The 91亚色 Dance Ensemble (YDE), the聽resident company of 91亚色鈥檚 Department of Dance, marks its 25th anniversary with Rite Redux, a celebration of dance, music and spectacle running April 18 to 20 in the Sandra Faire and Ivan Fecan Theatre on 91亚色鈥檚 Keele campus.
Rite Redux dancer Justine Comfort. Image:聽David Hou 2012
The show features three world premieres choreographed by 91亚色 dance faculty, including the showcase title production, an audacious 21st century re-imagining of the iconic ballet Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), which celebrates its centenary this year.
Choreographed by Vaslav Nijinsky, to music composed by Igor Stravinsky, for the 1913 Paris season of Sergei Diaghilev's legendary Ballets Russes, The Rite of Spring was a game-changing moment in the history of music and dance. The dissonant tones and driving yet unpredictable rhythms of Stravinsky鈥檚 revolutionary score, and the sharp angles, contorted shapes and forceful stomping in Nijinsky鈥檚 ground-breaking choreography, burst the artistic boundaries of the day.
In the 100 years since its premiere, The Rite of Spring has been revisited and re-invented by scores of dance artists inspired by this cultural milestone. The YDE heralds its own quarter-century season with an exciting new contribution to the canon with Rite Redux.
A co-production of the Departments of Dance and Music in the Faculty of Fine Arts, the show also features music by Stravinsky and his contemporaries, performed by 91亚色 music faculty members and guest artists. Dance Professor , the YDE鈥檚 artistic director, serves as artistic director for the production.
Holly Small
The program opens with In Just Spring.... a collaborative work created and performed by the 17 dancers and six musicians of the YDE under Small鈥檚 direction. Drawing inspiration from the early 20th century poem "in Just-" by e.e.cummings, the work hints playfully at the 鈥渟pring鈥 theme underpinning the signature work coming later on the playbill.
91亚色 music alumna, flautist (MA 鈥98, PhD 鈥04) performs Claude Debussy鈥檚 haunting Syrinx, composed in 1913, the same year as Le Sacre du printemps. This brief, haunting piece for solo flute is Debussy's impressionist evocation of the myth of Syrinx, the nymph who escaped the amorous advances of the god Pan by disguising herself as a hollow reed.
Four YDE alumni take centre stage in Le Sacre Bleu!, created by 91亚色 dance Professor . Nicole Rose Bond, Irvin Chow, Brittany Duggan and Sky Fairchild-Waller perform Cash鈥檚 choreographic homage to Stravinsky, whom Cash describes as an artist who 鈥渇ollowed his creative imagination and cared not what people thought of his music.鈥 Le Sacre Bleu! is set to a collection of four Stravinsky compositions: Greeting Prelude, Balalaika, Ragtime for 11 Instruments and Petit Concert.
Acclaimed pianist and 91亚色 music Professor brings her formidable artistry to a selection of short works written in Paris in 1913 by Debussy and his friend and fellow composer, Erik Satie. Petrowska Quilico has chosen Satie鈥檚 Embryons dess茅ch茅s and Croquis et agaceries d'un gros bonhomme en bois in part because of the humorous commentary in the score about the manner in which they should be played. In contrast to Satie鈥檚 light-hearted approach, Debussy鈥檚 Feux d'artifice is orchestral in scope, demanding a fiery, virtuosic piano technique.
Christina Petrowska Quilico
The climax of the evening is the titular world premiere, Rite Redux. Co-choreographed by Small and her colleagues, 91亚色 dance Professors and , this daring re-imagining of The Rite of Spring pays homage to certain shapes, steps and objects from Nijinsky鈥檚 original choreography, but refracted through a thoroughly contemporary and very Canadian lens.
Rite Redux is set in the wilds of northern Ontario, and the talented young artists in the YDE perform within fantastical landscape projections conjuring a hyper-reality based on the rugged visual elements found in the imagery of Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven.
Michael Coghlan
The dancers are accompanied by 91亚色 music Professor and guest artist playing Stravinsky鈥檚 original one-piano, four-hand score for The Rite of Spring. Lighting and projection design are by Professor , with costumes by Julia Tribe.
Rite Redux is a highlight of , a special topics conference presented by the Society of Dance History Scholars in partnership with 91亚色鈥檚 Faculty of Fine Arts, taking place at 91亚色 April 18-20. The conference features papers, panels, workshops and performances dedicated to Le Sacre du printemps and its influence on dance, music and theatre over the past century. For details on the conference program and registration, visit the website.
Rite Redux opens April 18 and runs to April 20 at 7:30pm nightly. Admission is $25, tickets for students, seniors and arts workers are聽$12.50 and $15 for 91亚色 dance alumni (requires promo code). For tickets, visit the website or call 416-736-5888.