims who, in the face of violence and cruelty, courageously reveal the dignity and beauty of humanity. As Daniel Pearl’s widow Marianne writes, “In the end, you can only oppose them with the strength they think they have taken away from you. ” KAY THEATRE $37 ($30 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

PHOTO OF DOUG VARONE & DANCERS BY PHIL KNOTT

Commissioned by the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center.

Contains adult themes and language. Not recommended for children under 18. March 4 – 5 . 8PM UM DEPARTMENT OF DANCE

MFA THESIS CONCERT

Geminuspace ¦ Remnants and Ritual MFA candidates Diedre Dawkins and Betty Skeen present two evenings of contemporary dance and new ideas. DANCE THEATRE $20 ($16 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

March 25 – 27 . 8PM GESEL MASON

Women, Sex, & Desire: Sometimes You Feel Like a Ho’ , Sometimes You Don’t

Through dance, personal stories and video images, Mason tackles powerful personal and political issues. Women, Sex and Desire challenges pre-programmed cultural assumptions, examines our belief systems and reflects the struggle, humor and pleasure we encounter as sexual beings — whatever our erotic choices may be. By combining real stories, real people, pop culture, humor and a diverse movement vocabulary ranging from post-modern to hip-hop to pole dancing, Women, Sex and Desire is at once entertaining, insightful, honest, risky and risqué. KOGOD THEATRE $37 ($30 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)

April 15 – 17 . 8PM April 18 . 7:30PM UM DEPARTMENT OF DANCE

MARYLAND DANCE ENSEMBLE

Undergraduate and graduate student works selected by audition and performed by the repertory ensemble. DANCE THEATRE $25 ($20 WHEN YOU BUY 5 OR MORE PERFORMANCES)