The world of dance has evolved and expanded in so many different ways that there are so many diverse types of dance. One of the most recently popularized dances of the United States is called krumping or krummpin’, a street dance characterized by free, expressive, exaggerated, and highly energetic movement involving the arms, head, legs, chest, and feet.

Krumping started in the beginning part of the millennium in South Central, Los Angeles in African-American communities. This dance began as a leeway of an escape for youths away from the gang life that surrounded them in their neighborhoods. It helped them release the anger or aggression they had bottled up inside in a non-violent method. This type of dance was actually derived from “clowning”, which is the less aggressive form of krumping. That’s why when you see krumping, the faces of the dancers are usually painted as a clown. It is often represented as K.R.U.M.P., which stands for “Kingdom Radically Uplifted Mighty Praise”, presenting krumping as a faith-based art form.

There are four primary moves in krumping: wobbles, arm swings, chest pops, and stomps. Krumping is rarely choreographed; it is almost entirely freestyle and is danced most frequently in battles or sessions, rather than on a stage. Krumping is different stylistically from other hip-hop dance styles such as b-boying because b-boying is more acrobatic and is danced more on the floor to break beats. Although, both these elements of dance help characterize a part of the hip-hop culture.

In 2005, the movie “Rize”, was released at the Sundance Film Festival, which documented how this type of dance came about and how fast it has risen into the young culture today. This movie further advanced the popularity of krumping as well and I can tell from personal experience since I was introduced to this type of dance exactly through this movie. Krumping has now appeared in many well known music videos such as Missy Elliot’s “I’m Really Hot”, The Chemical Brothers’ “Galvanize”, and others.

What I found most impressive about this dance is how on point the movements are because the more precise the movements, the greater the impact, which is the purpose of the dancer to his/her competitor. I was also impressed of how in-sync his movements were with the beats of the song. It demonstrates one of the major aspects of dance that makes it so unique. This is shown by a man in the video below:

Here are the videos of Missy Elliot’s “I’m Really Hot” (yes, I am bringing back the old school) and The Chemical Brothers “Galvinize, where you can see the incorporation of krumping in the song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADzAUTAAwCI

Over the course of the year, I know we’ve been speaking about the traditional art of ballet and how beautiful it is (all of Sandra’s posts come to mind!).  To fix some of my neck and back problems with playing the violin, I have recently decided to begin taking ballet lessons; according to a massage therapist that I went to, it will help my posture and back alignment and teach me to use the proper back muscles.
While I know I am not going to be the next prima ballerina, I would still like to believe that I can learn something so new at such a late age. In reading the NY Times this week, I was especially interested to read one particular article about a boy from China who similarly has had to learn something completely foreign to him, but in quite the opposite direction. Long Zou is from a small town in China named Liling and was never exposed to anything other than strict traditional ballet until he was accepted in Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, which is a unique dance company of all male dancers who dance on point and perform in tutus for many of their numbers.
What I found so amazing about his story was his way of breaking through to this open, new world of dance that he never got the opportunity to explore while living in China. Mr. Zou described how his first experience in China at a ballet school in Guangzhou was military-like with long hours of ballet dancing and academic work, which was so vastly different from the Central London School of Ballet, where he “saw a completely different dance world…In China, they tell you, this is right or wrong. You can never doubt your teachers. In London, I understood you can move in this way or another way. There were so many possibilities.”
It took Zou a lot of courage, hard work and determination to first convince his parents to let him dance at the age of 10, then go to ballet school in China where this isn’t very common and then ultimately get permission from the government to leave the country in order to dance abroad. He even admitted that “In China, we don’t have news from outside, and it’s hard to get out…There is no Facebook, no YouTube, it’s very limited what you can see. When I told my mother and uncle that I might want to dance elsewhere, they laughed at me.” I feel inspired to now start ballet lessons and will remember his courageous success as I continue on in my violin career!
Read more about this here.

Last night, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Company performed at City Center, the same place that we saw Fall for Dance. The company was founded in 1958 by Alvin Ailey, and is currently one of the most popular dance companies internationally. However, the nature of the company has drastically changed in the last 58 years. If you look at footage of their earlier performances, you might describe it as “rough hewn – and powerful,” whereas now they are “sleek, athletic masters of the universe.” The dancers are so beloved by audiences that they are known for their ability to excite the crowd to the point of applause in the middle of movements. Although I would usually think of their popularity with international audiences to be a very positive attribute, but in class we have been discussing the exact opposite. Does their widespread popularity mean that the Ailey Company has become too McDonald’s-like? Is the company only appreciated by such a vast audience because it lacks the aesthetic integrity that only smaller snob-filled audiences can recognize?

The picture shown at the top of the post depicts the company performing “Prodigal Prince” at City Center. “Prodigal Prince” was originally created in 1968 by Geoffrey Holder, and portrays the life of Hector Hyppolite, a Haitian painter who also happened to be a Voodoo priest. The piece begins with Hyppolite’s vision, in which the goddess Ezrulie and St. John the Baptist tell him that he will become a famous painter in the future. Ezrulie is dressed in a long turquoise robe and headdress and St. John is wearing a bright green tunic (in the image above) that creates a visual explosion of color. As a result, “the hallucinatory, out-of-body experience, the sonorous drumming, the vivid colors and dreamlike actions that Mr. Holder conjures make for a compelling spectacle that isn’t the usual one seen on Ailey stages today.”

Read The New York Times article

Watch the Alvin Ailey company dance to Stevie Wonder music

During this semester, I have learned a lot about ballet, and how it is a very specific type of dance that consists of graceful and fluid movements. That’s why I found Ballet Hispanico to be so interesting. The company just started their two-week season of performances at the Joyce Theatre, but unfortunately, the New York Times did not give them such a good review (which you can read here).

I was able to find a promo for their 2010 season on youtube, which you can find below. Judging by the promo, I would have to say that Ballet Hispanico looks like a very exciting “contemporary ballet” company. Although their style of dance is called ballet, I recognized a lot of movements that reminded me more of modern dance, similar to the Alvin Ailey Dance Company or even Parson’s Dance. One thing that really stood out to me was the fact that they don’t use pointe shoes, which is practically used all the time in traditional ballet. Some of the dancers in the promo for Ballet Hispanico do go on point, except they are barefoot, which looks a lot harder. Although there are a lot of movements that are very different from traditional ballet, some of the movements are very fluid and elegant, which shows that some aspects of traditional ballet are still present in their performances.

Many individuals stress the importance of arts in education, but it is rarer for individuals to stress education in arts. Let me explain. Professional artists and dancers and musicians generally measure their experience by the companies with which they’ve performed or the galleries in which they’ve been featured. While some have graduated college, others have not even graduated high school. In the arts world, that is okay.

A recent New York Times article, though, entitled “Exchanging Slippers for Schoolbooks“, discusses how a recent trend in the ballet world has been a return to collegial education. Certain schools, such as the Columbia University School of General Studies, are targeted towards encouraging continuing education to “nontraditional” students, and dancers have been taking advantage of such programs.

They are beginning to realize that their bodies will not last forever. At twenty-four years old, many are already feeling physical strain. Dancing is not something they will not be able to do forever. However, the mind does not fade so easily.

Our new generation is stressing the focus of education and its everlasting nature, and I think this is incredibly important, both in the arts world and in every sphere of life.

I found this article in the New York Times. The article discusses the criticism that dancers, especially ballerinas, face when they perform. And sometimes, that criticism has nothing to do with their technique, but their physical appearance and weight.

Their was an uproar by readers of the New York Times when writer Alastair Macaulay criticized Jenifer Ringer’s weight in his review of “George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker.” Macaulay wrote that Ringer, who played the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy, “looked as if she’d eaten one sugarplum too many.” While many readers thought this critique was too harsh, it is important to note that there has always been a particular standard that ballerinas should be very thin. The article also mentions that if Jenifer Ringer had been performing the flamenco or any other form of contemporary dance, she would be considered very slim.

Size in ballet is not just a recent issue. In the mid-18th century at the Paris Opera, ballerina Marie Allard was fired because of her inability to lose weight, even though she was considered to be a very talented dancer. I myself remember going to a dance recital at Frank Sinatra School of Performing Arts, and when a dancer (she looked healthy, but was just slightly bigger than the rest of the dancers) came out, a woman sitting behind me said in disbelief, “She thinks she can be a ballerina looking like that?”

I don’t think it’s fair to judge ballerinas based on how their bodies look. They should be praised or criticized based on their talents and technique. But with a stereotype stretching back centuries, is it even possible for that to happen? Even in the movie “Black Swan,” (which Beth posted about earlier) the already-slim Natalie Portman had to lose weight to look like a ballerina. So, can ballerinas be judged based on their dancing alone, instead of being criticized for their weight? The article doesn’t end on a happy note (“If you want to make your appearance irrelevant to criticism, do not choose ballet as a career. The body in ballet becomes a subject of the keenest observation and the most intense discussion.”) What do you think?

This past Sunday, there was a performance done at the Manhattan Movement and Arts Center put on by the Alpha Omega Theatrical Dance Company that is worth noting. While reading the dances performed that night, one in particular, which is rarely performed, caught my eye because of it’s unique nature. It is a piece called “Radeau,” which means raft. This work is the scene of three Haitian women who are lost at sea and depicts the struggle they go through as they “leave one life and journey toward another,” as it was so gracefully worded in the New York Times. Interestingly, the choreographer, Mr. Pomare, worked with modern dance during his lifetime and specifically created pieces that delivered accounts of urban, political and social occurrences experienced by black Americans. In “Radeau,” the women are shown growing closer because of the circumstance and being fearful with tight-lipped, frozen faces. It was also noted in the review that to show the unforgiving and rough sea, the dancers moved in a rocking linear motion.

I found this theater-like approach to dance very refreshing and was reminded immensely of one of the works we saw at Bryant Park at the Fall Festival in September. Unfortunately, I can’t find or remember the exact name of the piece I’m referring to but know that it was the dance depicting a painter, who is creating a piece of art work. The dancer actually used paint and the girl who was dancing with him held a palette for him to create on. This lyrical type of story of how this famous painter went about creating his own artwork was similar to the way that “Radeau” told a story of three women. Both versions of choreography are taking a scene and acting it out, the way it would be done in a theater, except that it is done not with the spoken language but with body language.

Check out the article here.

Swan Lake is by far one of the most well known and most beloved ballet performances to have ever hit the stage. Even in our own Arts class we have seen a few clips of ballerinas mastering the art of ballet, specifically that of Swan Lake. A new movie is in the works, called Black Swan, featuring Natalie Portman as the lead role of Nina, which is a psychological thriller based on the ballet Swan Lake. Ms. Portman discusses the incredible amounts of work that she was required to put in even before the movie began filming. Almost a year in advance, Portman began training with Mary Helen Bowers, a former dancer with City Ballet. Even after strenuous workouts and months of formal ballet training, a body double was required to do difficult point work and turns. Portman, who took ballet until she was thirteen years old when she began acting, says that, “I really thought I was better than I was. It was a rude awakening to get there, and to be, like, I don’t know what I’m doing. If I had known how not close to ready I

was, I never would have tried it. I’m glad I was a little ignorant slash arrogant.” Mila Kunis, who is Portman’s rival in the movie, says that for her it was also quite close to impossible to be able to master the art of ballet is such sort time, as opposed to balletrinas who begin at a very young age and never stop training until the end of their careers. She referred to her experience as “ballet on crack.” Ballerinas must look graceful and weightless and make ballet appear effortless, when in reality, ballerinas strain every muscle in their body to look that way. Portman said, “The contrast between what you see onstage and what is underneath is part of the resonance of this film. That it’s supposed to look easy and painless and carefree and light and delicate and just pretty, and underneath it’s, like, really gruesome.” Actress Emily Blunt, who will also star in a movie about ballet as a member of a real troupe, the Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet, says that it’s extremely hard as an actress to pull off the task of pretending to transform into a ballerina because you don’t want to misrepresent the brilliance of what these dancers do. Portman trained with some of the best dancers in the ballet world including Kurt Froman, Jock Soto and Marina Stavitskaya, the ballet mistress Olga Kostritzky and the beloved coach Georgina Parkinson, who recently passed away. Portman also watched various YouTube clips of Swan Lake Queens such as Alicia Alonso and Natalia Makarova. At the end of the article Ms. Portman makes a beautiful analogy to describe the physical and mental sacrifices she was required to put in in order to complete her role. She said, “It was very religious in my mind. The ritual of, like, breaking in your point shoes and getting them soft, all of that, it’s almost like tefillin wrapping in Judaism, this thing you do every day, this ritual.”

I think this will be an extremely interesting movie to see in terms of whether or not the actresses were able to pull off the ability to appear like prima ballerinas in only a few short months. Ballet requires talent and loads of hard work and I think that is why this movie is already creating Oscar-buzz.

Beginning December 1st and ending January 2nd, the Alvin Ailey Dance Company will be returning to New York City and performing at City Center Mainstage.  For those of you unfamiliar with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, it is a dance company that began in 1958 from a performance at the 92nd Street Y, a place we are all familiar with by now.  It was founded by…you guessed it… dancer and choreographer Alvin Ailey.
Since then, the company has performed for an estimated 23 million people.   They have traveled to 48 states, and performed in 71 different countries.

In 1969, the company established a dance school and in 1974, they established a program for younger professional dancers called Ailey II.  The company has become quite famous over the years, and has earned a reputation as “one of the most acclaimed international ambassadors of American culture, promoting the uniqueness of the African-American cultural experience and the preservation and enrichment of the American modern dance heritage.”  The artistic director of the dance company today is now Judith Jamison.

This holiday season, the Alvin Ailey dance company is going to be performing 9 premieres and new productions of works by Alvin Ailey, Robert Battle, Camille A. Brown, Geoffrey Holder, Christopher Huggins and Judith Jamison. In addition, for one week, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis will join Ailey for a live music collaboration.  Throughout the season, the dancers will be performing Revelations, one of Alvin Ailey’s original choreographed pieces.  If anyone is interesting in learning more, here is the Alvin Ailey site and here is the site to purchase tickets.

Below, is clips from the different parts of a performance of Revelations.

One of Sandra’s earlier post about performances in NYC subway stations reminded me of the many times I have stopped to watch breakdancers perform in the stations. I have always loved break-dancing and b-boying, which is why I stopped to watch almost every time. It was just a couple of days ago that I saw a b-boy crew showing off their skills in the 34th Street station. What I find most admiring is how tough it is for these performers to make a living because it is for sure that they don’t make a lot collecting change from bypassers. Some of these performers are very talented and I believe should receive a little more credit than they get. They don’t stop at subway stations because while I was downtown, near the court houses, I saw another group of breakdancers setting up. I took a picture too.

Just as I was finishing up this post, I opened a new window and coincidently saw this article about a crew performing on the actual platform of the subway.

Check out the video below. (My favorite part is at 1:11) It is a video of some breakdancers at a subway station. This type of dance really exemplifies and utilizes the use of acrobatics in dance.

Almost other elements of hip-hop have been blogged about in previous posts such as graffiti, MC-ing, and beatboxing, therefore I am going to add to the hip-hop theme with b-boying. B-boying began in the late 1970’s in Brooklyn when Latino and African-American youths “moved” before hip-hop music even emerged. It slowly began to develop into the hip-hop culture that has now assimilated into our society so widely. The terms ‘b-boys’, ‘b-girls’, and ‘breakers’ are the preferred terms to use to describe the dancers. B-boying consists of four primary elements: toprock, downrock, power moves, and freezes/suicides.

A look at one of the originators of b-boy – Crazy Legs:

Here are some videos of some other notable b-boys:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJa9-5ajzDQ

I just discovered the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, which is a modern dance company that’s been performing since 1958. I became very interested in modern dance after we went to see Parson’s Dance at Bryant Park and Fall for Dance. Although I enjoy watching dances with graceful music as is characteristic of ballet, I find modern dance more exciting because I feel like the dancers aren’t as limited as ballerinas. They can flex their feet and have more angular and dramatic movements.

That being said, I’m very excited about Alvin Ailey’s new season. Performances start December 1st, and the Alvin Ailey website already has clips of some of the dances they will be performing. The first dance, The Hunt, is about the predatory side of human nature. The concept of the dance reminds me of Sutra by Sidi Larbi, a dance that Professor Smaldone posted about before, but the movements are more traditional compared to the flips and jumps in Sutra. Another dance that I liked was Cry. It starts out with a female solo, and it is amazing to see how can she express so much emotion through her movements.

I think the Alvin Ailey Dance Company is definitely worth checking out, and I would love to go to one of their performances.
Link to Alvin Ailey Site, with Clips

Jennifer Homans, a professional ballet dancer who became a historian, recently published a book, “Apollo’s Angels,” about the history of classical ballet. The book is an academic analysis of “four centuries of ballet – from its origins in 16th century France to its elevation in the court of Versailles, through the Renaissance, Bolshevism, modernism and the cold war – describing the dance’s evolutions and revolutions in the context of political, philosophical and aesthetic currents.” The book is very interesting because it teaches you historical facts about ballet the perspective of a ballerina herself. This gives the reader the best of both worlds, in terms of wholly appreciating the art form of ballet.

Interestingly, Homans introduces her discovery of old ballet rehearsal notes. One of the notebooks that she unearthed was had dance notations written out, with music written above it. In order to authentically recreate the dance, she got a violinist to record the music from the notebook. Then, she reconstructed the dance by assigning steps to the music.

While most of the criticism about Homans’ book has been positive, one of the negative critics is Rachel Howard of the San Fransisco Chronicle. Howard criticizes Homans for including “unsubstantiated forecasting” at the end of the book. Howard is referring to certain claims made by Homans that ToniAnn discusses in her blog post below mine. That is, Homans claims, “After years of trying to convince myself otherwise, I now feel sure that ballet is dying.” This statement is very strong, and Howard isn’t the only critic who harshly criticizes it.

Despite her critics, Homans maintains that ballet is going to continue to decline, unless something changes. While she doesn’t offer a concrete solution to the problem, Homans does advise ballet choreographers and dancers to “look at the history” in order to find the answer. Homans hopes that her book can be a resource to artists, allowing them to be inspired by ideas of the past to revitalize ballet today.

So in response to ToniAnn’s question about whether or not ballet is dying, Homans argues that yes, ballet is dying, but if we understand its past we will be able to revitalize it in the present.

Read the New York Times Article

In today’s fast-paced society–and especially in America–the general public has less and less of an attention span.  People are constantly searching for something to hold their interest, and after a few minutes, usually get bored and move on to something different.  Think of how often you see people starting one TV show and then flipping through a number of others during a 30 minute period.  Even I am guilty of this; there are so many times that I will be listening to my iPod and I shuffle through tons of songs, quickly moving from one to the next before the first one is even halfway through.  Along with the shorter attention spans comes the quickly changing tastes in style.  Just looking at musical eras alone, the genres of music changed pretty quickly, which was fueled by both lack of interest and changing times.

It is for this reason that I pose the following question: Is ballet dying?  I am aware that ballet is still present throughout the world, but it seems to be less prevalent than it once was.  Is this because of a lack of interest?  Dance critic for the Washington Post Sarah Kaufman feels that directors and choreographers are moving away from more traditional ballet because they need to sell tickets, and the public is not as interested in buying tickets for a ballet performance.  She feels that the desire for dance is moving away from traditional ballet and more towards modern dance, which is why more choreographers are making up dances that they think will sell the best.

Perhaps ballet is on the decline due to the failing budget for classical ballet productions and theaters.  Former New York City Ballet dancer Edward Villella feels that this is the case.  He said that “…ballet isn’t dying in countries where there are state theaters with large national budgets.”  Maybe if there was a larger fund for ballet, there would be more of an interest in said performances, and therefore more productions featuring traditional ballet.

You can read some more opinions on this topic here.

So, is ballet dying?  What do you think?