Bill T. Jones' A Quarreling Pair at The Kennedy Center Next Week

Bill T. Jones' is my favorite choreographer. And I know this even after only seeing his company perform live twice. The strength, concentration and determination of his dancers is beyond comparison to any other group. His theatrical, multi-media work, such as "Chapel/Chapter", drives me to tears. 

Next week, the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company will perform "A Quarreling Pair" at The Kennedy Center on March 24 and 25 at 8pm. He also will hold a master class on March 23 at 7pm. 

Here is the information about the company and the performance from The Kennedy Center's Website:

Founded in 1982, the company that emerged from a longtime collaboration between Bill T. Jones and his late partner Arnie Zane brings together movement, music, and the spoken word to articulate compelling perspectives on the major issues of our times. The singular style of Bill T. Jones, the 2007 Tony Award winner for Choreography for the musical Spring Awakening, is instantly recognizable: Provocative partnering and body juxtapositions. Arms and legs propelled with explosive energy. Soaring leaps and daring lifts.

Nearly four years after its last full engagement at the Kennedy Center, his Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company performs A Quarreling Pair, which the New York Times calls "a funny, almost painfully tender theater-dance piece." The work is the result of Bill T. Jones's 15-year fascination with Jane Bowles's four-page puppet play of the same name. In this hour-long production, Jones begins with the apparently simple story of two sisters: Rhoda, a depressed and tired introvert, and the pragmatic and self-contented Harriet. Jones uses these interconnected polar opposites as a point of departure for a multi-layered theatrical rumination on the question: "is temperament destiny?" 

If you have not seen this captivating company perform, I promise you will be amazed if you go. 

Hope to see you there! 

PS: Bill is on Twitter. 

Want to read other posts about Bill T. Jones?  Click here. 

Bill T. Jones' Exploration of History, Focusing on the Civil War

With the bicentennial celebration of Abraham Lincoln's birth this February, Bill T. Jones' new piece "Another Evening: Serenade/The Proposition" examines our nation's history, focusing on the civil war. Jones' first section of a three-part series  again integrates multimedia work and voice with fluid, abstract choreography. To learn more about the piece, take a look at the review by my classmate Chelsey Philpot for Big Red & Shiny. 

Modern Dance Goes Commercial

The Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company has been plastered along the T's trains for months here in Boston. The performers are captured sliding and leaping through the space wearing Puma clothes and shoes. What I thought were new ads are actually part of Puma's "I'm Going" campaign started in 2007. The company has also performed in a television commercial for Puma (see below). But Jones' company is not the only group showcasing dance through advertisements.

Many of you have probably seen Pilobolus Dance Theater's commercials for General Motors, Toyota, Hyundai and Bloomingdale's. But what's interesting about Pilobolus is that it actually has its own creative services unit that focuses on choreographing original works for advertising, film, television and corporate and fund-raising events. The unit was founded in 1997 to support the "growing demand from the commercial world for first-rate movement services." Besides commercials, the company has created live events for corporations such as IBM and Procter & Gamble, performed in a Marilyn Manson music video and has captured movement for books, such as Twisted Yoga. But, is this new trend of modern companies entering advertising campaigns beneficial or detrimental to modern dance as a whole?

On the positive side, these ads attract unlikely audience members to view and even appreciate modern dance. Take my boyfriend, an engineer who works all day analyzing patterns created in a vacuum chamber. After seeing Pilobolus on a commercial, and then on Conan O'Brien's show in June, he's willing to see them perform in November. I didn't even mention they were coming, he found the show. Now even people who's heads are usually filled with numbers are willing to sit for two hours and enjoy a modern dance performance. Amazing.

But will the attraction of new audiences alter the movement created for performances? What you see in commercials are a lot of flexibility and many jumps. People want the "wow factor." And to new dance viewers that comes in the form of leaps and unnaturally flexible performers. But what about those subtle performances with raw emotion and no tricks? Are we going to substitute flexibility and leaps for well-crafted simplicity?

One of the most beautiful pieces I've every seen was a modern piece called "I Am Not My Little Black Dress," the last piece choreographed by the late Ed Tyler. This piece, crafted for my fellow members of the 2007 Virginia Repertory Dance Company, was comprised of simple hand and leg gestures and sustained movement, without the fluff. But it had power and poignance. More power than any leap I've ever seen. I would hate to see that kind of emotion taken away from a choreographer's vocabulary just to please new viewers.

Hopefully there can be a happy medium that transitions newcomers to regulars and integrates these more simple pieces into a repertoire, even possibly in an advertisement. Do you think that's possible?

Bill T. Jones Puma Commercial