VÉRTIGO
Photo by Enmys López Hernández
CHOREOGRAPHY Susana Pous
MUSIC Boris Covac y Alexander Balanescu
COSTUME DESIGN Guido Gali
LIGHTING DESIGN Guido Gali
6 bailarines - 22 minutos
A DANCING ISLAND
Photo by Enmys López Hernández
CHOREOGRAPHY Osnel Delgado
MUSIC Alejandro Falcón, Ted Nash y Trío Cubadentro
COSTUME DESIGN Guido Gali
LIGHTING DESIGN Manuel Da Silva
12 bailarines
NANA PARA UN INSOMNIO
Photo by Enmys López Hernández
CHOREOGRAPHY Daile Carrazana
MUSIC Jordi Sabatés
COSTUME DESIGN Daile Carrazana
LIGHTING DESIGN Guido Gali
bailarín Osnel Delgado
FLOOR... Y ANDO
Photo by Frank D. Domínguez
CHOREOGRAPHY Ephrat Asherie
MUSIC Emajoy Tsegué Maryam Guèbrou
COSTUME DESIGNEphrat Ascherie
LIGHTING DESIGN Guido Gali
PIANO Carolina Baños
LA ÚLTIMA CANCIÓN
Photo by Frank D. Domínguez
CHOREOGRAPHY Daile Carrazana (Cuba)
MUSIC Maria Teresa Vera/Lorenzo Hierrezuelo. Jordi Sabatés
COSTUME DESIGN Rachel Forbes
pIANO Carolina Baños
LIGHTING DESIGN Guido Gali
ELEMENTAL
Photo by Rachel Aka
CHOREOGRAPHY Robyn Mineko Williams
MUSIC Tim Rutili, Ernesto Lecuona, Pedro Vargas/Benny More, Arvö Part, Panda Bear, Chris Merrill, Robby Haynes, Robyn Mineko Williams
musical supervisor Robby Haynes
COSTUME DESIGN Branimira Ivanova
LIGHTING DESIGN Burke Brown
10 dancers — 26 minutes
Elemental is made possible through the generosity of Pamela Crutchfield (Lead Comissioner) with additional support from Patti Eylar & Charlie Gardner and Amalia & William Mahoney.
TABULA RASA
Photo by Raúl Reinoso
CHOREOGRAPHY Ohad Naharin
MUSIC Arvo Pärt
COSTUME DESIGN Eri Nakamura
LIGHTING DESIGN Ohad Naharin
10 dancers — 30 minutes
"[Tabula Rasa] seems tailor-made for the men and women of Malpaso."
— Robert Greskovic, The nEW YORK TIMES
"This multipart and extended piece lays abstract dance immediately atop
clear, intentional storytelling to form an engrossing and accessible
work – this program's most memorable and worthwhile."
— Dustin K. Britt, CHATHAM LIFE & STYLE
Tabula Rasa made its world premiere on the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre on February 6, 1986. It premiered on Malpaso Dance Company on May 4, 2018 in Havana-Cuba.
FACE THE TORRENT
Photo by Rose Eichenbaum
CHOREOGRAPHY Sonya Tayeh
MUSIC Colette Alexander and the Bengsons
COSTUME DESIGN Karen Young
LIGHTING DESIGN Nicole Pearce
8 dancers — 20 minutes
"...[Face the Torrent] took Malpaso to a much darker place, an unspecified inky, secret world of tension, whispers, quivering, fear and lineups...[it] had genuine raw emotion."
— Laura Bleiberg, LA TIMES
Face the Torrent was commissioned by The Music Center, and was created in part during the Vivienne Jones Residency at Jacob's Pillow as well as during a 2017 creative residency provided by DANCECleveland.
Sonya Tayeh discusses her commission for Malpaso Dance Company, Face the Torrent, with Joyce Theater Producer Ross LeClair.
DREAMING OF LIONS
Photo by T.M. Rives
CHOREOGRAPHY Osnel Delgado
MUSIC Composed by Arturo O'Farrill, performed by the
Afro Latin Jazz Ensemble
COSTUME DESIGN Reid & Harriet Design
LIGHTING DESIGN Al Crawford
11 dancers — 60 minutes / Live music possible
Dreaming of Lions is a new dance work by Osnel Delgado, the resident choreographer and Artistic Director of one of the newest and most sought-after Cuban contemporary groups, Malpaso Dance Company. Taking inspiration from Ernest Hemingway’s beloved novella The Old Man and the Sea, Delgado offers an abstract rendering of the classic tale of an old man’s quest to catch an elusive fish. Featuring a unique movement vocabulary performed by exceptionally trained dancers versed in both ballet and Cuban techniques, the work wrestles with themes of honor, determination and loss, in one fisherman’s crusade for victory in the unrelenting sea.
An evening-length work for 11 dancers, Dreaming of Lions engages a creative team of frequent collaborators including Grammy award-winner Arturo O’Farrill and his Afro Latin Jazz Ensemble, who, when possible, play live; lighting design by the resident lighting designer of Alvin Ailey Dance Theater, Al Crawford; and costumes by Reid & Harriet, who have worked with American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet and many more. Fernando Saez, the company’s Executive Director and co-founder, provides dramaturgy.
This project was made possible by Joyce Theater Productions, a producing partnership of The Joyce Theater Foundation, Inc. (New York) and Sunny Artist Management, Inc. (Toronto). It was formed to create and tour works by some of today’s most exciting dancers and choreographers. The piece made its world premiere in Havana, Cuba in September 2016, and will make its US premiere at Duke Performances in Durham, NC on February 24 and 25 2017, followed by an engagement in NYC at Brooklyn Academy of Music from March 1-5 2017.
Dreaming of Lions was co-commissioned by the Luminato Festival, Joan and Jerry Lozinski from Toronto (Canada), and The Yard.
A technical residency was generously provided by Duke Performances for the US premiere of Dreaming of Lions by Osnel Delgado.
Additional support provided by the following generous funders: Con Edison, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Jerome L. Greene Foundation in honor of Karen Brooks Hopkins, Todd Gordon and Susan Feder, Lisa and Richard Witten, and Diana and Dick Beattie. The work is dedicated to Ronald Feiner.
INDOMITABLE WALTZ
Photo by Judy Ondrey
CHOREOGRAPHY Aszure Barton
MUSIC by Alexandre Balanescu, Michael Nyman and Nils Frahm
COSTUME DESIGN Fritz Masten
LIGHTING DESIGN Nicole Pearce
8 dancers — 26 minutes
"...totally engrossing...an abundance of distinctive
movement that is both simple and stunning at the same time."
— Tara Mitton Catao, palm beach arts paper
—
Indomitable Waltz was made possible by the New England Foundation for the Arts' National Dance Project, with lead funding from; the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Executive Director’s Fund at The Joyce Theater Foundation, and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, with additional support from the National Endowment for the Arts.
It was co-commissioned by DANCECleveland and the Cleveland Foundation.
A technical residency was generously provided by Duncan Theater at Palm Beach State College for the US premiere of Indomitable Waltz by Aszure Barton.
24 HOURS AND A DOG
Photo by Judy Ondrey
CHOREOGRAPHY Osnel Delgado, in collaboration with the dancers
MUSIC —featuring an original overture— composed by Arturo O'Farrill, recorded by the Afro Latin Jazz Ensemble
LIGHTING DESIGN Al Crawford
COSTUME DESIGN Eric Grass
10 dancers — 45 minutes / Live music possible / Shortened "suite"
version of 24 Hours and a dog can also be made available
"Inspired by the daily life of dancers in Havana,
the work is a non-stop barrage of fluid movement,
supported by admirable technique and an easy musicality."
— Kathleen Smith, now toronto
WHY YOU FOLLOW
Photo by Bill Hebert
CHOREOGRAPHY Ron K. Brown
ASSISTANT CHOREOGRAPHER Arcell Cabuag
MUSIC by Zap Mama, Gordheaven & Juliano,
The Allenko Brotherhood, The Heavy Quarterz
LIGHTING DESIGN Clifton Taylor
COSTUME DESIGN Keiko Voltaire
9 dancers — 23 minutes
Yoruba Road
Why You Follow
That path is yours
The reason
For your life
LOVE FREEDOM PEACE
Rolling down Yoruba Road
Like water down a hill
People moving forward
Making a way for
The rest
Why you follow
Because you must…
To be able to lead
Learning on Yoruba Road
En route to the Mother Father
And the child
The children are waiting
On Yoruba Road
© Ronald K Brown
Why You Follow has been commissioned by The Joyce Theater Foundation.
UNDER FIRE
Photo by Robert Torres
CHOREOGRAPHY Trey McIntyre
MUSIC by Grandma Kelsey
LIGHTING DESIGN Al Crawford
COSTUME DESIGN Reid Bartelme
8 dancers — 22 minutes
“Trey McIntyre’s Under Fire, created for the company,
is one of those rare transcendent works in which music,
movement and mood come together with absolute rightness”
— Tresca Weinstein, Times Union
—
"I wanted to burn all of my paper: all of the printed documents that had followed me for my life and had become a weight and a burden. I put them into a bonfire and watched them blacken and spark against the night sky. When the fire went out, I moved some of the charred paper with a stick and found that what was underneath was pristine. In some ways the fire had compacted it, sealed it, made it more of what it is. This struck me as an elegant metaphor for human life. The more we try to burn away and change our exterior, the more our essential born selves become evident and manifest."
— Trey McIntyre
Under Fire was co-commissioned by The Joyce Theater Foundation and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival.
BAD WINTER
Photo by Judy Ondrey
CHOREOGRAPHY Trey McIntyre
MUSIC by The Cinematic Orchestra & Arthur Tracy
LIGHTING DESIGN Travis C. Richardson
COSTUME DESIGN Andrea Lauer
3 dancers — 12 minutes
OCASO
Photo by Robert Torres.
CHOREOGRAPHY Osnel Delgado
MUSIC by Autechre, Kronos Quartet and Max Richter
LIGHTING DESIGN Matt Miller
COSTUME DESIGN Osnel Delgado
2 dancers — 13 minutes
“A never-ending cycle of union, separation, union,
separation as the sun sets... flawlessly executed”
— Dustin K. Britt, CHATHAM LIFE & STYLE
DESPEDIDA
Photo by Cherylynn Tsushima.
CHOREOGRAPHY Osnel Delgado, in collaboration with the dancers
MUSIC Composed by Arturo O'Farrill, featuring the Afro Latin Jazz Ensemble
LIGHTING DESIGN Al Crawford
COSTUME DESIGN Reid & Harriet Design
10 dancers — 30 minutes / Live music possible
“Despedida is at once elegant and bold, inventive and joyful…"
— Tresca Weinstein, Times Union
—
Despedida draws inspiration from the eponymous poem by Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges. The piece deals with themes of solitude and leave-taking. A moment of farewell becomes a metaphor for defenselessness as a condition of human nature; the piece develops a poetic approach to a cultural reality in which the sea, featured as a collective character, plays a defining role. The journey of the work travels through five movements:
Mare Nostrum, The Intruder, The Sound of a Memory, Absence, and Farewell to the Broken Gods.
—
Farewell
Between my love and me three hundred nights like three hundred walls will have to be raised and the sea shall be like magic between us. Nothing will remain except memories. O afternoons brought in with suffering, the nights aspiring to see you, the fields on my way, the firmament that I am seeing and losing... Certain as marble your absence shall sadden other.
Despedida
Entre mi amor y yo han de levantarse trescientas noches como trescientas paredes y el mar será una magia entre nosotros. No habrá sino recuerdos. Oh tardes merecidas por la pena, noches esperanzadas de mirarte, campos de mi camino, firmamento que estoy viendo y perdiendo... Definitiva como un mármol entristecerá tu ausencia otras tardes
— Jorge Luis Borges