HQ REVIEW: Saint Louis Dance Theatre opens its 24/25 Season with (RE)CLAIM
The opening visual is striking. Sergio Camacho in tasseled silver pants, crawls and undulates on the floor. Two others run in a circle, connected, yet seemingly lost. There is something just beyond their yearning fingertips. What is this world we have been dropped into? It reverberates with liminality. As though they are stuck between two worlds and are not sure how to escape. As this stark scene dissolves, a single dancer joins from the dark abyss upstage as another leaves. Sinewy textures build and collapse within their bodies as they build tableaus of relationships that dissipate just as quickly as they were formed. “Come…The Sun Doesn't Wait,” choreographed by Omar Román De Jesús, builds this world, then elongates its presence, allowing the viewer to mull over its internal atmosphere for the length of its duration. The reprise of this work in Saint Louis Dance Theatre’s concert “(RE)CLAIM”, Program B Matinee, set the stage for the ensuing journey that this concert of four male identifying choreographers had in store.
The climax of the second work, “Unfold” by Robert Battle, was quick and to the point. The lights come up upon Molly Rapp, and her body appears to be snapped in half. Her legs stand upright, yet her back dangles down to the ground, as though she were hanging by a cable that was attached to her hip. As a second dancer, Angel Khaytyan, walks slowly downstage to her, Rapp draws her torso back to an upright position in a slow and entrancing manner. All the while, the operatic sounds of French composer, Gustave Charpentier, give a classical romanticism to the scene. This work feels straightforward in its presentation of these two individuals. Rapp is enveloped in some kind of inner turmoil as she slaps the ground and elevates her limbs in gravity defying ways, while Khaytyan supports her various articulations. Though elements of the physicality appear quite challenging, they are done with clear control of the movement. It is a brief relationship shared by these two dancers, but it is a welcome brevity in contrast to the lengthiness of the other works in this concert.
Kirven Douthit-Boyd’s world premiere, “For Love’s Sake,” is a potent work of dance for the artists of Saint Louis Dance Theatre, and continues to establish the kind of artistry that Douthit-Boyd is pushing this company towards. The world we are enveloped in is dark and subdued. A dim stage is illuminated with small oscillating light bulbs that hang from wires above. It is a nighttime tryst underneath a star lit sky. Dancer Keenan Fletcher draws us into this intimate encounter with a heightened sensitivity that resides just underneath his skin. As this sensitivity awakens, so does the atmosphere of the work as the delicate articulations of his torso expand into his outer extremities. He is soon joined by dancer Demetrius Lee, and the receptive energy of their bodies begin to multiply into the space around them. Though there is a level of sensuality within their connection, the choreography maintains a dynamism that evades over sentimentality. Fletcher lifts Lee onto his shoulder as Lee’s legs expand into the stratosphere above them. With rapturous control, Lee effortlessly whips his body through numerous turns that releases into a tilt, his limbs elongating beyond the sphere of both their bodies. As their relationship continues to unfold, six other dancers join them on stage, reflecting back the strength and sensitivity that the duet has already established.
Throughout this piece, a sparse sound score by uwazi zamani rumbles alongside the complex physicalities of the dancers. uwazi’s soundscape is filled with subtle pulses of bass and ambient like textures. While this sound design clearly communicates the tone of the work, its subtlety also allows the movement to come to the forefront of the viewing experience. The gradual shifts in the soundscape highlight the evolution of the dance itself and allow the emotional nature of the work to not feel overly wrought in melodrama. It is that of a heartbeat, exceptionally vital to the survival of this dance, but with a pulse that resides just below the skin.
Though much of the physicality in this work is complex and dynamic, towards the end, this athletic vigor melts into euphoric tenderness as Fletcher and Lee hold each other in a soft embrace. This embrace gradually shifts into a kind of slow dance, one arm wrapped around the other’s torso, one hand clutching that of the other. As this poignant moment resounds within the theatre, the other six dancers’ frenzied energy continues around them, marking a sharp contrast to their soft composures. Throughout this work, but especially in this moment, the relationship between these two black male dancers resounds. It is the sound of mutual care and support that can exist in abundance, but often, does not receive enough representation. And so, the world spirals on, sometimes ignoring our tenderness, shared and intimate. Nevertheless, our decision to love and craft inner worlds of resistance echoes off into the extremities around us.
“Good Grief” by Jamar Roberts, closes this concert with a sense of cool. It is the afterparty come down. It is the tranquil unwinding of an emotionally charged night. Dancers start in a line upstage, then a few walk towards the audience with pedestrian like poise. Sharp gesticulations begin to develop in the dancers’ limbs, straight edges that spiral into curves. Quick feet and directional changes that feel gestural while also inhabiting the entire body. With the soft yearnings of a jazz quartet accompanying this movement, it feels as though the dancers are embodying the sounds and improvisations of the instruments themselves. The lulling, yet complex quality of the music is largely reflected in the choreography itself as it finds new ways to make similar patterns within the body to be varied and intricate. Though shifts occur, like the squeaking of a saxophone, or a disco ball that descends from the ceiling, this work continues the concert’s sense of durational hypnosis in the length of these musings.
A standout moment within this piece is a series of three solos, each lit by a single spotlight center stage. Each solo is executed alongside the accompaniment of an individual instrument, Angel Khaytyan with a saxophone, Nyna Moore with a piano, and Dave McCall with a bass guitar. Each soloist allows the instrumentation to inhabit their bodies in unique flourishes, extensions, and an overall sense of ease. The qualitative edges of the choreography are given new life and individuality as each soloist captures the essence of how their bodily structures collide with the tonality of the music. The directness of the lighting and sound enlivens this moment, and the contemplations of their bodies serve as a reflection upon a concert that’s coming to a close.
As a whole, Saint Louis Dance Theatre’s concert series “(RE)CLAIM”, continues to expand the variety of textures that this company is capable of inhabiting. While there is definitely room to challenge what can or should be done artistically by an individual company, this concert served to highlight the more melancholic and contemplative notions of dance that they can embody. The concert as a whole left me enlightened by what this group of artists is capable of achieving, but also with an internal emotionality I couldn't quite name. Something like the come down after flying high for too long. An essence of nostalgia that grasps towards the future. A grounded euphoria on the cusp of change.