Category: dance

When the port city of Mukalla was finally liberated from Al-Qaeda, “[these] five Yemeni hip-hop dancers thought their problems had ended. … But last month Yemeni security forces briefly detained the five members of the WaxOn band, broke their equipment and only released the dancers after they had signed a document saying they would stop dancing hip-hop in public.” — Reuters

“What did our readers care about most in 2018? Judging by our top-clicked stories, topics as broad as confronting a bullying teacher, investigating how Instagram has impacted the dance world and advocating for dance as an intellectual pursuit were the biggest stories in dance this year.” — Dance Magazine

It happened in the 1940s, when Erik Chisholm and Margaret Morris brought modernist dance views to bear on stories of Celtic legends that mixed traditional Scottish and modernist music. One principal: “Rehearsals were held up because the dancers had to learn Scottish folk dancing and that is all on the balls of the feet, whereas ballet you have to push your heels down; so it didn’t come naturally or easily – lots of us got blisters – but we respected it.” – The National (Scotland)

The ballet will be choreographed by dancer Melanie Hamrick, who is in a relationship with Jagger. – RTE (Ireland)

Those aren’t really viral dances – they’re witty and very smart social media moves for established performers. To quote a CEO, “Dance sells.” – BBC

“There have been breakthroughs and positive changes in the dance climate this century. They’ve made me happy. Yet, Cassandra-like, I foresee ills ahead. … We’ve now entered a Silver Age, in which theatrical dance is a less radically creative art than before. Where once choreographers forged their dance language, now they tweak within lexicons they have inherited from others.” — The New York Times

“The Rockettes are all about power and cheery domination — they are a glittering army in heels — but there is no hierarchy. Their power is group power. It’s a collective whose uplifting force is greater than what any single dancer could achieve. There is something reassuringly American about them, their natural athleticism, their beauty, their wholesome sexiness.” — The Washington Post

As a 12-year-old on Chicago’s South Side, Solomon Dumas was interested in the arts but had never thought much about dance. Then his mother sent him to AileyCamp. “After that camp, I was completely obsessed.” — The New York Times

And if that’s not surprising enough, he chose as his subject a local Nutcracker. Why? Well, in Europe he grew quite tired of the Christmas chestnut, but over here, “Nutcrackering became for me — a British dance critic working in New York since 2007 — a happy way to discover America.” — The New York Times